Starlink: Battle For Atlas Switch File Size Revealed, Almost As Large As Zelda: Breath Of The Wild

Lazy optimization.

That's just for the basic edition which on the Eshop doesn't even have a price yet. There is a 'Standard Edition' and 'Deluxe Edition' also which oddly do have the price on the Eshop but no file size. These cost £69.99 and £89.99 respectively. The fact they've called the middle one 'Standard Edition' and the enormous amount of DLC it and the Deluxe version includes, it's pretty clear Ubisoft don't want you buying the basic one.

If you were to buy all of the DLC the Standard Edition includes seperately it would set you back over £55,with the Deluxe Edition's adding up to over £80. That's far too much!

"the game supports surround sound" Wait, that's not the case for every 3D game?

Fortunately, there is a retail version.

@OorWullie since the game is built as a "toys to life" game, naturally all of the necessary character/vehicle data would need to be included in the base download so that the toys could work on the fly as intended. All of the "DLC" in the digital version most likely just unlocks that content for use without a figurine.

TLDR; the file size won't likely be getting much higher. Possibly a bit due to standard patches and updates, but not due to DLC.

How much is the basic retail version? Do we know yet? I just want the game w/o bits of plastic.

Wait, then why does the retail version require a 15 GB download?? It doesn't matter to me either way since I'll be getting this game anyway, but that's odd if the full game on the eShop is 12.7 GB..

I always buy physical when I can, but this is a rare instance where I’ll be opting for digital. The digital deluxe comes with all of the available DLC (correct me if I’m wrong) for $80, whereas the physical is $75 and only comes with the most basic stuff. I’ve got no interest in the toys anyway, so it’s a no-brainer for me.

EDIT: I should add that this is pending reviews. I’m likely to get the game, but I’m not 100% sold on it yet.

I've just had a look on the US Eshop and there are only 2 versions, Digital Edition at $59.99 and Deluxe Edition at $79.99. On the UK Eshop the Deluxe Edition costs £89.99 though. That's $118 and it includes the exact same DLC as the much cheaper US version. So folk in the UK have to pay $38 more?

All of the different versions and pricings are a little confusing for this game, but I believe there is an FAQ on the Ubisoft website that lays everything out.

From my understanding (and again, please correct me if I’m wrong), you have 3 choices:
Retail - $75 - Comes with Star Fox toys and a minimal amount of other stuff (some of it is download codes).
Digital - $60 - Comes with everything in the retail bundle plus a bunch more, for less money. Of course you don’t get the toys though, which is why it is much cheaper.
Digital deluxe - $80 - Comes with everything that is available at launch, digitally.

Also, I thought I read that the required download is down to about 4 GB now. The 15 GB number came from an earlier build of the game.

Despite it being a toys to life game, which I'm rather over, I was looking forward to this and had it on pre-order but after assassins creed gated off the endgame behind a payment or massive grind I'm done with ubisoft. Odyssey will be the last game I buy from them for a long long time,

Considering the whole gimmick is the plastic tat attached to the controller I don't think people have to worry too much about the eShop version.

Also 13GB is nothing considering most modern AAA games weight 60GB and more...

@BarFooToo Is there more actual content after the grind or is the grind the endgame, like in Shadow of War?
That whole idea was so terrible. Micro transactions tied to a frustratingly dull part of the game most players wouldn't have patience for anyway.

Pre-ordered!

@klingki @KryptoniteKrunch @Geobros For this game it's better to buy digital. Ubisoft went the cheapskate route by using an 8 GB cart: so you get 6.7GB of the game on the cart and you need to download an additional 6 GB (Just like LA Noire and Doom). You can take my word, I am already playing it.

The physical copy will have a 6GB day 1 update. Not 15GB

@Retupmocnin Good to know, thank you!

@SmaggTheSmug As I understand it and as it seemed in game a lot more story was left. The first time I felt it was around 16 hours in (at least half of that was already spent checking out side quests) . Main story quests are level locked. So to carry on I had to spend over 5 hours doing mindless rubbish, pay for a instant xp boast or pay for a 1.5x permanent level buster. I did the grind. But after carry on with the main quest for just 2 more hours it happened again. This time it looked like even longer grind or pay up. I just quit the game. I understand if you do every side quest as you find them then your ok but I don't have the time or inclination for fetch quest after fetch quest.

@kobashi100 I'll delete my comment that mentions that so not to create any more confusion.

@Retupmocnin

Oh ok, thanks for the info.

@klingki loving your work.

