Past 24 Hours of Nintendo News (56k begone)

First off, the news and this concerns the following games which can be read about under the bold topic headlines below:

Mario Kart Double Dash
Pikmin 2
Advance Wars 2
Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike

Not interested in any of those?  THEN GET OUT!  For the rest of you, enjoy the following information and screens.

Mario Kart Double Dash

Nintendo has today released the first gameplay information on the GameCube version of Mario Kart via its official E3 Web site. The game will boast a number of new features, the most obvious and intriguing of which is that each kart is manned not only by a driver, whose attributes will affect the handling of the kart, but also by a second character that will be responsible for handling power-up items and weapons. In addition to six regular items that are available no matter which character is riding shotgun, each character will have access to a further eight items that are specific to them. Players will be able to have their two characters switch seats on the fly, which could make for some quite tactical racing since every change will alter both the handling of the kart and the items available.

Also, according to a report in the latest issue of Famitsu, a number of Nintendo characters that haven\'t previously appeared in Mario Kart games will also be making up the numbers on the starting grid. The 16 characters confirmed for inclusion in Mario Kart to date are as follows:

Baby Luigi
Baby Mario
Birdo
Bowser
Bowser Jr.
Daisy
Diddy Kong
Donkey Kong
Koopa Paratroopa
Koopa Troopa
Luigi
Mario
Peach
Wario
Waluigi
Yoshi

Famitsu\'s report also hints at support for up to eight players using two GameCube consoles, although no more specific details are available at this time. We\'ll bring you more information on the GameCube version of Mario Kart when we report live from E3 in LA next month.

http://www.gamespot.com/gamecube/driving/supermariokartworkingtitle/news_6025528.html

Pikmin 2

Nintendo has today updated its official E3 Web site with information on Pikmin 2, the sequel to Shigeru Miyamoto\'s innovative real-time strategy game that was released back in 2001. Players will once again assume the role of Olimar, who, this time around, has deliberately returned to the planet inhabited by the Pikmin rather than crash-landing on it. The reason for his return is that the company he works for is going bankrupt, and so, along with his assistant, he\'s hoping to clear the debt of 10,000 pokos by enlisting the help of the Pikmin to salvage treasure buried on their planet.

Pikmin 2 will do away with the time limits of the first game and will introduce new colors of Pikmin and cooperative play for two players. In the single-player game, players will be able to alternate between controlling Olimar and his currently unnamed assistant. We\'ll bring you more information on Pikmin 2 when we report live from E3 in LA next month.

http://www.gamespot.com/gamecube/strategy/pikmin2/news_6025530.html

Advance Wars 2

Nintendo has today updated its official E3 Web site with information on Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising, the sequel to its popular turn-based strategy game Advance Wars, which was released back in September 2001. Players will once again assume the role of Andy, a military advisor in the Orange Star army, who, this time around, must do battle against the evil Sturm\'s Black Hole army as it attempts to drain the resources of every country in Cosmo Land. Andy will be aided by a number of brand-new commanding officers as well as all eight of the COs from the original game, all boasting new and improved CO powers, such as the typhoon, which rains destruction on enemies and brings them to a standstill.

New units in the game will include the massive four-legged neotank, and as in the original game, the hundreds of battlefields available for both single- and multiplayer games will be complemented by a map designer. We\'ll bring you more information on Advance Wars 2: Black Hole Rising when we report live from E3 in LA next month.

http://www.gamespot.com/gba/strategy/advancewars2/news_6025531.html

Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike

Exactly one thing about Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike--the laser-hot GameCube-exclusive sequel to Cube-launch hit Rogue Leader--will not surprise you: When the game zips from hyperspace this fall, it\'ll pack a level on Hoth, the tundra-topped planetoid that has served as a seemingly Constitutionally mandated locale in nearly every Star Wars game set in the classic trilogy. "I can\'t remember how many times we\'ve gone there," says Julian Eggebrecht, president of Rogue series developer Factor 5. "To quote the guys in the meetings at LucasArts [Rebel Strike\'s publisher and co-developer]: \'Are you nuts? You want to go to Hoth again?\'"

But Factor 5 didn\'t return to the ice world just out of habit, and we guarantee Rebel Strike will have you doing things on Hoth that you\'ve never done in a Star Wars game before. You\'ll just have to pick up the June issue of EGM--which hits newsstands May 6 (subscribers get it this week)--to see how Factor 5 has re-written the rules of the Rogue Squadron games.

