With Nintendo's console revolution a few years ago - when the Wii and DS brought a whole new generation of players to the fold, many of whom had never picked up a controller before - a whole load of new, unique games started cropping up too. From living-room-workout-tool-and-weighing-scale-replacement Wii Fit to Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training on the DS and the cult party dancing hit Just Dance, new experiences were cropping up everywhere, aimed at folks who wanted something a bit different to the myriad of space marine shooters and sports games. The DS' Touch Screen opened up a myriad of possibilities, and gave birth to a little-known art package, Art Academy - after all, what console had as obvious an interface for painting as Nintendo's handheld? Fast forward a few years, and the series has seen several sequels and spin-offs - including a seriously amazing Pokemon themed one - and the next is close on the horizon.
Beautiful hand-drawn horizons, to be precise.
Given the GamePad's jumbo-sized Touch Screen, it should come as little surprise that Nintendo figured the Wii U would make the perfect platform for a new Art Academy game - an artsy-focused title which aims to teach people the basics of drawing. Unfortunately, like a few too many Wii U games, the promised package was soon quietly delayed, put back and seemed to eventually fall off the radar all together after the release of the pared down, doodle pad app, Art Academy: Sketchpad in 2013. Extra downloadable lessons teaching you how to draw various Nintendo characters were promised, but likewise those disappeared into the ether, never to be heard from again. So, imagine our surprise when a press release for a new Wii U Art Academy landed in our inbox yesterday, detailing a game we'd given up for dead a long time ago.
Under the watchful eye of Vince, you'll paint, draw and pastel your way through thirty lessons, gradually taking in the concepts, theories and techniques you'll need to create some surprisingly good masterpieces - even if you've never picked up a paintbrush before. A variety of materials and tools are on offer, including the aforementioned pastels, paints and coloured pencils, as well as an all-new charcoal stick for monochromatic sketches - and a choice of canvas and textured papers to draw on too. Not sure what to use for the best? The nifty tools course will take you through everything step by step, while the glossary can be used to look up any unfamiliar terms in a pinch.
One feature that was sorely lacking in the mini Art Academy Sketchpad is here too - the ability to save your creations to an SD Card to preserve them forever. In the stripped down version, you had space to save a grand total of twelve drawings, after which point you had to overwrite your existing ones - a workaround was posting your pictures to Miiverse, then picking them up on your computer from there, via the website, but it wasn't really ideal. Of course, posting your artwork to Miiverse is still an option in Atelier too, and you're now also able to capture a time-lapse video of you creating your masterpiece and upload it to Youtube, giving you a great comeback for the next time someone asks you how you did it! There's even a virtual gallery of your doodles to stroll around in first person view for a full blown ego-trip of your artistry skills.
Here's one we made earlier.
Art Academy: Atelier seems to be download only, and is due to hit the Wii U's downloadable eShop on the 26th June (the same day as Yoshi's Wooly World!), priced at £24.99. Anyone who already owns Art Academy: Sketchpad will be able to download the new version at a bit of a discount too - a strangely precise £21.40.