@OorWullie I wonder what the boxed physical version counts as??? im guessing basic of the basic. I knew this would be a micky taking money drain. Im in it for Fox McCloud... and playing a new adventure as him, hopefully they wont add much else that involves him and I can just enjoy it.

Im not interested in generic ships and characters...

Ahhhhhh Im a bit bummed out now...

Seems within reason.

Lots of planets, artwork, music, voice work.

I'm sure it be 6GB or even less if it needed to, but at a certain point, you start cutting into the fidelity in a noticable fashion. And as long as the whole game comes on the cartridge (!)

@klingki I'm going digital deluxe if it reviews good. Had it preordered physically but cancelled a couple days ago when I learned I'd be punished and get 3/4 less content. My SD card can handle it.

The Starter Packs for PS4 and Xbox One include:

Starlink: Battle for Atlas
Controller Mount
Zenith Starship
Mason Rana
Flamethrower Weapon
Frost Barrage Weapon
Shredder Weapon

The Starter Pack for Nintendo Switch includes:

Starlink: Battle for Atlas
Joycon Mount
Arwing Starship
Fox McCloud and exclusive Star Fox missions
Mason Rana
Flamethrower Weapon
Frost Barrage Weapon
Digital Zenith Starship
Digital Shredder Weapon

Both Starter Packs retail for $74.99

I'll buy this in a year or two when it's cheap

The Digital Starter Packs include:

Starlink: Battle for Atlas
4 Starships (Zenith, Pulse, Lance, Neptune)
6 Pilots (Mason, Chase, Levi, Razor, Hunter, Kharl)
12 Weapons (Shredder, Flamethrower, Frost Barrage, Levitator, Volcano, Imploder, Iron Fist, Freeze Ray Mk.2, Crusher, Shredder Mk.2, Shockwave, and Gauss Gun Mk.2)
The Nintendo Switch Digital Starter Pack also includes pilot Fox McCloud, exclusive Star Fox missions, and the Arwing starship

All digital starter packs retail for $59.99

@Pod actually i saw on gamexplain's unboxing video that the box says "download required"

@OorWullie there is no "basic edition". they just listed the game (that's included in the standard and deluxe versions) on the eshop by mistake.

The whole thing seems to have been designed with the Switch in mind. Not only is there extra Star Fox content but also the controller mount just works perfectly with joycons. On PS4 you need a bulky controller clamp thing that actually has a wired connection to the console.

@BarFooToo you say you're done with Ubisoft in the same line as where you say you're buying their latest game. That's why they keep doing it.

@Retupmocnin : L.A. Noire and DOOM both shipped on 16GB cartridges (the total file size of the games is over 20GB each). In their case, the publishers opted for 16GB as opposed to a 32GB cartridge.

Either way, it is absolute madness that Ubisoft would cheap out on a game that would have easily fit on a 16GB cartridge. Unless there is a last minute change and the full game will be on the cartridge after all, I will be skipping this.

@NewAdvent exactly how I feel. The review can't come fast enough.

@manu0
Yeah, reading this comments section as well makes me realize that it's the case.

What a pity.

I won't be buying any games for Switch with such requirements before Nintendo opens up for cartridges with rewritable storage, so that patches and updates can be stored on the actual game card. And publishers actually utilize those.

Thanks to everyone for posting all of the useful information, Ubisoft seems confused about whether this is a digital game or toys to life. I'm guessing it was conceived as toys to life years ago but then reality set in. Nice to have choices though. For SSB4 on Wii U we had to pay to download a DLC character even after spending $12 on the amiibo, it was a pay twice proposition. So as objectionable as some of this may be for some people it still seems like a better offering of choices than SSB4 had.

We'll wait 6 months and buy it in the spring half price. I was going to look for the box on clearance at Target but digital really seems the way to go, we have enough toys, I'm kind of getting bored building shelves to hold them all. They should have made the Star fox amiibo work in game.

@EeryPetrol I can't change the past, I'd already bought Odyssey before I played it obviously. But it did go straight back to smyths Tuesday so I got £32 credit back

I am very torn on this game. As others have mentioned, the pricing is the first reason for caution. Especially when buying digital, it just feels like you're paying for added functionality that could have been included in the base version.

At the same time, I've been itching for another vast open world exploration/action game like Zelda or Xenoblade and this looks like it could scratch that itch. I'll be holding out on the reviews as well then.

