Latest Features
Exclusive "The Farming Genre Is A Bit Tired" - How SunnySide Aims To Refresh The Farm Sim
"In order to have a Sunny Side, there has to be a dark side…"
It is a truth, universally acknowledged, that farming games all have a lot in common. Crops, livestock, and dateable townsfolk are the staples of the genre, and if you've played one, you've likely experienced what a lot of them have to offer — and that's not even necessarily a bad...
Soapbox Mario Gave Us The Powerwashing Fantasy Before It Was Cool
Mario was the original ASMR powerwasher
As Super Mario Sunshine turns 20 on the 19th July, 2022, Kate wants to get a few things off her chest about how the game would have been a massive hit today, probably... ALRIGHT, LISTEN. Whenever I am in polite company, and I mention enjoying Super Mario Sunshine — yes, despite its insistence on collecting...
Soapbox 20 Years Later, Super Mario Sunshine Is Still The Best 3D Mario
Defending the GameCube outing on its 20th birthday
What you lookin' at? Soapbox features enable our individual writers and contributors to voice their opinions on hot topics and random stuff they've got on their minds. Today, the overabundance of sunshine from the current heatwave has clearly got the better of Ollie, as he makes wild declarations...
Soapbox Correcting A Horrifying 15-Year Mistake By Finally Playing Elite Beat Agents
They don’t make rhythm games as bizarre as they used to
Soapbox features enable our individual writers and contributors to voice their opinions on hot topics and random stuff they've got on their minds. Today, Lowell makes amends for a poor life choice and finally gets down with that funky, funky beat... Rewind with me all the way back to...
Feature What Is Live A Live? Everything You Need To Know (And Maybe More)
Find out how JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is involved!
If you've been following game news lately, you've probably heard about Live A Live. You probably also belong to one of two camps: Someone who knows what Live A Live is, and someone who can't really tell it apart from all the other HD-2D Square Enix games, like Triangle Strategy and Octopath...
Feature "A Story Without Antagonism Or Violence" - How Blanc Tells The Story Of Two Unlikely Friends
A chat with Casus Ludi
During June's Nintendo Direct Mini, you may have seen a game that looked a little bit like heartbreaking Disney flick The Fox And The Hound — except instead of a fox, it's a wolf, and instead of a hound, it's a deer. This was Blanc, a gorgeous, monochrome, hand-drawn game from French studio Casus Ludi, coming to the Switch...
Feature Is Pokémon Unite Ready For Its Moment At The Pokémon World Championships?
The Pokémon MOBA showcases its competitive chops in August
Before last year, a Pokémon spin-off in the style of League Of Legends felt like an obscure offshoot, even for a franchise that’s pitched Pikachu as a coffee-swilling detective. In many ways, a Pokémon MOBA makes considerable sense – as a world filled with hundreds of unique monsters...
Feature Backlog Club: Hollow Knight Is A Perfect Game For Notebook Cartography
Leaving a paper trail
This article is part of our new experimental series, Backlog Club, where we (Nintendo Life!) pick a game that's likely to be on our list of "games we should get around to playing", and then we (NL + you!) spend the next month playing that game. In the first part of our Hollow Knight playthrough, Kate has noticed that Hollow...
Poll So, How Do You Pronounce 'Live A Live'?
Lie-valive? Liver-liv? Gimme five?
We're big fans of noodly linguistic questions around these parts, and if they involve video games, all the better. Whether it's Nintendo-related gaming vocab, Pokémon pronunciation, or finding out how you say the name of Link's sentient sword, we're always down a
Talking Point What Are You Playing This Weekend? (July 16th)
A fairy finally came to you!
Well, it's felt like quite a hectic week here at Nintendo Life! The biggest news, of course, was the confirmation that Bayonetta 3 will finally be launching in October this year, along with the delightful surprise of a physical edition of the first game. To top it off, Platinum Games confirmed that you can
Feature Resident Evil Netflix Review: Wesker Steals A Show That Lacks Bite
Out of ammo
The live-action adaptations of the Resident Evil franchise have had a real rough time of it, huh? Paul W.S. Anderson’s six-movie take on the series — while commercially successful — was widely slated by fans of the games and critics alike for diverting too far away from the tone and scope of Capcom’s source (plus, some of them...
Talking Point Would You Mind If Nintendo Retired The 'Big' Nintendo Direct Format?
The Joys and Cons, direct to you
With the reveal of a new trailer for Bayonetta 3 along with a launch date announcement, Nintendo fans are looking back over the last couple of weeks with a question on their mind: Why didn't the company bundle up this news with the third-party announcements from the Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase and deliver...
