News

Since I've been away from a PC for almost twenty-four hours now, I assume that most of you have already seen all this. I know a lot of you have seen the new avatars, as I myself and several of you have already taken advantage of them.

Thanks to Teta, we now have a new large gallery of stylized FFT portrait avatars - as stated, my current Ramza comes directly from them. Thanks a lot, Teta, for making them for us! Additionally, I decided to add just a couple more FF6 avatars from the PSX port, mostly of Squall being abused and Onion Kid looking chubby and goofy.

And, thanks to our new fanart team (this time, it was Mimic and Kappa the Imp), we've got a big chunk of new fanart too. This update features art from Kame, Galsic, Rujuken, Ronin, Bum's Rush, BratKitty, Silverfork, and Perigryn, and it includes some new stuff from every single game we cover! Thanks a lot to all for the submissions and work.

By now most gamers in the US are familiar with the recent bill passed in California intended to further restrict the sales of graphically violent video games to minors. This has seemingly acted as a cue for other states to follow its lead, beginning with Florida senator Alex Diaz de la Portilla, who introduced a similar bill this week.

Diaz de la Portilla's bill, more specifically, is nearly identical to the bill approved by California governer Arnold Schwarzenegger. Both provide corresponding examples of what constitutes a violent video game, and the limit on fines for breaking this law as well as the required 2-inch-by-2-inch label reading "18" on the covers of adult-themed games are virtually the same. Apparently the only difference between the two bills is that, under Diaz de la Portilla's legislation, anyone under the age of 18 will be forbidden to access violent games within arcades in addition to stores.

Video game legislation is becoming quite a hot topic among state leaders. Tighter laws regarding violent games have garnered heavy support on both sides of the political spectrum in recent years, and further debates aren't expected to cause a division along party lines.

Source: GameSpot

The 100,000th post came courtesy of new staffer Caesar, posting in the fabulous A Perfect FFVI World: Change it or leave it thread!

That, of course, concludes our contest as well. And, as my own personal luck would have it, we have two winners. Nobody guessed the exact day, but both DarkPaladin and Zodiac should be thanking Caesar for making them the closest guessers. They will now have first crack at a special mousepad or mug, available only to them. Of course, should they decide they don't want those special edition prizes, they can also have their pick of any other mousepad or mug from CoNStore.

What are these prizes, you might ask? Well, they'll have special customized items featuring the new CoN logo, debuting right now for this occasion:



Congratulations to our two winners, who can expect to hear from me soon, and thank you to everyone who brought us our first one hundred thousand posts!

Until Halloween, everyone can get a discount on all CoNStore items purchased through CafePress. I know that we don't sell a lot there because items are a bit pricey, but for the next week you can get $10 off any $25 order. Just fill your cart and use code DES1 at checkout to get the discount.

I wonder if I can use that to buy the prize for the 100K Post Contest...

We're looking for volunteers to join SilverFork on the news team.

Your task as a newsposter would be to locate news stories relating to Final Fantasy and Square-Enix, and of general interest to RPG fans, and report on them for CoN's front page news.

We're after people with the following qualities:

• Enthusiasm about games to the point of enjoying searching out news about them;
• A good grasp on proper usage of English, including spelling and grammar;
• Prepared to spend time to ensure their news reports are of the highest quality possible.

You would be required to make a certain number of news posts per month - that number will depend on the number of staff we take on to the position.

If you're interested, please e-mail climhazzard@cavesofnarshe.com to let us know. Please provide a sample news article in the e-mail, exactly as you would post it to our news forum if you had the job. Feel free to ask any questions either by replying to this post or sending e-mail as detailed above (though if it is a general question with an answer that could well benefit other potential applicants, the former would be preferred).

We look forward to hearing from you!

Famitsu magazine recently revealed new details concerning the two latest Mana games: Seiken Densetsu 4 and Seiken Densetsu DS: Children of Mana.

The former, according to producer Koichi Ishii, will feature the Havok physics engine used in many recent games including Half-Life 2 and Max Payne 2. The engine will allow for innovative interaction with surrounding environments and objects, giving the feel of a much more realistic world, Ishii hopes. Titles on both the PlayStation 2 and XBox gaming systems have experienced the depth of the Havok engine in the past, as has the PC, but the console on which Seiken Densetsu 4 will be launched has yet to be decided.

Meanwhile, several story, battle and character details from the upcoming Seiken Densetsu DS: Children of Mana have been announced in spades.

The game begins on an island located at the very center of the world, known as Illuja Island, where the familiar Mana Tree has stood since the beginning of time. But an unspecified disaster strikes, killing many residents of Illuja. Three young survivors manage to gather at the base of the Mana Tree, and their adventure begins.

The heroes of the game consist of the following:

• Frick: A young man who, many years prior to the disaster, was rescued by a wandering swordsman who inspired him to learn swordsmanship for himself. Frick's attitude is quite upbeat and cheerful, but his whole family is killed in the disaster on the island.
  
• Tumble: A former dancer and acrobat for a traveling circus, Tumble is very mature for her age, enough to cause others to believe she's much older than she actually is. Both her parents and her brother are killed in the island's disaster.
  