@OorWullie that sound expensive on the UK store but bear in mind that version includes taxes

ok, that's yet another example of the NL writers chaotically scrounging around for anything to write about to legitimize their continued involvement with NL

I've been noticing it a lot more lately, articles, news', randoms, soapboxes about pointless and confusing info, multiple short articles about the same subject with only slight different info that could have been melded into a slightly larger objective article or just rewiting articles that have been out of date for years

file size ???
so what, I read this article hoping there would be more than the pathetic title suggested and....nothing, just what seemed like bigger is better, well, "bigger" may be great for some things, but does not guarantee games will be "better"

get real, get out there and find real reasons to write about

Can't wait for this I had it preorderd soon as it was available

@beazlen1 There is no basic physical version. Theres only the starter pack. You have to get the game with a pilot, a ship and a weapon which are all DLC, so they only offer the starter pack so you get the standard. Its like skylanders, you cant play that game without getting a figure and the portal, so its included in every purchase.

@OorWullie The actual content is included in the game files, other wise you would have to do a download if you purchased one of the ships/pilot/weapons etc. Because they will just immediately unlock when using a toy rather than initiate a download, the content for all the ships etc are in the game files. The DLC content will just be unlock keys, not additional data to download.

@jhewitt3476 You should demand a refund.

I think the chance of Nintendo making a brand new Stafox game is riding on the potential success of this game on the Switch.

13GB is nothing by modern standards, especially from a 3rd party! I've felt for a while that a lot of companies have stopped trying as hard to compress and/or optimize their file sizes because it's not the absolute necessity it used to be. If a game takes more space than originally planned, it's just on a hard drive half the time, so it doesn't matter.

Gone are the days a developer knew there was an absolute upper limit that they couldn't exceed. Heck some PC games exceed 50GB now!

Even if this gets great reviews, I’m more interested in Red Dead 2 and some other things this year. It’s also an Ubisoft game, which means it’ll drop to half price a lot faster than other games will.

@rjejr I had the same thought. It's clear it was conceived when Amiibo was still at their height and Lego & Disney Infinite were still expected to do well. What I don't get is why they chose to continue pushing it as such long after that ship sailed, hit an iceberg, listed, sank, was raised by archaeologists, and then was swallowed by a whale.

But a fairly large Arwing model? Yes, I'll buy that.

@BarFooToo Is that because you've played the game and got frustrated personally with the level disparity between you and opponents at the latter part of the game, or because you heard about it on the internet? (Genuinely curious, I bought AC:O, haven't played much of it yet, but it's difficult separating people who actually played the game, did the side-quests and found the game is effectively broken at a certain point, versus internet-fan outrage from things they heard other people say.)

@Heavyarms55 Says the guy who lives in Japan where ISPs don't cap between 300GB-1TB/mo.

@NEStalgia Naw man. Japan has great internet in most places sure. But if you live up in the mountains or in some of the rural small towns, you're basically limited to a home version of pocket wi-fi and like, maybe, 50gb a month.

I myself am very lucky, my apartment building is only about a decade old, we have a freaking fiber connection! My download speeds are nuts! And by fiber I mean fiber-optic.

@Heavyarms55 Red Dead Redemption 2 is 105GB.

@Retupmocnin Good lord are you serious?!

@Balta666 That's true but it's not normal for the pound price to be higher than the dollar price. A $60 game would normally cost £50 to £55 in the UK with some rare exceptions like BOTW which cost £60.It always works out costing more when converted of course but this is nearly balanced out when US taxes come in. Starlinks 2 packs though are £70 and £90 compared to $60 (£45) and $80 (£60). That's a big difference. I don't think any state in the US charges $39 tax on an $80 purchase.

@Heavyarms55 Google and find out.

I was excited for this, but the digital DLC was a letdown. $80 for a complete version of the game digitally is too much, considering the toys-to-life thing already made the full package (physical) as expensive as a sealed New 3DS XL.

@Heavyarms55 Huh, I'm shocked anything in Japan has a 50GB limit. That makes the digital push on anything even more inexplicable when even in Japan of all places it's not universal unlimited. I don't get how the media companies expect to push digital everything when there's still plenty of places that don't have unlimited utility internet and many likely never will. There's a disconnect between industry and reality. Sure they can make all the profits they want by the group that can participate, but it progressively splits society into two distinct camps of norms, realities, and rules. A society split between two radically different expectations and normals can't end well....and it's only getting worse.....and it's apparently worldwide. Maybe in this case it's just entertainment. But can you imagine if during the rise of TV only some locales had access to normal TV and everyone else had radio? You'd have two completely different cultures that developed separately, even within one geographic space.

