BenAV

There's a chance that I've bought my last first party Switch game at this point unless there are more surprises on the way. Definitely getting Metroid Prime 4 but there's a chance that could release on the Switch 2 as well. Thinking about giving Xenoblade Chronicles X another chance (didn't like it the first time despite mainline Xenoblade being my favourite series) but it comes out a day before Atelier Yumia so not sure if I'll get around to buying it.

@Maxz I think if it was going to launch early next year then we probably would have gotten an announcement by now regardless of the upcoming holidays. If it's a bit further off, which I think the Xenoblade announcement is a hint towards, then there's really no reason to announce it yet.

Had the game preordered since it was announced but ended up cancelling this week just because I don't think I'd get around to playing it for at least a while and I'm trying to get out of the habit of buying games that I think I want to play but then never end up getting around to. Glad that it turned out well though, hopefully I'll find the time to pick it up and play it eventually.

Haven't played any of them as of yet. I've had Slay the Princess on PC for a while and intend to give it a go at some point in the near future now that The Pristine Cut is out. Neva is definitely on my list of games to played as I quite enjoyed GRIS but I have a lot to play as is so will probably wait for a sale.

Ys VIII is my favourite that I've played so far. It's also the only one I've played so that doesn't mean anything. Good game though.

Dave the Diver was an absolute blast. If whatever comes next is anywhere near as fun then count me in.

PS with the top four in the software charts but the Switch hardware just keeps on selling.

@Samalik Not free but it's pretty cheap standalone.

Don't mind seeing info for Mario Party games all come out early considering how questionable a lot of the mechanics and other design choices have been in recent entries. Probably not getting this one regardless though, I know I'd end up playing it like once then never getting around to it again.

I had very little expectations from this one just based on the first trailer I saw for it TBH. Art style is pretty enough but I couldn't see what else it had going for it aside from that.

Some of the big publishers these days probably would have just released this as the full game.

I wasn't too bothered by it TBH. I think the game's button mapping in general could be more optimised (it would be very easy to completely free up the Dpad for setting echoes to) but it was simple enough to work with as is. Most of the time the echoes I wanted would be near the start of the most recent list and if they're not I'd just use the + menu instead.

I don't give much weight to Metacritic scores as I often find my personal taste in games can be very different to the general consensus but I do think that the Switch easily has the overall best library of games out any console yet.

I'm generally not too fussy about framerate but I've definitely found it to be noticeable in this game and it's somewhat impacted my experience of exploring the world. At least the dungeons have been fine. Overall the blur effect still bothers me more though.

I'm all for as many games as possible being ported to the Switch but the visual hit is a little rough when I think the visuals/atmosphere is one of the main things it has going for it. I felt the gameplay was alright but nothing special really, but I dunno if that's just me.

As far as the gameplay goes, it's my favourite top-down Zelda game. The inconsistent framerate and the blur effect have taken away from my enjoyment a like bit though, which is a bit annoying as both issues would be pretty simple to solve with a couple of options in the settings to lock the framerate to 30fps and turn the blur off. Overall I've got it as an 8/10, not finished yet though.

Not sure how well utilised they'd be for third party ports but they could be pretty handy if used correctly. It never hurts to have more control options at the very least.

@geo-shifter I did play the fan translation years ago but I'm mainly just meaning the continuation of the main series anyway. Been over eight years since Spirit of Justice now and over seven years since The Great Ace Attorney 2 originally released in Japan. That's a pretty long time without any new games beyond ports/translation so hopefully they've spent that time coming up with some good ideas for the next game and the wait will be worth it.

Feels like a billion years since the last game. Hopefully we're getting pretty close to a new entry now that the entire series is available on modern systems.

As long as it's a full, proper game and doesn't require me to touch the mobile game to get the most out of it then I'll buy it. It's a series that I always enjoy and I end up smashing through the games in like a week so two in a year is no problem.

@Bratwurst35 I'm one of the ones who has never really been able to tell. I've never known whether a game I'm playing is 30fps or 60fps without being told and I need a side-by-side comparison to really see the difference. Been playing some games on PC lately with 120fps or higher but I don't notice any difference from playing a game at 60fps.

Still my favourite game of this year so far.

@DarkTron Assuming that it also doesn't get delayed a billion times then yeah.

@UltimateOtaku91 Or they could just not announce them all way before they're close to being finished.

As neat as the remake of the first game is, it's really hard to get excited about Level-5 announcements when they always announce way too early in advance and then inevitably delay further. I don't want to know about planned 2026 releases in 2024.

Looking forward to playing this in 2028.

I don't think the game is very good to begin with TBH so I'm not particularly surprised that Nintendo wouldn't care about holding onto the trademark.

