Stage Debut
Stage Debut, formally the 64DD's Talent Maker, was without a doubt the oddest game at Nintendo's Connectivity Corner. Although, in this area of the booth, "odd" is quite the relative term. Many of the titles shown in the section resulted in a blank stare sweeping across my face, but I enjoyed every title. Stage Debut was no exception. The game kept me incredibly entertained. Actually, I shouldn't be calling it a game. The Nintendo rep continually reminded me that it was just a demo and by now, I'm pretty much inclined to agree with him.
There really wasn't that much to Stage Debut, but that of course doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy it. The main purpose of the demo was to show off Nintendo's GameEye, a GBA peripheral that allows you to take colour photos. The images were surprisingly detailed. The rep there took a picture of me (asking me to pull the hippy hair out of my face of course) and the picture actually looked like me after it was modelled (and no, that's not me in the image). Once you get your picture taken with the GBA's GameEye, it's downloaded and then you're working with the GameCube. The demo then takes out your head and kind of rounds it to create a 3D model of your head, along with a less-adjustable body. Once you've got that done, you're all set to play around with your new self (not like that).
The demo gave you a wide variety of options for different features. By selecting different objects around what looked to be a dressing room, you could access a ton of different noses, ears, eyes, lips, hair, eyebrows, pretty much everything. Impressively, as you selected each one, you never had to position it. Your selection came out just in the right spot, whether it was your ears, eyes, nose, etc. I spent about a half hour adjusting my face colour to look like Michael Jackson, giving myself a Jay Leno size chin, tossing on a Pinocchio nose and screwing around with just about anything to make myself look funny. I think the rep figured I'd been having too much fun when he told me that maybe I should head out on stage. Having no real knowledge of what happens after you've actually created your character, I could only reply with: "...Stage?" Blank stare fully intact of course.
I was directed to a door leading out to the stage. I was greeted with a nice intro sequence showing off the audience and the stage area. The camera swooped down as my character came into view. Then to my surprise, pre-made models of Shigeru Miyamoto, Hiroshi Yamauchi, etc. came out to join me. It was kind of hard to figure out what to do, but I managed to get the characters to dance a little. Then I realized that you could pick up people. You'd be amazed at how much fun it is tossing around a gaming legend.
While there wasn't much to do, Stage Debut shows a lot of promise. Just think of actually having your own self-resembling character running around in a video game. Or better yet, your siblings.
Brenden Petracek