Oh game sizes on most consoles are extreme now. I was shocked. SotTR is only 28GB base game, 47GB with the Croft edition DLC. That's one of the smallest newer games I've seen. RDR2 is over 100GB. COD BLOPS III is over 100GB. XBox games are routinely huge Halo MCC (granted it's a 5 game bundle), Halo 5, Quantum Break, Gears of War 4 are all around 100GB. Forza Horizon 4 is "small" at 65-ish GB. Destiny 2 is around 80GB with the current add-ons through Forsaken. AC: Odyssey is pretty small at 48GB or so. More "major" games are 50-80GB than aren't. 30-50GB downloads are now normal for many physical purchases.

Thus poor Switch. When Switch launched most PS4/X1 games were 20-25GB with 2-5GB patches, and Switch's storage seemed like a reasonable reduction. In the past year, year and a half, suddenly PS4/X1 game sizes quadrupled on average and mandatory 30+GB downloads became standard. It was quite sudden. Meanwhile Comcast implemented a 1TB cap.....and PS5/X2 are hinting at 8k visuals.........yeah....this'll end well.

@OorWullie you are right. Normally the games in europe are fixed to the 60€ mark (with a few exceptions as noted like you mentioned). It appears that they decided to increase the price tag due to the toys and possibly because they don't expect to sell a lot in Europe and therefore decided to have them with a bigger margin of profit...

I wanted this game BEFORE the Starace Fox announcement. Now I NEEDS IT!!!!

I think this isn't the full size because the physical version has a large update. Unless the cartridge is like 1GB, the file size doesn't make sense so I think it's more likely the true digital file size is closer to 30GB and Ubisoft used a 16GB cart.

@NEStalgia Its not a difficulty issue. You beat on a enemy 3 levels above you for 30 minutes and they will not feel anything. Changing the difficulty does not change that. You also need certain abilities to progress the story and they are only available above a certain level and so act as a hard lock on the story. I wish I had heard more about this before I bought the game although I would probably have bought it anyway with the good reviews. I enjoy single player adventures. I think if you do all the busy work from the start you would be fine and I was really enjoying the game. but I really felt like I was being shock down and as you may be able to tell I'm still quite pissed about it. Sure I'll shrug it off at some point but not in time for Star Fox

@BarFooToo Thanks. That's really a shame to hear they broke it like that, though I'd heard mixed reports that it seemed more like a balance issue that will probably be patched than a forcing of the store. I've always loved that series for some reason, simplistic though it may be, and the first hour or so I spent with this one, I was really liking it. By the time I get to it in my backlog hopefully they'll patch (either by intent, or by reacting to backlash)....I actually got the Gold edition since I'm a sucker for the series, so I don't really want to play it until all the DLC is available anyway.....I'll cross my fingers it's just a balancing issue or, as you said, that if you do all the side quests and all you don't feel it (I usually tend to do most sidequests in RPGs that aren't named Xenoblade Chronicles (1) )

I shouldn't be excited for a Ubi game after that...but I am.

@Grumblevolcano Doubtful, like many such games these days they likely either put nothing but an unlock code on the cart, or probably put most of the game on the cart but then in a "patch" had to include most of the game as a download anyway, so the "extra content" for physical is really just the whole game downloaded again anyway. You know, like the MCC update and the BLOPS 3 mess.

I'm a gummy bear oh I'm a gummy bear - this is my excitement for the game, i have it downloaded to my system ready for take off! Mr. Spock we're going all in!

Pre-ordered the Switch Starter Edition to get the Arwing. Also pre-ordered an extra ship and weapons pack, my hubby is also getting another ship and weapons pack & then we'll share them. Glad I'm getting the physical version though, my MicroSDXC card is pretty much full of videos and screenshots. 128GB card was not big enough. Now if only the 400GB cards would come down in price!

FWIW, even on XBox One the game is only 16GB or so. The smallest non-indie game I've seen on the system, let alone for an "AAA" release.

I'm guessing the barren planet textures compress quite nicely.

So I guess no one is getting this physical? The deluxe edition seems like the best offer, but I really want that Arwing toy.

@Devlind Planning to get physical, so I can sell it towards something once Im fully done.

@rjejr The problem with amiibo and dlc characters in Smash is that, if you were able to get them with the amiibo, you could share it with other people so they get the character for free. You could say that they could have locked it overwriting data on it, but we know that NFC isn't really super safe. This could lead to people to dump their amiibo data and start selling amiibo tags to unlock the characters that way (or getting the data online and do it themselves). While it is a shame it was that way, I can't think of any way to prevent this from happening.

There's a digital bundle for all the extra ships etc that go with the starter pack. Can't find any UK pricing, but it doesn't look that great compared to the US. I don't think I'm going to want the extra stuff, but does feel like the whole pricing scheme is intended to fudge over the fact that we're actually paying more for what would traditionally be included.

