Sadness might be out of the vaporware bin (thanks to Nibris' earlier promise to bring it to Leipzig this year), but what about Rygar: The Battle of Argus? Some of you might have expected to see that and Fatal Frame 4 gracing their presence in the Tecmo booth at this year's E3 event. Too bad both games were a no-show - which may come as a bit of a shock to some of you since Fatal Frame 4's bound to be released at the end of this month already. So why a no-show? Keep those fingers on the trigger button and take a snapshot of info at the full article.

Sadness. The game, I mean. You guys remember Sadness right? I'm personally looking forward to that game. Anyway, we have news on that and a whole bunch of other updates for you in this week's Wii Weekend Warrior. We have everything from the new downloadable content for My Life as a King, to the awesome new trailer for Sonic Unleashed! Let's get started!

It's starting to look like Nibris has some kind of system wherein they only release info about Sadness once every three months. The last update we got was in April, so it's high time for another one, if we're to follow the three months schedule. Anyway, the developer has finally updated the game's official website with more game info and GASP! Is that a release date? Find out in the full article.

Good news, Sadness fanatics! Seems Nibris' black-and-white thriller for the Wii has just been saved from getting tossed into the vaporware bin thanks to Emergent, who announced that the game is currently being developed using the Gamebryo engine. More in the full article.

It's still very early to tell, but will Nibris' Sadness end up gracing the yearly lists of vaporware titles that online news mags come up with? A concerned fan, reminded of the game thanks to Nibris' Sadness Christmas card, decided to ask Nintendo about its current status. Nintendo's answer at the full article.

We've heard good things about Nibris' development on Sadness for the Nintendo Wii several months back, but right now, the title that promised plenty of "Adult Only" rated scares is believed to be far from finished. One poster over at the NeoGAF forums claims he received an e-mail from Nibris stating the delay of Sadness to 2009.

"Nibris is alive and well," according to the e-mail. With that, Sadness is apparently still in development and slated for release in 2009. The scrolling shooter Raid Over The River (ROTD) for the Nintendo DS is also in the works, and it's expected to hit the shelves come Q3 2008. Another DS title, the bloob-filled adventure Double Bloob, is scheduled for Q2 2008.

We'll wait for confirmation regarding this piece of news (whether good or bad). Until then, we'll put the said release dates under rumor. Stay tuned.

This next one is rather short but the implications are quite sweet. We just learned that Japanese video game development studio Mitchell Corporation will be coming up with a Wii game this year as well as two new DS titles.

Best known for the Buster Bros. series of games, Mitchell Corporation is one of the older development studio that still exists today. It was founded back in 1960 and started making games for arcades; its later titles appeared on Nintendo DS and PlayStation 1 (PSOne)

Mitchell even made a title on Nuon - a technology that allows DVD players be compatible with 3D video games. Anyway, since their stint on the DS with Magnetica and Polarium, nothing was heard about Mitchell Corporation.

While we're hoping that the new titles would involve Buster Bros., we're not leaning towards it because Nibris is already making a new version known as Double Pang.

 

Nibris' Sadness is starting to get a lot livelier, at least on the news front. The folks at Cubed managed to pick up some new artwork and info on the game, and it's definitely pointing towards intense psychological drama as well as tons of dead people.

First off, the characters. According to the new report, the young woman (whom we know as Maria) is of Polish-Hungarian origin. She also spent her childhood in England, and that's where grew up and started a family. As far as we can tell, Maria is also the same person who has a son in this game, though the new report doesn't say much about it. Furthermore, most of the game time will be spent on playing her, so you might as well get attached to her life story while you're at it, especially since the secondary character will most probably be her son.

Related to this are the monsters they'll be encountering. You'll encounter 18 different species of monsters in the game, with some of them being friendly or hostile depending on your choice of actions throughout the storyline.

Now for some gameplay tidbits. One playthrough is now expected to last 20 hours, with a short portion of that spent in Poland. If we're lucky, that might also mean that we'll be able to relive the events of the train wreck that started most of the storyline in this game. They also mention that there won't be any loadtimes, and that the graphics will involve a lot of fog effects with the quality of most visuals being near that of the artworks they've presented to the public thus far.

More importantly, they're planning to pull out all the stops for dramatic effect. In addition to getting voice acting onboard as part of the game's initiative, they'll also be working with an orchestra to get the most effect out of the game's story. Bad news or no, Nibris' game has certainly got our interest piqued. Keep checking QJ for more updates to this intriguing release.

 

A couple of days ago, we reported on the Sadness' bleak future as FrontLine Studios answered an email saying that they are "no longer interested in developing Sadness game". Today, Cubed3 has received comment from the Polish game developer Nibris on the status of the game.

The developer is still enthusiastic about the Sadness' progress and they say that the break up is not a problem. Nibris attributed the end of the partnership (last March 17) to artistic differences. And they have apparently got themselves a new partner - the question of "who" still goes unanswered. The company had this to say, "We would like to apologize for rumors and doubts that might have arisen. We want to assure, that Nibris Ltd. makes great effort to make our projects completely innovative and meeting highest quality standards."

Certainly good news for the players who have been waiting for this dark and creepy title. Let's hope we don't have long to wait for the Sadness to gloomily stalk into the shelves. Stay tuned for more updates on this one.

Shocking development for the over-21-only (and with perfect health, too) Wii shocker Sadness. A member of the IGN Boards sent an email to FrontLine Studios asking if they were "programming" Sadness, and received an answer to disappoint those waiting for the game.

Of course, he sent the email to the wrong guys - it's Nibris handling "programming" - but FrontLine's answer suggests that they could have been the undisclosed publisher for Sadness. Well, not anymore. Reply:

I can confirm that FRONTLINE is no longer interested in developing Sadness game based on Nibris' concept, and also Nibris is not authorized to claim anything on behalf of FRONTLINE.

Best regards,

Marcin Machel

Could said IGN Boards member be pulling a belated April Fools'? Unknown. On the other hand, those who've visited the FrontLine website noted that there are no references to Nibris or Sadness anymore, so it's quite plausible he's claiming what is true. Will this lead to the game being canceled? Unknown. There are other options, including self-publishing, but that would depend on

• how well Nibris markets to potential publishers or investors, and
• generating enough gamer buzz to pull this game into publishing reality by demand, making it even more appealing to publish.