Meanwhile, you\'ll find several hints in the seven exclusive screens presented here. For starters, it looks like players can now exit their vehicles, eh? And when they\'re not blasting stormtroopers in third-person levels, players will hop aboard everything in the Star Wars trilogy that moves--from whizzing speederbikes to chicken-walking AT-STs to ponderous TIE Bombers (which fire multiple lock-on missiles Panzer Dragoon-style). But the ultimate surprise: Expect the most souped-up two-player cooperative mode ever. Let\'s just say that once you play Rebel Strike\'s cooperative campaign with a pal, you might consider selling your used copy of Rogue Leader. You won\'t need it.

Enough with your Jedi mind tricks--we\'re not revealing any more info. You\'ll just have to pick up the June EGM for all the exclusive details and nearly 40 screens you won\'t find anywhere. Oh, and come back here in mid-May for a spectacular two-minute gameplay movie that\'ll rule the galaxy.

http://gamers.com/game/1340454/previews

The screenshots are below.

Star Wars Rogue Squadron III: Rebel Strike

Mario Kart Double Dash

Pikmin 2

Advance Wars 2

RS III looks beautiful as always
MC is looking kinda nasty from what i expected. And no toad???
Pikmin looks the same but hey.
and im not a gba person so ill pass.

[Living-In-Clip]

I\'m a 56k\'er and it was worth it.

Thank the good lord. A new Mario Kart (hopefully better than MK 64) and ...yes...god almighty yes...PIKMIN 2!!!!!

[Jumpman]

Baby Luigi
Baby Mario
Birdo
Bowser
Bowser Jr.
Daisy
Diddy Kong
Donkey Kong
Koopa Paratroopa
Koopa Troopa
Luigi
Mario
Peach
Wario
Waluigi
Yoshi

Sweet. I love Birdo, though I ****ing miss Magic Koopa badly.

Can\'t wait to play and just see Rogue Leader 3. I loved the first 2 even though they were very similar and it looks that 3 will add some freshness to the series.

I think Pikmin 2 will lose most of its charm from the previous game.

I might have to pick up the GBA SE just to play Advance Wars 2 on. Advance Wars is one of the most underrated games ever.

[Bobs_Hardware]

Pikmin 2 is really the only game that I\'m looking forward to in a substancial way.  It\'s definately one of my more anticipated titles (2 PLAYER!).

Rogue Squadron was kida dull, non-stop action with no thinking.  Hopefully the ground aspects will be well done.

Mario Kart better be better than Mario Kart 64.  Diddy Kong was my Kart racer of choice for the generation.  

Oh!  Forgot about Advance Wars 2!  Can\'t wait.  

Those Rogue Squadron pics are incredibly nice.

I don\'t know what happened to the Advance Wars 2 pics.  Nintendo\'s site dedicated to E3 is dead for some reason.  It\'ll probably be fixed later on.

Pikmin 2: Buy buy buy pre-order buy..
Mario Kart: Pre-order pre-order buy buy buy!
Advance Wars 2: Lemme beat the first one before I start with no.2..
Rogue Squadron III: Looks very good but Rogue Leader kinda burnt me so it\'ll be a rent-first..

You get to play as Chewbacca... and ride Speeders... Ohhhh yeah, I can sense a good one.

[Kurt Angle]

Rogue Squadron 3 looks absolutely stunning! Especially the 1st person speeder bike view :eek: