Blizzia

@SwitchVogel Ironically I'd throw all my money at the screen for a Star Wars game completely centered on Jar Jar Binks.

Best Star Wars character ever xD I don't even like the franchise, but I love Jar Jar Binks.

@SpaceboyScreams Honestly, as a MH veteran, my advice to you is to ignore literally all the tutorials. Just A that shtuff and start fighting.

There is nothing in the MH franchise that you'll be properly taught through the tutorials, they've always been horrible, obscure or simply too "lab-like" (completely controlled environment that doesn't teach you how to do something when the actual situation occurs).

All you need to know is that Y uses the item in your lower right (basic UI), and holding L and pressing Y/A scrolls between available items to use.

As for other notable items - there's meat which replenishes stamina (the big yellow bar), and potions which replenish health (you know this bar, because it's probably hitting zero or close to it often in the beginning ). Traps you place on the ground, let monsters run into them and point and laugh when they do.

All weapon combos are listed in your "Hunter's Notes" but honestly, it's just a bunch of text that won't truly show you what the weapon does.

Pick any weapon, go into a mission, and just start trying out different buttons to see what they do. Check your hunter's notes if you're curious on additional possible moves.

When you start out fighting monsters, focus specifically on one of two things:

1. If you're melee simply focus on HITTING the monster. Don't worry about your combos, don't worry about WHAT you hit the monster with. Just hit it. Bonus points for head with blunt weapons, or tail with sharp weapons.

2. If you're ranged, focus on aiming, and avoiding the monster. Aim for the head of the monster, aim for the tail, aim for the upper back. These are common weak spots, and the better you get at aiming, the better you get at ranged weapons. Dodge early and dodge often.

That's it.

Also, special note: keybinds differ a bit from melee to ranged, so the first time you try ranged, just be aware of that.

Once you're consistently hitting the monster with melee (read: not trading - aka you hit it, it hits you. Single-way action - it takes damage, you do not), you can start thinking about combos.

Once you stop missing half your shots with ranged and carting before the monsters limps, you can think about combos. Don't use stationary ranged moves until you know what you're doing.

@tseliot I mean they are, but they're probably in the genre "interactive movie" more than a meta game genre.

Interactive movies/books etc are still games, as you can control what happens to a certain extent.

The same holds true for most games. The level or method of control is all that differs. A visual novel with branching stories is no different from an action game with branching stories. You're actively deciding how to progress. The gameplay portion still revolves around these choices - whatever the game decides to force you to spend the rest of your time doing ultimately doesn't make it any less of a game, even if one game is pretty much just a movie where you make choices here and there, and the other is a button mashing hack and slash hypertempo game

I still hope we aren't getting a Switch Pro. It'll just end with the new 3ds fiesta we had and that was annoying. Besides, I'd be pretty sad if my animal crossing edition stopped seeing use haha.

I mean yeah it's cool, but it's a mod so it is kinda irrelevant.

Also, Nintendo will shut it down before it nears completion anyway since they went public so it doesn't really matter.

If you want to release mods for Nintendo games, you stay silent until it's done, release it, let as many people download it as possible, then remove the download link and allow the community to share it with the world so you don't get bombed by the Nintendo ninjas.

NGL that looks bad.

I prefer how it looks now honestly xD Not joking either.

You know, I don't think they are. Especially not if they're aiming for 500 units.

@TheFrenchiestFry I mean honestly, Apex is a joke on all platforms. It's just about the most hacked game out there and it's utterly pointless to even attempt ranking in it when you're guaranteed to face cheaters half the time.

Won't be getting it, already tried it years ago and it's pretty much as bad as nearly every other Zelda game. Hoping they stick to the BotW formula permanently moving forward as that's a very distinct and clear evolution from the old Zelda formula.

If they entirely redesign the overworld sprites, sure. The rest is looking great, but the overworld looks like a cheap mobile game rip-off, which is a massive shame.

The overworld looks so insanely ugly I just wont be able to bring myself to buy and play this. Christ. Those player models are HORRENDOUS. They look worse than the originals!

Looking forward to Pokémon Legends though.

Sorry Liam, but this is simply clickbait. Please try harder in the future.

I'm with Beatrice up top here. Nintendolife is an active contributor to said problem, so it's pretty hilarious that this article exists. That, coupled with the CP2077 picture seeming like the article defends that sad sad product stops me from taking it too seriously.