Soapbox Games Go Down Better When Paired With Books, Movies, And TV, Just Like Wine
Well, not JUST like wine. You can't drink a book
I don't know much about wine, but I sure like to pretend I do, and I bet I'm not alone. Who else here — of drinking age, that is — has bought a red wine to accompany dinner, because it "goes well with pasta"? How many times have you been poured a glass of wine to "taste" in a fancy restaurant,...
Exclusive Dogs, Death, And Fantasy Life - An Interview With The Creators Of Potion Permit
(Yes, you can pet the dog. No, the dog doesn't die)
There's a slew of charming life sim-type games on the slate for the Nintendo Switch in 2022 and 2023, and Potion Permit is one of the ones we're most intrigued about. Published by PQube, with a release date of September 22nd, 2022, Potion Permit is all about tending to the ailments to the people...
Talking Point What's Your Favourite Nintendo Switch Screenshot?
LOOK AT THIS PHOTOGRAPH
God bless the screenshot. Ever since they were first invented, and then brought to consoles, the world has been a brighter place. Where would we have been in the Animal Crossing Pandemic of 2020 without the images of our homes and islands to share with others? Would Spider-Man be less of a good game without that photo mode?...
Feature Nintendo eShop Selects - June 2022
The best of the last month's eShop games!
Blimey, it's July already? June flew by, but looking back at the month and all of those Switch games, we think we have an answer as to why things went by so quickly — it was a darn good month for video games, wasn't it? How will we ever pick the best of the best? Well, we've tried to! Like always, we're...
Guide Best Switch Games For Short Play Sessions
Perfect for busy people
It used to be that we'd take our 3DSes with us on holiday, public transit, and to hospital waiting rooms, because it was easy to pick up and put down a game on this tiny little handheld, and to put it into sleep mode whenever your attention was needed. These days, we're more likely to take a Nintendo Switch with us whenever...
Talking Point What Are You Playing This Weekend? (July 9th)
Wahoo! It's the weekend!
It's been a little bit milder here n the UK this week, but it looks like things are about to hot up again. The news has also been a bit steadier, too. Nintendo unveiled a brand new Splatoon 3-Themed Switch OLED earlier this week. The upcoming Crisis Core: Final Fantasy VII Reunion will have some "differences" in
Memory Pak The Best Puzzles Are The Ones That Make You Want To Throw Things At The TV
A puzzling reaction
Welcome to the latest instalment in our new-ish column, Memory Pak, where we're going to be doing a deep-dive into some of the most memorable moments in gaming – good and bad. This time, Kate discusses her puzzle tantrums... The first time I played Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, it was under the supervision of my partner. It...
Hands On Xenoblade Chronicles 3 Is A Heck Of An Emotional Ride So Far
Fight to live, live to fight
With just a few more weeks to go now until the release of Xenoblade Chronicles 3, we've been busy getting to grips with the latest entry in Monolith Soft's epic action-RPG series and, you may be relieved to hear, it's more than living up to our lofty expectations so far. Xenoblade Chronicles 3 introduces us to Aionios,...
Back Page Making The Perfect Nintendo Frankenconsole
Sum of its parts
In the magazine business, the Back Page is where you'd find all the weird goofs that we couldn't fit in anywhere else. Some may call it "filler"; we prefer "a whole page to make terrible jokes that are tangentially related to the content of the mag". We don't have (paper) pages on the internet, but we still love terrible jokes —...
Hands On 'Live A Live' Gives A Unique 16-Bit RPG A Gorgeous New Lease Of Life
We're LIVE from the past, present, and future
If you have any interest in Super Nintendo RPGs, then you’ve likely heard of Live A Live. Released in 1994 for the Super Famicom in Japan, it came out during what many claim is Square Enix's — then known as Square, or Squaresoft in the West — 'Golden Era', launching just under a year after Secret...
Guide Best Space And Sci-Fi Games On The Nintendo Switch
The answer to the Ultimate Question
Space. The final frontier. These are the voyages of the — sorry, er, these are the best space and science fiction games that can be found on the Nintendo Switch, despite the fact that none of the developers in this list has actually been to space. What makes a good space game? Well, first it has to take place...
Feature What It Takes To Be A Zelda: Breath Of The Wild World Record Speedrunner
BOTW's best 'runners talk tricks and clips
It’s 1 AM and you have just spent the past 12 hours replaying the same segment of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. In your mind, there is no stopping until perfection is achieved – or the more likely option – you pass out from sleep deprivation. For the next few weeks, you continue to hone...