"If you already own a physical starter pack, you can purchase a Digital Collection bundle that includes:

4 Ships (Neptune, Pulse, Lance, Nadir)
8 Pilots (Judge, Chase, Hunter, Shaid, Levi, Kharl, Eli, Razor)
12 Weapons (Levitator, Volcano, Imploder, Iron Fist, Nullifier, Hailstorm, Meteor MK.2, Freeze Ray Mk.2, Crusher, Shredder Mk.2, Shockwave, and Gauss Gun Mk.2)
The Nintendo Switch Digital Collection 1 Pack also includes pilot Fox McCloud, Fox Story Missions, and the Arwing starship

The Digital Collection 1 Pack retails for $59.99.

You may purchase additional starship, weapon, and pilot packs digitally in the Nintendo eShop, PlayStation Store, and Xbox Market Place.

Digital starship packs retail for $12.99, weapon packs for $4.99, and pilot packs for $3.99."

@NEStalgia It's just catering to the future. Eventually most people will have unlimited. It'll get there, eventually.

@Heavyarms55 you could say that, but for now it's getting worse, not better. The more media companies expect people to download in excess of what used to be Enterprise grade commercial accounts for 8x the cost, the more isps pull back the reigns. Plus in the us the future isps are planning is 100% cellular 5g, no more wires. And you know that means even tougher caps than before. That's the actual future just getting started. The rest is a pipe dream for decades away. Most of the fiber commpanies have halted expansion entirely and will go cellular only. Cable still does wires... But with ever more restrictive caps. Game makers may find themselves building a market that physically can't exist.

Interesting that they are offering a digital only version, I know some people (w amiibo/ skylanders / etc) don't care about the toys part of it, so offering a cheaper digital alternative will be a boon for them

I don't mind buying the toys generally, if they look good, as I collect the figurines. Offhand I'm not sure about how these guys look (compared to amiibo, I know they're smaller), though the discount per going digital makes that seem more worthwhile

I am curious about the switching mechanic of the toys, but realistically the digital version seems more practical. I'm curious to see how the sales do per the various versions

@Devlind Just have it have to unlock the character every time you boot the game, simple. Nobody is gong to keep their Wii U on and the game running forever just to play as Cloud or Bayonetta or Ryu. It was only 6 or so amiibo anyway, not all 60, sharing should nto have been that big of deal. So what if 2 or 3 people unlock a character with one amiibo if they each paid $60 for the game. Every copy of the game they sell increases their likelihood of selling more DLC. They would make more money than they would loose from people sharing amiibo to unlock 6 characters. Heck a $12 amiibo shoudl unlock 3 or 4 characters anyway as they are only $3 in game.

I mean if they are that worried about people running back and forth to their friends every time 2 people want to share 1 Cloud amiibo to play as that character, well they really need to find other things to worry about and let people enjoy the game.

@NEStalgia "why they chose to continue pushing it"

Well it doesn't really seem like they are pushing the toys all that hard. It seems more like - well let's sell everything digitally, but since it's Christmas and parents like to buy toys for their kids, lets just throw a few of these on the shelves and see if anybody buys them. And if that doesn't work, let's sell Starfox toys to the amiibo collectors.

To me their biggest obstacle is - no more TRU. I think that probably came as more of a shock to them than amiibo, Skylanders, Lego D and DI dieing. Most of those were already dead. They were probably thinking - hey, all that empty space in TRU, let's fill it up with ships and weapons. And then that shut down, so digital was really the only way to go. But since they already had all the toys ready to go, might as well make a few. I'm betting they make half as many toys as originally planned pre and post TRU. Maybe only 1/4. These wont' sell well on Amazon, and Gamestop clientele mostly only care about CoD. I suppose Walmart will have a bunch. The newly remodeled Target's, which I hate and can't stand being in, have no space for amiibo, much less Starlink.

But they'll sell a few. Maybe I'll pick them all up for $1 each clearanced next summer at Walmart.

@NewAdvent: Same here. I became interested in the game once I learned StarFox was in. Waiting for the review before I decide whether to pick it up or not.

