BAN

I’m absolutely tired of anything with the word “rogue” in it, just give me a normal game, for god’s sake.

@Phantomensch1987 Spectacular….? They’re just nicely decorated hallways. Essentially the exact same design- some alien looking facility, but swapping in different themes like ice and lava. The ONLY area that’s actually unique and interesting to look at is the gynecological-looking ruins in the jungle, but even that’s extremely limiting on where you can go and there’s not much to do there. Everything is extremely linear and you always know where to go. I don’t know man, my standards really aren’t even that high but to me the only way this game’s levels are spectacular is if you haven’t played or seen non-Nintendo AAA games in at least 15 years.

@MK73DS Ridiculous. I’ve played all the other Prime games countless times. This game’s connections to that series is skin deep at best. It’s a piss poor imitation made by an inferior staff compared to the competent devs that made 1-3 and have since left Retro. They had no creative energy, no spark, just a general direction from NCL and a deadline. The final product is a major disappointment. And people are allowed to criticize the games they’ve spent their money on, actually.

This game is crap. Boring, linear, pointless. The desert, pointless. The bike, supposedly its hallmark innovation, pointless. It feels half finished. The desert is so empty the game would honestly be better if it didn’t exist. Studios shouldn’t develop games around what people say online. You can tell there’s no passion in this turd. It represents total creative death. Anyone saying it falls “just behind Prime 1” is likely to never have played the other games. And why this site is standing by that 9/10 score is beyond me (no pun intended).

Wow. Super exciting.

@Vash0125 Okay this has to be bait.

“an unexpected direction for the Metroid Prime series – possibly more whimsy than isolation”

Oh yeah that’s totally what I want from a Metroid game. “Whimsy”. Not. And nor do I want it to be “silly”. It sounds like pathetic fanfic. Wtf were they thinking? If Metroid ever gets another game after this, hopefully they won’t hire some millennial reddit addict who’s never played a Metroid game in their entire life to write it. But given that Nintendo is hardly even mentioning this turd, much less promoting it, it’s going to be a very long time before we get another 3D Metroid.

That said, I’ll see what the reviews say about the final game. Maybe it’s better than the previews are making it sound.

I can’t imagine making this game and not targeting Nintendo platforms before anything else.

@Pillowpants Oh I’m sorry, did I express a negative opinion about games? I forgot that wasn’t allowed here.

Why tf did they make junior sound like an adult? Really off putting.

So frickin tired of roguelikes.

I can’t think of anything I’d rather do LESS in a Metroid game than drive around a big boring open sand world. Or do ANYTHING in a sand world. Does anyone actually like these areas in video games? I can’t think of a single one where people stop and go “oh yes, another desert zone, this is great.” It’s always something bland and ugly that you try to blitz through as quickly as possible. And it’s the antithesis of a good Metroid area and misses the point of the series completely.

Easy 10/10 for me. Two of the best platformers ever made (if not two of the best games in general) with improved visuals. Gaming doesn’t get much better, in my opinion.

@Qbecknight That’s just part of the Mario Galaxy experience, my friend.

@Suketoudara One, I envy you getting to play it for the first time, the game is excellent. And two, yes, I’ve always felt that about that part of Yoshi’s Island. Even when you get the star and baby Mario runs along walls and ceilings, it feels like something that could fit in Galaxy. Star bits always kind of reminded me of star men. And you could probably find several other similarities. Kinda fun.

Wow, the head of legal, lol. Can’t wait to see NOA continue to be as interesting and inspiring as a beige wall.

@N00BiSH Did you miss my other posts about it where I criticized it on numerous other points and wrote several paragraphs doing so? I replied directly to you and you replied to those posts so I can’t see how that could be.

Also that is literally all you’re doing, lol. You just keep taking everything I say is a negative about Bananza and saying “nuh uh!” or “you just described the Country games.” That’s all you’ve done so far. So it’s kind of odd to accuse me of not contributing anything of substance to the criticism when you’ve already read my posts wherein I’ve done exactly that.

@N00BiSH Such as…? What else is it if not that? I’ve been playing it. It’s fun. But what else is there? Running to the next waypoint, bypassing all the loot the game wants you to get? Splatoon level/world design? Splatoon boss fights? A chick with no shoes? Very cool.

@Oldstalk You’re right, there’s also running and climbing. Very unique.

@The_Nintend_Pedant Yup. It’s the sort of game I might go back to to mess around a bit but feel no need to complete ever again. You can really inhabit the Country games. Bananza feels incomplete. Just punching the ground gets kind of old after a while. And the overall vibe is basically just somewhere between Mario Odyssey and Splatoon, which is fun but not particularly unique or classic-bound, in my opinion.

@N00BiSH Not at all an accurate comparison. That feeling may have been true of the first Country game but that immediately became Donkey Kong’s default identity, as a character and as a series, and has been its identity for 31 years now. Far, far longer than what Donkey Kong was originally, which was really just a precursor to the Mario Series.

Bananza is good, and the moment to moment gameplay is some of the most fun I’ve ever had in a game, but what does it really add to make it the new identity of DK? Punching, digging, throwing? It’s just mechanics. That’s the only thing about the game that actually stands out. It’s Mario Odyssey dialed up to 100. The whole game is just the destructible snow drifts from Odyssey. There is no unique, cohesive vibe to make it feel like it could actually be the new way forward for the series.

Country gave you a sense of place. Highly unique music and concepts. It was visually very well crafted and really original. It added new characters that instantly felt iconic. An instant classic. All of this while harkening back to the original DK. Bananza is kind of ugly and plain. Just big random piles of terrain and not much else. The music is good but doesn’t really come close to anything from the Country games or even DK64. Probably the only thing from Bananza that will identify DK going forward is the redesign and animations of DK himself.