At the very least it always seemed like they were deliberately walking the tight line between what they can and can't get away with, if some of the design similarities were anything to go by. If you're going down that path then you've gotta be careful to make sure you're covered legally from all angles as you know the other party is going to be looking carefully for any slip ups.

@MiltonHolmes It is allowed to succeed. It just needs to do so without infringing on other companies' patents. If they did nothing wrong then no worries but if the allegations are proven true then they deserve to face the consequences.

EA can say whatever they like but I'm still not buying any of their games on any of my systems.

I loved Ender Lilies so I've been looking forward to this.

The delays really killed my interest in this one. Been keeping my eye on prices for the physical copy but being a Nintendo game, it never gets cheap enough to really tempt me. If anything it hasn't even gotten any cheaper than what I originally had it preordered for before Amazon cancelled my order.

I just want more games that are fun TBH, don't really care how technically impressive they are. Only one I'm particularly interested in is Monster Hunter Wilds, assuming it's a better Monster Hunter game than World at least.

@Diogmites I'd highly recommend playing the original Ace Attorney Trilogy before these games as there are a lot of returning characters and references to those games that you won't fully appreciate otherwise. Plus they're great games and are worth playing.

Investigations 2 is right up there with Trials & Tribulations and The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles as the very best in the entire series IMO. Easy 10/10 game. Glad it's finally got an official localisation so that more people can experience it. Better late than never.

@SillyG Reminds me of when I went to buy a copy of Xenoblade Chronicles on the Wii in the morning on launch day from a big EB Games store in Melbourne and was lucky enough to snag the last of the two whole copies they received for non-preorders. I've preordered games I want day one ever since then just to be on the safe side.

Visual novels are never going to be huge sellers compared to a lot of other types of games but a game doesn't need to sell millions and millions of copies to be a success. Niche games are just as important as the big mainstream ones IMO. The video game market would be very boring with little variety if developers only focused on making whatever will sell the best all the time.

I'm still in the middle of playing the game so I can't give it a final score yet but I'm loving it so far. Probably a solid 9 at least for me unless the ending is super disappointing.

Edit: Changed my vote to a 10 after finishing it.

Love the series so will be grabbing this day one. I was interested to see the combat as I didn't like the system in the Ryza games as much as the more traditional turn-based ones and this one seemed it might be going more in the action route. From the small glimpse here it looks like it could be a bit more along the lines of something like Xenoblade's combat system, which I wouldn't be complaining about at all if that were the case given that's easily my favourite JRPG series ever.

That's good news if it's available from the start. I hate it when games have their higher difficulties locked behind completing the game, especially when the default difficulty options are too easy. I like a bit of a challenge but I rarely feel like doing multiple playthroughs of a game.

Thank Goodness You're Here! definitely gets my vote too. SteamWorld Heist II was fun as well though. Haven't played the rest but been planning to check out Can of Wormholes someday. Was originally planning to play World of Goo 2 but the price put me off.

Biggest highlight for me was definitely the new Atelier game but it's also nice to see a new Rune Factory game that has potential to be good. The Indie World was overall pretty solid as well.

@Samalik They've always got their unique twist on things but they were always turn based till Ryza which introduced some real time elements into the mix. Maybe if they continue to pump out games like every year or so like they have been there could still be room for both though.

@IceEarthGuard Yeah it looked more like an action game plus with a bit of a darker/more serious tone than you typically see in an Atelier game. Made me question whether it was going to be a brand new series by the same devs rather than an Atelier game.

I do hope they don't completely abandon the more traditional turn-based games to be honest. I don't mind them taking the series in a new direction and trying to grow its popularity but hopefully they occasionally give us something a bit more traditional from time to time as well like Atelier Sophie 2.

This one genuinely surprised me just by how incredible it looks based on the trailer compared to Rune Factory 5. Hopefully they've got this whole 3D thing figured out now.

I assumed it was at Atelier game straight away from the style but grew increasingly less and less sure about it as the trailer went on. Seems to have a pretty different vibe to it to the rest of the series and I'm really keen. Been one of my favourite series in recent years since playing Rorona for the first time on Switch followed by the billion other titles.

I usually enjoy the Indie World presentations so just that would have been enough for me. The Partner Showcase right after is just a bonus. Should be a fun time.

It's such a great game. I'll probably end up buying it again on PC sometime down the track as an excuse to play it over from scratch and experience all the new stuff added since launch. Played great on Switch in handheld mode though.

I'm all for the game getting as long as it needs but it really shouldn't have been announced when it was.

Not interested in the game personally but always pleased to hear about more games adding gyro aiming. It should just be a staple feature for Switch releases at this point.