Is there a hype problem? Yes. Is it mostly on news websites and marketing/developers with big mouths? Yes.

CP2077 is actually a good example of the "chasers" being completely in the right. Both marketing AND developers promised something they knew they couldn't deliver in any way, shape or form, and also proceeded to rush development, leaving the final product even worse off.

I didn't do izuchi a lot, but think I have a lazy bow clear of 7 min while testing the new kit.

as for mizutsune I managed ~8 (7:56) min with hammer and 10 (10:00 lol) min with bow so far.

Ah, how disappointing. I thought he might have had some backbone. He wasn't wrong, after all. Just a hypocrite, but still.

@The_Pixel_King You're welcome, and that sounds good! Hoping to see you around.

@The_Pixel_King You're welcome! Some people are saying there are animation locks, and while that is true, the animation locks in Rise are very minor, and honestly, as long as you don't button mash, you won't have trouble.

Fighting a new monster? Don't mash the buttons that you know will lock you into animations.

In Monster Hunter, it's actually very useful to simply not attack a monster for 2-4 minutes the first time you fight it. Just focus on dodging and reading its movements. After that, you'll have a better idea of when you can attack.

@Lugazz You're welcome

Ranged weapons are addicting once you get hooked on improving with them - melee weapons are a lot easier to start out with, despite still having high skill caps.

I look forward to (hopefully) hearing you toot that horn!

@crimsontadpoles HH buffs yourself as well

Also, the finisher is now a useful offensive tool, and the silkbind jab attack does HUGE damage as well.

It's a very different weapon from previous entries, a lot better.

@The_Pixel_King I don't think there's a wrong way to use dual blades honestly They're really nice, fast to use, excellent for newbies due to the low recovery, and have a fairly simple loop of max energy -> demon mode -> super demon mode -> back to normal while your energy recovers. Switching between the modes is also pretty easy, and removing demon mode when you don't feel safe enough (like if you need to conserve energy for dodging) is also easy and safe to do.

Over time you'll discover the most damaging combos, so don't worry too hard about that. They do overall great damage, just gotta keep them at max sharpness and make sure you don't attack armored spots without demon mode activated if you don't want them to bounce off.

EDIT: And if half of this sounds like gibberish to you, just read the TL;DR instead.

TL;DR Dual Blades: great for new players, very easy to experiment with and the only thing you really need to know is: open your menu, find "hunter notes", go into the weapon notes and figure out how to activate demon mode. Once you know that, activate/deactivate it during hunts (activate for damage, deactivate to conserve/recover energy, for example for dodging) and just keep playing

@Lugazz As far as ranged weapons go, I would advise you to start with the LBG. It might be a tad boring, but it's honestly THE weapon to get used to gunner gameplay with. Especially in Rise, seeing as it is relatively powerful at all stages of play, and lets you avoid hard punishment as it has no moves that require you to truly be stationary for prolonged periods of time.

Once you get used to moving as a gunner (hint: don't get hit Gunner life is pretending you have 1 hp, getting caught in a bad spot usually means carting in endgame), you can upgrade to Heavy Bowgun if you want to work on your movement even more (HBG is easy to use offensively, but it's essentially a ranged Greatsword in terms of movement - it'll improve your awareness a ton), or Bow if you want to work on maintaining correct range and sweetspotting/hitting weak spots (much easier to test sweetspots out with, faster movement but you get punished much harder for not hitting sweetspots.)

As far as Charge Blade goes, it's in a weird spot in Rise, but it's a super fun weapon tbh. With weird spot I mean that it has CPP (Counter Peak Performance), a silkbind move which is the best option in any and every situation once you master the weapon.

For a newbie, this doesn't matter, but once you master the weapon, you'll discover that any time you could've done something else, the better offensive option is to use CPP. Which is a shame, as the weapon has a nice rhythm otherwise, which is just turned into "wait for CPP, use CPP, big damage, wait for CPP".

