A popular series in Europe and Japan for ages, the soccer-RPG series, Inazuma Eleven is finally coming soon to North America, with an all-new 3DS game releasing exclusively on the 3DS eShop! Players take control of a middle-school team, led by Mark Evans, a student whose grandfather and his team, the titular Inazuma Eleven, won the soccer championships back in the day.
Inazuma Eleven is an interesting hybrid of quirky training minigames and strategic, albeit exaggerated soccer play, with players managing and developing squads of players, RPG-style. Players can recruit new additions to their team, buy new skills with Prestige Points, boosting their stats by levelling them up.
During actual soccer battles, players must strategically pass and carry the ball, undertaking duels to see who keeps possession of the ball when squaring off with opposing players, and dictating which special moves to use in which situations. Higher-strength moves for example may be more effective, but they’re also more likely to result in a potential foul.
Of course, this is certainly no down-to-earth soccer sim! Special skills that players on yours and the opposing team can use attacks like combined acrobatic blocks and shots that would never be allowed in any sensible, real-world soccer game, flaming tornado kicks, and goalies that stop balls by spawning giant energy hands. It certainly looks equal parts eccentric, creative and compelling!
Can’t wait for this promising North American series debut? Well, good news! It’s available right now, having gone live after the broadcast! Check out Inazuma Eleven on the 3DS eShop, since it’s long overdue that this highly acclaimed series made its way over to the U.S. and Canada!
Predictably, with so much talk surrounding the 3DS eShop, it was inevitable that the upcoming indie game selection of both 3DS and Wii U would be addressed. Indie developers were interviewed in a montage, talking a bit about their upcoming Nintendo indies.
Developers featured included: Renegade Kid, discussing treasure-hunting action-adventure, Treasurenauts and episodic first-person shooter, Moon Chronicles, the first proper first-person shooter on the 3DS, FYI, Yacht Club Games, discussing retro 8-bit platformer throwback, Shovel Knight, Nicalis, discussing masochistic pixel art gauntlet, 1,001 Spikes, and VBlank Entertainment, discussing enhanced 8-bit sandbox adventure, Retro City Rampage DX.
Viewers were then reminded to subscribe to Nintendo’s YouTube channel and check out the Nintendo Minute segments to hear more from these independent developers and their games. This concluded in a couple of splashes detailing the independent games on the docket for both the 3DS eShop and the Wii U eShop over the next few months
The Wii U eShop will be seeing: Armillo, 1,001 Spikes, Teslagrad, Scram Kitty and His Buddy on Rails, Little Dew, Assault Android Cactus, Squids Odyssey, Shovel Knight, Monkey Pirates, Nihilumbra, Q.U.B.E.: Director’s Cut, Wooden Sen’Sey, and Ballpoint Universe Infinite.
Likewise, the 3DS eShop will be hosting: Shovel Knight, 1,001 Spikes, Retro City Rampage DX, Squids Odyssey, Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse, Moon Chronicles, Weapon Shop de Omasse, Siesta Fiesta and Treasurenauts, along with today’s release of Inazuma Eleven.
So, in case you forgot, Nintendo remains committed to the indie market, even if most of these games are games that indie fans with Nintendo platforms already knew about. Still, there’s some new offerings on the way apparently, and it’s nice to see that Nintendo’s commitment to independent developers is still being upheld!
Nintendo encourages viewers to subscribe to their Facebook and Twitter channels to keep up with the bevy of 3DS eShop and Wii U eShop releases, as they’re planned.