What do I mean by that? In game development terms, a "vertical slice," is a gameplay segment of finished or near-finished quality that showcases all the planned features of a game to potential investors. At the start of a project, these are a massive sink for time and effort, since they essentially involve doing all the hard parts of finishing a game to complete one 10-minute section. Generally, they’re seen as a bad practice. However, toward the end of development, it’s a lot easier to pull assets together for a vertical slice. Of course, if you’re shopping your game around to publishers at that stage, you’re probably in a lot of trouble, but a standalone "vertical slice" can also serve as a strong alternative to a traditional demo.

Over the past few weeks I’ve spent a frankly irresponsible amount of time on my 3DS, a great deal of it with A Link Between Worlds . But when I wasn’t busy rescuing princesses from other princesses (or, uh, doing actual work for the site) I was delving into Bravely Default . Not just the full game, but the demo. Most of us have, at one point or another, obsessively played a demo for a game that had us hyped, but what may surprise you is that I’ve sunk over 10 hours into a single playthrough of this one. Any way you slice it, that’s a lot of content for free software. Well, I say "any way," but it comes pre-sliced, vertically.

The trend of building homes that don't look like homes is one of the best ones in Minecraft . It lets players innovate and think outside of the box. A home is wherever the Minecraft bed is, and that could even be a massive battleship docked in the middle of an ocean bi

Yet Nintendo ignores it, just as they have ignored pleas from their own fans regarding everything from addressing many of the issues already noted, to making their own historically great back catalog more readily available. Yes they've done things like release Earthbound on the Wii U, but only after years and years of remaining silent on the subject while fans begged and pleaded for even an acknowledgment of the damn thing.

Medieval and traditional building styles will often reign supreme in Minecraft guide , due to the game's natural style. The wood and stone textures inspire players to go for these traditional, almost gothic-style builds, as seen in this grandiose cas

This Nintendo title can offer lots of fast-paced multiplayer fun for you, friends and strangers. Thanks to Turf Mode, Ranked and Salmon Run, you and others will be able to enjoy plenty of splatisfying action. Because you play with a team of people there's a need for teamwork and going through tough battles alongside one another bonds can form. While there hasn't been much new in the last few months for Splatoon 2, there's still a large amount of users at different levels of skill to make things interesting. You could easily play round after round all day and experience something new each time in each location. Also, maybe it's time you pick up a new weapon just to change things up. Splatoon 2 keeps things fresh for those in search of online interactions.

I love Nintendo, but its tough to watch something or someone you love go through such a rough time and seemingly stop bothering to even try anymore. Eventually that sympathy is going to turn into anger, and for many that's exactly what is happening.

The introduction of the demo heavily references the first Dragon Quest, from the remixed Dragon Lord theme to the explanation that this takes place after Erdrick's descendant chose the bad ending. Will there be references to other games in the series or any specific characters making an appearance, such as Alena from IV or Yangus from VIII?

So if you accept that the Wii U is Nintendo's system for the foreseeable future, and that the system itself is not going to make any major changes, you considerably narrow down the list of problems that Nintendo can conceivably address in order to improve their console market standing.

For any builders wanting to challenge themselves or seasoned experts looking for new ideas to add to their build maps or survival worlds, huge projects tend to be the best way to spend time. They're rewarding to make, but difficult to execute. Here's a bit of inspiration for experienced builders wanting to create massive builds in Minecra

Certainly, this lends itself to some games better than others. It won't work with any sort of scripted, linear action game, but it's not much trouble to take a chunk of an RPG or Sandbox world, string together a bare-bones quest line, and set players loose. This allows for demos of the caliber you see with emergent games, where it's much easier to take a chunk of gameplay and give it away - Civ V's Demo let you play with a few civilizations on small maps, for instance, while Killer Instinct gives players one free character as a taste. I'm all for anything that allows single-player, structured games to be more competitive, especially when it provides a workable alternative to awful early-access crap.