@rjejr You're right I hadn't even thought of the impact of TRU on things like this. We're left, in the US with ONLY Walmart, Amazon, and Target as toy stores. K-Mart technically where it exists, though it's looking like by the end of the year they'll all be gone too. Sometimes I think I should stop looking at the internet and just live in a bubble of video games alone. It's too depressing and horrifying seeing, on a daily basis the entire structure of life distilled further and further into 10 feudal corporate lords, and a kingdom of serfs. And more depressing that most people neither notice or care, accepting it as all ok and normal. Sucks a lot for me since, a K-Mart is the only local store to buy anything. We have dozens of shopping centers. All of them feature the same thing: 2 banks, a drug store, a Panera, nail salon, hair salon, upscale spa/salon, some art/yoga/pet training/karate studio, an up scale Indian, Asian Fusion, Sushi or some other $30/plate restaurant, a mobile phone store (or two), some upscale pizza place for the executive lunch crowd that sells $24 pizzas, and an upscale sports bar-grill. Every single one of them, repeat over and over and over. Then they build an empty shopping center across the street from that and the same stores just move from one to the other. K-Mart is the last retailer in the area that's not a drug store. After they're gone (not that they have much anyway) the nearest actual b&m shopping is 45min-1hr away, starting with Walmart in the most horrifying parking lot ever devised as a torture chamber. So "retail" is down to "buy everything on Amazon and only on Amazon, and maybe Walmart.com" or spend no less than 3 hours and 8 gallons of gas picking up hand soap. People talk about online shopping with shipping as some kind of luxury. It's not luxury, it's literally the only retail method reasonably available. (And no, this isn't rural! 35 years ago it was! Then they "gentrified it" and zoned it for miles and miles of luxury estate homes and corporate parks. The roads are gridlocked. That hour trip to Walmart was a distance that took 15-20 minutes 25 years ago. Now there's 30 traffic lights and non-stop gridlock to wade through to get there. But they haven't built a single road, instead selling all the land to housing developers, adding to the gridlock. If you don't buy online, you simply don't buy anything. Unless you can live on CVS and gas stations alone. We have like 12 of those now.....

Walmart and Target are not toy stores, they just carry whatever the handful of most popular things are. I'm not sure how things like this will be sold anymore. It has to sell online. That's the only place to sell. If they bombard cartoons (or is that Youtube now? I swear, if we just get rid of all the kids the world will be fine. They're the real problem here. Darned usurpers. ) with ads maybe they can make it an in demand item. I don't see it though. The StarFox kit has appeal for old nerds. Modern kids don't care. And I doubt modern kids care about Generic Army Men In Space parts. It feels kind of 80's, and not in the good way.

EDIT BTW what's with the Target remodel? I haven't been in one in ages but I used to really like the layout of the store. What are they doing different that's so awful?

@rjejr You are viewing this from a consumer point of view. If they did that, then we could go as far to ask why they just didn't give away the characters for free if you already paid $60? It makes no sense from a business point of view. Both the amiibo and the character are completely different products, so you, as a consumer, should pay for both. There's no workaround for this.

Unlocking the characters every time through scanning the amiibo would be annoying. We saw this with Shadow Mewtwo in Pokken Tournament, but in that case, you can unlock it through normal gameplay. The amiibo card just let you use it before that. You already paid for the character when you bought the game. In Smash, when you buy an amiibo, you are not paying for the right to use the character, just for the figurine and the perks it has in compatible games. We could be here arguing back and forth about this, but at the end of the day, things are just like this.

@Geobros
^ This!
IMO, regardless of what game we are talking about...
e-shop = garbage edition.

@NEStalgia Target turned itself into a department store. I know it already was a department store but to me it was a big fun store now it's a well lit clothing store with food in the back. It's very Macy's, the worst store's on Earth. When you walk in it's actually Pier One Imports.

Do any of those strip malls near you have hashish places? Well not hashish, those hokum smoking places? You must live in a nice neighborhood, my strip malls are all porn stores, pawn stores, barbershops, check cashing, and florists. No, I don't know what gives with the florists. And I live in suburbia, but it's very working class.

Kmart near me closed recently, they stopped selling video games years ago. There is a Sears but it's in the mall and I dont' go to malls. Did you really write all of that and not mention Gamestop? I know we all hate it there but it's still there, only I don't think they sell games anymore, only socks and jigsaw puzzles. Maybe ice cube trays.

I want to end this on an upbeat note but I can't. And I didn't even touch upon your worldview of doom, which I total agree with and feel, but it's weird reading it from you, your usually a tad more optimistic than I, being a tad younger than I so there's still hope for you. Here's my twitter post from this morning to give you some idea of my day.

"Spending my morning replacing our 17 year old shelving paper in the kitchen cupboards. I feel like I just went from being an old man to being an old woman."

@Devlind "just for the figurine and the perks it has in compatible games."

Do you know what the #1 perk should be for buying an amiibo character from SSB?