• Pop: A fearless and laid back individual, Pop often speaks and acts before he thinks. Although this leads others to think he's immature, he despises being treated like anything other than an adult. Pop's father dies in the disaster, but his mother passed away years before when giving birth.

The game will once again feature many of the battle traits present in the previous titles. Among the weapons included in Children of Mana, the sword, bow, and flail have been confirmed. The former two will function as normal while the flail will have the added advantage of longer range attacks than the sword and the ability to grapple far off enemies and objects. The length of the main quest itself is estimated to be around 25-30 hours.

Development is currently 60% complete and is scheduled to be finished just in time for its Japanese release sometime this winter. No word yet on a North American release date, but the title Children of Mana has been trademarked by Square-Enix in the US.

(Thanks go out to href="http://www.cavesofnarshe.com/forums/ipb/index.php?showuser=529">laszlow for the links)

Source: RPGamer
Children of Mana Details

Following an agreement made with Wayport, a wireless Internet provider, Nintendo announced yesterday their plan for allowing easy and free access to wireless online play on their DS handheld: 6,000 McDonald's restuarants across the US will soon become Wi-Fi Connection hosts, permitting gamers to play Internet-enabled DS games against people all around the Net while in the comfortable vicinity of fast food.

Yes, you read that correctly.

As stated by Nintendo, players need only start up an online compatible DS game at one of the participating McDonald's to play, sans any fees or extra hardware - it's guaranteed to be simple and cost-free. The timing of this announcement comes as little surprise given the upcoming releases of the first two online games for the Nintendo DS, Mario Kart DS and Tony Hawk's American Sk8land, both due to ship to North American stores on November 14th. Other future titles, including Metroid Prime Hunters and Animal Crossing: Wild World will also make ample use of Wi-Fi Connection.

McDonald's is only the most recent corporation to catch the DS fever. Other businesses, such as Starbucks and a growing league of game shops, will also participate in hosting wireless Internet for public gaming.

Source: GameSpot

Since its Japanese release on September 14th, Square-Enix's Final Fantasy VII: Advent Children, the movie continuation to the critically acclaimed RPG, has sold over 700,000 copies. In addition, it's been reported by the company that the limited edition DVD Box and first print limited edition have all been sold out, and the UMD version is also selling very strongly, although its offical sales numbers were not announced.

This overwhelming popularity has served to encourage Square-Enix to surpass this success in the future, according to the CG movie's producer Shinji Hashimoto, who added that expectations for the North American and European releases are extremely high.

Source: RPGFan

As I mentioned in my previous news post, announcing the new moderation team, we are picking up some helpers also to pitch in on other tasks around the site. In a completely unfair slight against them, it's taken me forever to actually mention them and give them the recognition they deserve. So allow me to remedy that by doing so now:

• Silverfork, who as some have already noticed is anchoring down the news posts these days.


• Kappa the Imp, who'll be working with Neal and me on the visual aspects of Fanart production as well as site data maintenance.


• Mimic, who will also be working with Neal and me on the database aspect of Fanart; as well, he too will be working on general data maintenance for the site.


• Del S, who will be assisting Mr Thou with Fanfiction production.

My apologies for taking so long, guys. We appreciate having you a lot more than the delay in this post would lead you to believe.

Yoichi Wada, the current president of Square-Enix, made what many fans would consider an exciting announcement yesterday at Japan's Nintendo DS Conference: Final Fantasy V and Final Fantasy VI are now in the process of being re-released on the Game Boy Advance. Much like Final Fantasy IV Advance, the games will receive extra content unfamiliar to both their Super Nintendo and PlayStation versions. Both titles are scheduled to be released sometime next year.

On an interesting note, Wada added that the Final Fantasy III remake for Nintendo DS is indeed well into development. The reason for the slower than anticipated progress? The graphics, specifically those of the characters and fields, are now being made up with polygons, giving the game an authentic 3D look.

(Big thanks to SSJ_Cloud for providing the link)

Source: Games Are Fun

The developer of familiar hits including Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and the Baldur's Gate series, BioWare, has announced a brand new action-RPG entitled Mass Effect for the upcoming Xbox 360.

Set centuries into the future, Mass Effect tells of an intergalactic society made up of advanced humans and alien races. Players will explore and battle their way across undiscovered alien worlds as they control an agent bent on halting a great evil threatening this coexistence.

No release date has been set, but a gameplay trailer can be viewed at BioWare's official website.

Source: RPGamer

As reported by a recent article in Shonen Jump magazine regarding the Game Boy Advance port of Final Fantasy IV, the game will indeed, for the most part, remain largely unchanged from its original Super Nintendo form. As indicated by early images of the game, graphical improvements have been made as well as the addition of character portraits inside dialogue boxes.

Nintendo and Square Enix reportedly display interest in porting more Final Fantasy titles to the Game Boy Advance in the near future as part of their "Final Fantasy Series Port Project", although no official announcements have been made.

Final Fantasy IV for the GBA will be in North American stores on December 12th, 2005. Japan has yet to receive a specific release date, but sources confirm it will be available sometime in Winter 2005.

Source: RPGamer