Feature 10 Series We'd Love To See Get The Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy Treatment
On the game's 10th anniversary
Why haven't there been more games like Theatrhythm: Final Fantasy? We have a particular soft spot for music and rhythm games, and even more so music and rhythm games that put their own twist on the usual beat matching. Theatrhythm is just one of those games. The first game launched in North America 10 years ago today...
Feature 13 Best Seniors In Games
These oldies are very goodies
Think of a game in which you control a character (so no Tetris or anything) — go ahead, any game! Now, chances are, whichever game you've picked, its protagonist is either young or, at the most, middle-aged. You've got the likes of Link, Mario, Samus, Cloud, Joker, Neku, Scott Pilgrim... We could go on, but you get...
Feature Backlog Club: July - If You Haven't Played Hollow Knight Yet, Here's Your Chance
Sorry to bug you
Rule number one of Backlog Club: Work through your pile of unplayed video games one at a time, and discuss them with other people. Rule number two of Backlog Club: Don't talk about Backlog Club. Just kidding! Tell everyone. Please. This article is part of our new experimental series, Backlog Club, where we (Nintendo Life!) pick a...
Talking Point What Are You Playing This Weekend? (July 2nd)
Take a sip
We're over halfway through the year now — isn't that a scary thought? And our calendars are about to get even busier after that Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase! But outside of that mammoth mini, rumours of a Metroid Prime 1 remaster are swirling once again. Sabotage's
Poll What's Your Game Of The Year 2022 So Far?
Yeah, it's already July, sorry
We regret to inform you that 2022 is half over. You might as well just start buying your Christmas presents now, folks, because from here it's a slippery slope to Winter. But before that happens, let's celebrate the six-month mark of 2022 with our games of the year so far, or GOTYSF! The list is stacked this year,...
Feature Mario + Rabbids Producer Talks Free Movement And Fusing Lumas, Rabbids, And Composers
"It was a kid's dream to do that"
As revealed in Nintendo's June 2022 Direct Mini: Partner Showcase, Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope is launching on Switch on 20th October. This afternoon, Ubisoft's dedicated showcase,
Movie Review GoldenEra - A Celebratory Examination Of GoldenEye 007's Creation And Impact
Worth its weight in gold
"A delayed game is eventually good, but a rushed game is forever bad." Ah, yes. The classic quote that may or may not have been uttered by Shigeru Miyamoto. With the gaming industry (understandably) experiencing an unusually high number of delays in recent years, the proclamation has been the subject of memes to the point...
Feature Spidersaurs Lands On Switch In July, WayForward Talks Saturday Cartoons And Contra
Everybody walk the spidersaur
Over the past 30 years, WayForward, makers of the Shantae series, has made a name for itself by crafting retro-flavoured gems that combine the best of modern gaming with an unashamedly old-school aesthetic and game feel. Whether it's baked into their own projects (such as the Mighty series or the aforementioned Shantae...
Round Up Every Game And Trailer From The Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase June 2022
What were your favourite announcements?
The June 2022 Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase has come and gone, and left us with a host of fresh announcements, release date news, surprise drops, and other tidbits to feast on. It may not have been the full-fat first-party Nintendo Direct fans have been anticipating all June, but there was something...
Poll What Are You Hoping To See In The Nintendo Direct Mini?
Howdy, Partner
Tomorrow we'll be getting a brand new Nintendo Direct Mini: Partner Showcase focused entirely on third-party games for the Switch. That's right, don't get your hopes up for any Mario Kart or Zelda news, as instead, we'll have 25 glorious minutes of upcoming releases from other developers. So not really that mini then! Proceedings...
Gen 9 starter final form predictions brought to life
A new generation of Pokémon is on the horizon and with it comes speculation and anticipation that runs as rampant as a horde of Tauros. During this time, a new generation’s Starter Pokémon take the centre stage, particularly their final forms. With Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, releasing on...
Feature Remembering Klonoa's Dreamy GBA Platformers - Empires, Champions, And Puzzles
It's not only a phantasy
The ‘90s and 2000s were a totally different era. I can’t tell you how many times I sat down playing the same demo discs over and over or replaying the same handful of games as a kid. Bandai Namco’s old mascot Klonoa — soon to return in the upcoming Klonoa Phantasy Reverie Series — is the first-ever video game...
Feature Backlog Club: Return Of The Obra Dinn - It All Comes Down To Socks In The End
An old-school mystery with older-school roots
This article is part of our new experimental series, Backlog Club, where we (Nintendo Life!) pick a game that's likely to be on our list of "games we should get around to playing", and then we (NL + you!) spend the next month playing that game. This is the finale for June, which was focused on Return of...
Hands On Two Point Campus Offers One Hell Of An Education
Learn more
If there’s one thing we need in life that goes criminally underappreciated, it’s education. Ejucashun kan turns a sentinse lik this into something that can be concise and precise, or eloquent and needlessly protracted. From students to heads of state, veterinarians to loquacious video producers — we all could do with a little more...