If you decide to use the CB in the full game, I suggest removing CPP and using Axe Hopper instead for that silkbind slot. It'll provide you with way more fun if you do get experienced with the weapon. If they nerf CPP, using it might be fine, but it'll quickly become a crutch

For effects:

CPP (Counter Peak Performance) - Perfect Guard, Fills phials to max, lets you immediately discharge for massive damage

AH (Axe Hopper) - Axe slam overhead hit, then you spin into the air where you can use Element discharge as you come back down. Harder to use, worse than CPP, but NOT the best choice in every situation, making it probably a lot more fun to use in endgame, since it's super good in some situations but isn't the go-to choice most of the time.

@Lugazz Glad you enjoyed reading it! The hunting horn has really come a long way since MH3U, truly.

It has been in a sort of tough spot where it was mainly trial and error (or tedious searching for guides, of which there weren't many) until you figured out what the heck to do. They've gradually made it more intuitive, simplified the moveset and increased the visual feedback, but until Rise it still remained a sorta obscure weapon to play with.

For me and a lot of others I know/knew, Hunting Horn was a side project we began delving into after mastering the Hammer. It felt so clunky and slow to use that unless you had spent a while with the hammer, it was really hard to get used to.

Combine that with forced combos (need the right inputs for the right buffs after all), and it was just not in a great spot in terms of being intuitive to use, and a weapon you'd start out with.

EXCELLENT weapon at all times, great endgame weapon, but never a weapon you'd recommend to someone new to the franchise. Which naturally meant that you rarely saw HH users, and the moment you saw a HH user online their room would be swarmed immediately (those buffs are GOOD).

But the current HH is just... Amazing. Great visual feedback, you can aim-adjust hits in process, and the weapons moveset finally makes you feel like you're grooving to the beat. Couple that with it being relatively simple to use now (visual feedback) for beginners, it being faster and way less clunky than before, and you've got a winning combo.

Also, regarding the topic at hand... Results don't surprise in the least.

Longsword, as usual, is incredibly versatile and has a kit that is so overloaded that using it even at the lowest level of skill feels amazing (I'd know, I've maybe spent 20 hours with longsword in total prior to Rise, felt it (in general, compared to other weapons) was really easy to use, but not exciting for me).

In Rise, the kit is just mental. I wonder how it'll fare vs everything else with properly optimized setups, but regardless of what set effects it has in the demo, that weapon packs a punch, and the kit is FIRE. It was really fun to use, super exciting, and it just looked good and felt satisfying. The demo has it placed super ahead of everyone in terms of how good it is, but I think they'll close in once we get the full game, since set effects in the demo are never optimized - they just give you full stylish sets to display what the game has to offer.

Hunting Horn has finally been made satisfying to use - it's usually not a very popular weapon because of how technical it is, but with Rise the learners don't start before the starting point, going "wait so what does this weapon even do", and being unable to string together proper buffs. There's visual indicators for every buff along with the buttons you need to hit, there's a bobbing "dude use ZR + X" icon when you've got a 3 buff lineup, and the "finisher" looks amazing - it makes you WANT to use it as much as possible. Compared to how HH was prior, this is a massive step up, and I'm so happy it is popular now.

Greatsword is, as usual, the resident "big eggplant damage" weapon, it's always been quite popular. I think people in general enjoy using it. Personally it didn't quite click with me this time around, though the true charged slash is just hilarious to use - especially in cases where, instead of whiffing the entire hit, I can actually re-aim it and still land the 2nd hit despite messing my position up, so the damage isn't fully lost.

Anyway, my pick, as usual, was the bow. It's incredibly fun to use, super versatile, having to be at the proper range and switch up coatings feels really good and satisfying - dragonpiercer is the dopest move ever. I REALLY like the bow. It simply rewards good play and punishes bad play to a degree where it can be an amazing asset or the most useless thing ever (0 charge non-sweet spot hits on resistant hitboxes deal 1 damage to a monster - literally nothing. Meanwhile 0 charge sweet spot hits on weakspots can do 1-3x 14 or 16 or even 18 damage). It's still not a weapon I expect to see many use, but for me, it feels rewarding to master.

I like how they made LBG and HBG "entry" gunner-type weapons. They feel far easier to use, and in general the HBG has gotten a lot of QoL that it was previously missing in my opinion. It just feels better to use and to move around with, probably due to how the game has been sped up.

I used to be switch axe/charge blade/hammer main, but this time it's the bow.

I can't wait.

