Since Taito announced their new NESiCAxLIVE system for arcades, we’ve been eagerly waiting to see how it will work out. The release date for the system hasn’t arrived just yet (it’s only a few weeks away) but there are some new content announcements for the platform worth talking about. If these continue and the platform itself is easy for operators to use and non-intrusive for players, NESICA could become just as prevalent as the NeoGeo has been.
We already knew that the big “launch” title for the system will be Blazblue Continuum Shift II, and several other previously released titles will be made available for download, such as Battle Fantasia, Samurai Spirits Sen and more. But what’s more interesting are the titles which are scheduled for a release to the system.
AM-Net Blog has a list of all of them including new announcements of Exception (look here for details on this unique shooter) and Dragon Dance a Mahjong style game that was previously released on the Sony PSP and Nintendo DS. SNK is bringing titles like KOF ’94, KOF’98 Ultimate Match Final Edition, KOF2002 Ultimate Match, KOF Sky Stage, and Art of Fighting. Raiden III and Raiden IV will be made available; Taito is also planning on releasing a number of titles from their back catalog to NESiCA including Space Invaders, Rastan, and Cleopatra’s Fortune.
I do hope to see efforts made for this or something like it to make it’s way outside of Japan. I understand that operators anywhere with an internet connection can import a NESiCA server although without official worldwide support then it’s unlikely to make big waves outside the parent territory. It should be interesting to see how operators in Japan take to the system and fortunately we’ll know the answer to that here soon.
Also since we are on the subject of Taito, they have announced a sequel to their Haunted Museum light-gun shooter, known as Panic Museum outside of Japan. ICE carries this game in the US although I didn’t see a cabinet for it at IAAPA this year as we did last year and at Amusement Expo. At the moment, Haunted Museum II is slated for a release in April 2011 and AM-Net indicates that a kit will be available for this as well.
I really think a download network like this is a great idea. Hopefully it will bring lower priced games.