Anyway, we’ll have to see. But as much fun as I’m having playing Bananza, it doesn’t deserve to be at #1, and I don’t see it adding anything meaningful or lasting to the series. It’s just a big tech demo with DK in it. Like I said, it’s just mechanics. And mechanics wear thin when that’s all you have. It just becomes Minecraft, eventually.

Bananza is not the best Donkey Kong game. I’m having fun with it but it doesn’t feel like a Donkey Kong game in any way really. It’s just a digging simulator that happens to feature Donkey Kong. Tropical Freeze is by far the best DK game. DKC2 is a close second. And as someone who considers DK94 to be one of my favorite games ever, putting it ahead of Tropical Freeze is insane.

Miyamoto has a much more nuanced view of it than that. This sterilization of his opinions isn’t really fair to him. The guy clearly cares about the games themselves. The amount of time and care that he puts into games that he knows aren’t going to sell well, like Pikmin, is an obvious reflection of this. He does not believe in simply churning out generic “product” like Pokémon’s devs do. His point is that a lot of developers these days lose sight of the fact that they’re making games for other people, not for themselves, so they should appeal to other people, not just to the devs. And they end up making movies with minimal interaction instead of games that you actually play.

Don’t worry everyone. They applied for thousands of H1B’s at the same time as firing everyone, so these jobs will soon be filled with 9,000 indians who work longer hours for half the pay and are unable to job shop because Microsoft will pull their visa and send them home.

Good thing almost 100% of all modern games are made by people willing to fall all over themselves to soothe your discomforts and politically patronize you, then. God forbid there be one or two games made by someone not willing to bend to your personal demands.

@Hee-ho-master Good thinking, I would never play a game, watch a movie, read a book from or even have a conversation with someone who has different political opinions than me. I intentionally only talk to and support people who are exactly like me. This is how I convince myself I’m right about everything.

The only reason I’m “happy” about is that I’m tired of people complaining that there’s no chat function on Nintendo systems. Not having to hear that particular complaint anymore will be nice.

This seems like inaccurate rage bait. Also I’m always surprised how mad people get over this topic. I must be the only person on earth who has never used cloud saves in my entire life and I’ve been obsessively playing video games since 1987.

Most people’s TV’s are still lcd, not oled, so I never understood why that was a sticking point with anyone.

Coming out of comment retirement to say that giving this game a 7/10 and “fans” giving it a 6 is downright idiotic. I get that it’s the third time we’ve seen this game. I get that it’s way overpriced for an up-rezzed wii game. But it still looks great and the game itself is one of the best platformers of the last 20 years. Might not be worth $60 to people that have it on other platforms but if you’ve never played it, I recommend it over MANY other games on Switch.

Lmao the things they arrest people for. I’d find it more humorous if it weren’t for the crap they DON’T arrest you for.

Looks excellent. Will buy.

Damn, I just watched this movie a couple nights ago. Goomba-Toad is my favorite character in it! Rest in peace, harmonica man.

They're going to go with something more 80's. Like some kid from the real world gets sucked into the world of a Zelda game. Like Where the Wild Things Are, but Zelda.

@Twilite9 Not true, everyone took a dump on the Mario movie when it was announced. Especially when they learned the cast. And as cool as a Ghibli film would be, or even Laika (gross), Nintendo wants people to actually SEE the film. So it makes sense to not go that route.

@Sunnyleafs Dude is getting paid to talk into a microphone for our entertainment. We’re the ones that have to pay for the result. I think a few people posting mild criticisms about it online is a small price for him to pay.

I know Charles is getting old and maybe that’s why he’s no longer voicing these characters, but after completing Mario Wonder as well as hearing this Wario, I honestly don’t think Kevin holds a torch to Charles. He’s kind of not a great replacement, in my opinion. In the very least, he probably shouldn’t be voicing Wario, as others have said.

I find this very surprising. I didn’t find these guys to be annoying at all, whereas the talking flowers (in English, at least) became as aggressively obnoxious to me as nails on a blackboard after like two levels.

Using the pro controller for sidescrollers is gross.

The only thing I’d ding it on is soundtrack. It’s just a slight disappointment. Oh, and the English flower voice actor is intensely annoying to me. Other than that, it’s a 10 for me.

@Bret Yep, that is the main reason I ended up muting them after a while.

I mean, if it were like $5 no one would care. It's just massively overpriced.

@5th313ment Welcome to the 2020's, western video games have been captured. It is just highly ironic for a series like Borderlands to go from what it originally was to essentially a work of religious devotion to ideology that diametrically opposes what it originally was. But oh well, we must support the current thing!

@Rykdrew Uhhh... why are you talking about Rayman? Literally no one cares.

Switch is probably the first system where most of my games on the system have been digital. It wouldn't really affect me to not have the ability to play physical games.

That said, I'm not sure if I would want a digital only Switch 2. I wouldn't rule it out. But if it's significantly cheaper, I'd say it's a good thing, because it would definitely help more people get their hands on one.

@Bizzyb We’ll see if it makes that two month deadline.

@Bizzyb I understand that, but having worked in development, I know that it is extremely rare for a delay to be announced a week before launch. Usually that can only mean the platform holder didn’t want to certify or strongly suggested delaying.

Weird to see a delay this close to the planned release date. Wonder if it didn’t clear Nintendo’s certification process or something.

@Cia I hope Nintendo continues to resist, but frankly Microsoft could easily push for a hostile route to taking them over. This email proves that they might try it.

@Znake Mario games have literally always been geared towards kids and general audience. That’s the whole point of the franchise.