Hint, it's a trick question.

@rjejr I hate to repeat myself, but as I said, things are just like how they are. Amiibo were sold as collectibles with some perks in compatible games. In the case of Smash, they were just customizable CPU players, and that's it. Nothing more and nothing less. You can keep on saying what they should have done, but in the end that changes nothing. I mean, you might as well go as far as to ask for the game for free without any playable character so you can scan amiibo to unlock them, just like how Skylanders and Disney Infinity worked.

@ryancraddock
Bonjour Ryan;

Will there be a review?

Thanks

@rjejr Eww...I liked Target the few times I've been in one....but IMO the "well lit white wall sanitarium" redesigns is what killed the shopping mall. Malls were cool. Darkly lit, dark colored and woodgrain aesthetics, campy storefronts, lots of neon, water features, dark slates, wood, kind of seedy, kind of an outdoor at night environment indoors during the day. They had events, shows, weird stores selling oddly specific things. It was interesting. A place to go to. Then in the 90's they turned them all into thousand megawatt fully daylit places with everything clad in shades of white minimalism filled with nothing but women's clothing stores, and the same 10 chains all owned by 3 parent companies everywhere. And just like that, the malls rotted and died.

Target is now emulating the mall model?! I mean why not just emulate the Sears model? It's faster.

Heck once Macy's is gone....what stores will there be? Walmart and Talbots? I'm not setting foot within 800 feet of one of those things.

Nah, no hookah joints around here, though there are smokes/tobacco stores around. Though now that I think about it the one tobacco store seems to be a "vaping" place of some sort now. So I don't know. Yeah it's a "nice" place...that's what's wrong with it. Back in the day it was rural. I didn't know it was rural I thought it was suburban. Apparently it was rural. There were farms and such around. Mostly empty forest. Slowly they've gentrified it, built over every inch of it. Lured companies in to "stimulate the economy." What they've built is a haven for the upper middle to lower upper classes. With a few multi-million dollar sprawling estates strewn through. I play Forza Horizon....it's kind of bland. All these Porches and Bimmers, and Lamborghinis.....it just looks like my commute. If there's not at least 6 of those at an intersection, something is wrong. Trouble is once those people move in and take over, you are expected, no MANDATED to keep up with their spending. Everything of theirs is always brand new and perfectly done, and so will yours be. They buy $14 sandwiches as a quick lunch and so will you, because business moves in to cater to where they can sell expensive things, so everything else leaves, by the time you're done, that's all that remains is a luxury lifestyle you can't afford but have to try. So I hide in a hole with video games That's the part nobody tells you. When the rich decide to take over your area, it's not coexistence, they take it over. And you are forced by simply having no other choice to live luxury even if you can't afford it. Heck, even home repairs cost a fortune....because the market here sustains it. So I just do hack-jobs myself

The stores around you sound actually interesting like normal people who don't take their dogs to the doggy daycare like children every day before taking them to the doggy bakery (not even joking) for a treat, in the back seat of their BMW M4 SUV (if they're taking the pauper's car today...) actually live there We sadly lack the porn stores on every corner but I dare not think what darker shadows are lurking for a bunch of well to do lawyers and global asset managers and such that's a lot worse than porn stores

I miss it how it used to be with rusting out farm tractors and random garbage in empty fields. Those were the good days. Send the rich people back to Malibu and Manhattan or wherever they came from. At least bring normal priced retailers and food stores back. They all close, and some haute cuisine/wine bar/ craft brewery place moves in.

Believe it or not my Gamestop is still there for now! Most of them closed. I guess game stores aren't fashionable. Even overpriced ones. I was in there at Switch launch and it was normal. I was in a few months later when Disgaia 5 released and half the store was clearanced Star Wars foam swords. At least they have puzzles and ice cube trays. It sounds like target doesn't.

Me? optimistic? I'm sorry you must have confused me with someone else. Thanos. Or Eeyore. I don't do optimism, it's all doom and gloom on worldview. I'm just perkily sarcastic about the fate of the world like an evil Vault Boy.

@NEStalgia Read the long post in my email inbox, got here and it was raining emoji.

So, at the risk of sounding like a stalker, where the heck do you live? Kind of sounds like the north shore of Long Island, where all the non-tax paying hedge fund managers live. Think Gatsby and Wolf of Wall Street. But while LI was nothing more than one large potato and duck farm in it's past it's been suburban more than rural for 50 years now.

https://www.americanamanhasset.com/

You could be outside Austin or Dallas but your'e way too sane to be a Texan. Maybe upper midwest outside the Mall of America but you dont' mention snow enough. King of Prussia outside Philly is one large shopping mall. Maybe southwest, but that doesn't' feel right either, you seem more northern. Des Moines? I'm a big fan of Des Moines, been there twice, both memorable. You can just give me a region, doesn't have to be a state. Quad Cities maybe? Chicago? St Louis?