Talking Point What Are You Playing This Weekend? (June 25th)
Preparing for a busy July
Is everyone feeling a bit more chilled out after not-E3? Okay, we're still waiting for a Nintendo Direct, but we did get a Xenoblade Chronicles 3-focused presentation, where a new Expansion Pass was unveiled. The AM2R devs have reunited on a brand new stunning-looking Metroidvania pr
Memory Pak After 20 Years, Eternal Darkness Really Deserves A Second Life
Being stuck on one system is pure insanity
Picture the setting. You’re walking around a grand mansion, testing out keys on locked doors, investigating every nook and cranny, and simply trying your best to figure out where you need to go and what you need to do. The rooms are well-lit and the furniture neatly positioned together. By all accounts,...
Memory Pak Becoming The Very Best In Black & White 2's Pokémon World Tournament
Like no one ever was...
Walking out into the arena of Pokémon Black & White 2’s Pokémon World Tournament (PWT) for the first time, I had chills. The lights were dimmed, the crowd was watching, and the commentary was introducing me – my character – as if I were some sort of celebrity. Well, sure, I’d saved Unova and become the Champion...
Feature 10 Famous Franchises That Would Make Great Warriors Games
Playable characters and killable enemies up the wazoo
We’re in the midst of a Warriors series Golden Age on the Nintendo Switch. Recently, we asked you – Nintendo Life’s readers – to rank each of these Musou games, and games like Hyrule Warriors and Age of Calamity beat out the likes of
Soapbox Why Do We Talk About Games By Comparing Them To Other Games?
It's a Stardew-like-roguelike with Soulsborne elements
"What's in a name?" Shakespeare once wrote. "A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." He was, of course, talking about the blood feud between two warring families, and the thirteen-year-old daughter of the Capulet family wishing that her crush could be called something other than Montague...
Feature Takashi Iizuka, Head Of Sonic Team, Speaks About Sonic Origins, Sprites, And Future Plans
"Sonic Adventure will always remain very dear to me"
Sonic the Hedgehog fans have had plenty to talk about of late. The staggered gameplay reveals and initial reactions to Sonic Frontiers have been one of the big talking points throughout this not-E3 2022 period, but we've also had the impending release of Sonic Origins to look forward to. While the...
Hands On MADiSON Is A Familiar Yet Effective Horror Tale
Picture perfect or underdeveloped?
After the monumental impact of games like Amnesia, Outlast, and Hideo Kojima’s doomed Silent Hills teaser P.T, horror fans have witnessed somewhat of a resurgence of the genre after franchises like Resident Evil and Dead Space started leaning toward more over-the-top action. While some fans have since taken...
Feature Nintendo eShop Selects - May 2022
The best of the last month's eShop games!
Okay yes, we know we're a tad late with May's eShop Selects, but come on, it was not-E3 season! Nevertheless, we're back again to round up the best offerings of the month; granted, it was a relatively quiet one for the most part, but that doesn't mean there weren't any diamonds lying in the rough (we might...
Feature Need More Turtles After Shredder's Revenge? You Should Check Out These Underrated TMNT Gems
Heroes in a handheld
Hopefully you’re all enjoying the absolutely tremendous Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge, the latest addition to the TMNT video gaming canon from Dotemu and Tribute games. We know we are. It’s another blistering action game in the tradition of Konami’s NES and SNES beat-’em-ups. And that’s great — we...
Talking Point What Are You Playing This Weekend? (June 18th)
A turtle-y good weekend
Is it a scorcher where you are, readers? It certainly has been in the UK this week. But the video game news has been pretty hot too! Hollow Knight: Silksong is alive with a brand new trailer! There are details of a rumoured new Fire Emblem game surfacing online.
Feature Capcom Fighting Collection - Every Game, And Why You Should Be Excited
Fightin' in the streets
As great as the Street Fighter series is, pugilism fans with longer memories will tell you that it’s about ruddy time some of Capcom’s somewhat lesser-known games are getting their time in the spotlight. Arriving on Switch on 24th June, Capcom Fighting Collection showcases not just the entire Darkstalkers series, but also...
Feature A Pokémon Retrospective: Generation 8 – 2019 To 2022
Gen-erally speaking
Six years ago, running up to Pokémon’s 20th anniversary, we did a rundown of each of the generations of Pokémon, and then brought it back three years ago to cover Generation 7. Now, we’re truly in the news cycle for Generation 9's Pokémon Scarlet & Violet, so it’s time to take a look back at the last three years,...