You do make me glad I'm living among the working class. Well except two years ago when my previously urban neighbors moved in and I'm almost certain they brought cockroaches with them, probably as stow aways in their cardboard boxes. I have a severe abhorrence of roaches. Didn't have any for 15 years and then the neighbors move in and I find one on my bedroom wall. I'm hoping it was just the one, or I mistook a jumping cricket, they look similar, but I've been jumpy ever since. I'll move if we get infested.

I was thinking vape shops when I said hashish, but you probably figured that out. Does anybody use the term "head shop" anymore? I miss head shops.

You ever watch "Orphan Black"? I just started the first season but the inner city punks spend a lot of time making fun of the suburbanites. Show is weird though, I think it's supposed to be in NYC, but all the cars have Toronto license plates and everybody has British accents. I guess people in the UK just accept that watching shows about NY from the distance of Britain.

Any way you should be cheerier. Sure keeping up with the Jones sucks, but at least there's still life somewhere. Back in the early 90's when I was teaching college I used a Tom Brokaw TV special about the death of America's middle class as a warning about how they'll all be paupers when they graduate. So that was early 90's recession, then the Y2K fears came for the 2000 recession, then 9/11 happened and NY broke, then the Great recession broke the country, nearly the world. So for me it's all been one long slope to the bottom since probably the irrational exuberance and unmitigated greed of the high flying coked up 80's. I think the people in power learned from the mass protests of the 60's not to let people protest anymore, to just crush them outright. Throw them a #metoo bone, or let them kneel, but where money is concerned it's 1% vs 99%, out in the open crushing.

But at least some people near you, probably the 70-75%, still have a shot at survival. As long as they can afford their $1,000 smartphones their good. Actually dab example, every poor person has a $1,000 phone, that's why they're poor.

I'm not even going to try to bring this one back on topic.

@rjejr LOL after what happened to FaeKnight I"m more paranoid about internet information than ever! (Did you know it was possible to just send swat teams to go attack anyone you don't like, anywhere in the country with a simple anonymous tip? Apparently this is a thing that happens, and FaeKnight received that due to winning an MK8 match and some crazy attacker looked up his IP and reported him as a terrorist or some such. Because this isn't like a Nazi Soviet utopia at all where just playing an online game can get you killed by your own government.

On a public forum, I'll say only that one of those locations isn't far off I'll say one of the worst problems is the flood of New Yorkers into the area....but that could be anywhere....there's a flood of NY plates all around the country suddenly. You people are like rats, fleeing a sinking ship and flooding the whole country at once Where do they all come from, how do they all fit in one city? I imagine it's like a Hollow Knight nest over there. Only the tunnels are in worse shape and the transport bugs aren't as timely

I just want to find a nice actually livable place that's not a luxury paradise for the monied and hurried, nor a ghetto that doesn't have summers below freezing or get flattened annually by hurricanes.

Yeah the vape shop is new. It was tobacco before. Then this ominous sign went up. I remember when it was Pizza Hut. This is what Reggie exposure does to a place.

All the old shopping centers, get totally razed and then these ugly faux stone big front header centers are built. Half of them are forever vacant and the only thing that moves in is upscale eateries for the business lunch crowd (because we all drop $18/day for lunch, right?) and "services" of various sorts. But the facade must be huge and beautiful! It must suit all the Porches in the parking lot! (Then again you're the guy with a potty the price of a Porche )

I've never seen that show but it sounds interesting. A British take on NY would be fun. Then again, isn't NY a British take on NY?

"One long slope to the bottom" yeah, that sounds about right. I'm still envious you're not living in yuppie land. Though if the trade off is being in NY, maybe it's not worth it.

@NEStalgia My best friends girlfriend family lives in Sacramento. He visits once or twice a year, it souds like what you describe. He hates it there, he's a true NYC denizen of the deep, no drivers license. Imagine where you live if you relied on mass transit. Though I suppose nowadays its Uber and Lyft.

No problem with the fear factor, I get it. And really, it's so the same everywhere anyway. I only spent 1 summer in Europe but it certainly has the US beat in variety. Though I also spent a few days in Toronto and thats just NY north.

Waiting in the auto mechanic for my NT state inspection drains me of anything even remotely interesting to say so I'm ending it here.