EDIT: Also, if anyone cares, hi. These are just my opinions - you don't have to agree with them. Worry not though, I'm not pulling them out of a hat with nothing to back it up. 3k+ hours in monster hunter - 1500 with the hammer at least. probs 1k combined for SA/CB, 100-200 hours on bow, and the rest around 300-400 hours combined.

@shazbot I think that the demos have always been an extremely poor representation of the Monster Hunter franchise, so I don't think anybody would blame you for not liking it after trying the demo.

The demo removes the satisfying loop that the game has. I've never understood why they do it this way, honestly.

Anyway, the actual loop is usually prep -> hunt monster -> craft gear/items, rinse and repeat.

Often you'd hunt monsters to craft gear that gave beneficial set effects when fighting other monsters and other stuff like that. Or hunt monsters for materials needed to craft something, or because they had a map full of good resources that just worked well while fighting them. OR just hunt them to progress through hunter ranks so you could fight tougher monsters.

So it is very much a loop of preparing to hunt, hunting, then using the rewards to prepare for the next hunt or work towards preparing for future hunts, or even crafting other weapon types.

The demo is legit just hunt, and no reward. The hunt is fun, for sure, but I'd be lying if I said I spent 95-100% of my time hunting. In reality I spent like 30% prepping, 60% hunting and 10% crafting. While that's still mostly hunting, it's still a much more satisfying loop than a "boss rush" where you can pick 2 monsters (I know there were a few guest stars, but still).

Anyway, I think you should at least check out a few streams post-release to see what it's actually like, but other than that, well, it's like any game franchise. Not for everyone.

Sounds good! I'll add this trilogy to my list of purchased Atelier games I'll never get to (Got all of them, played through zero so far on Switch, 1 on ps vita - it's a horrible addiction.)

Restarting Rorona for the 7th time tonight.

Lets gooo!

(I'll get there eventually. I buy them on sales So far I've just had poor timing and ended up finishing other games every time I've started Rorona, then forgotten the plot and mechanics and restarted.)

Whenever something like this comes up (an improvement that does nothing, or Nintendo being Nintendo and doing something that would've probably been cool in the 90s but is utterly antiquated and pointless today), I can't help but think that this is exactly what happens when you actively recruit people who do not play games to make, well, games.

It's incredible how easy it is for a gamer to see what will and what won't fly with consumers or make for a great experience. P2P? Get that ***** out of there. If a game has significant online presence, get that on a dedicated server immediately - it will make the experience better for the majority, which is what matters. Then include local multiplayer for the people sitting in the same room. Done.

Some people would argue fighting games are better with p2p, but that's also just bogus. P2P in a fighting game means that 7 out of 10 fights will be frustrating lagfests where you might as well just afk because the game is unplayable - even with good netcode. Yes, I pulled that number out of my behind, but it honestly isn't even an unfair estimate. Those 3 in 10 great fights where skill was the determining factor simply aren't worth it - consistency is king.

Anyway, rant over. Won't be answering replies, just something I needed off my chest :3

@Clyde_Radcliffe Personally I really disliked Miyamoto Zelda games like Ocarina of Time, and I think Breath of the Wild elevated the franchise to a new height. But I guess it does feel a bit alien for people who loved previous Zelda titles (I've tried them all, and the only one I actually enjoyed was Breath of the Wild) since it's such a large departure from what the 3D entries were previously focused on both in terms of atmosphere, pacing, storytelling and even gameplay.

Had it not been Tencent (or any other Chinese company), I would've applied instantly.

Alas, I draw the line at Chinese companies.

@HotGoomba___Rebrand Hmm? One time? Are we still acting like the Wii U didn't happen?

Though I guess it's a bit different since the 3DS covered the finances well.

But yeah, Capcom never fails to miss the mark.

Honestly I thought the Indie World was pretty horrible.

So many games that just outright looked "meh", and then Calico... Like jesus. Game looks half finished at most. Animations are wonky AF too, just in the trailer. I was like "cool, about 6-10 months from release then I guess" and then it hit me with the truth...

Cool with Among Us and Cyber Shadow, but the rest just looked meh (Very Very Valet looked sorta interesting, not for me, but in terms of how good the game seemed to be).

This was really not what I was hoping for at all, rip.

Spelunky was interesting to see though, as all I've ever tried is... spelunker party? or what it was called, which was an absolutely terrible, soulless game. Spelunky looks to be cool enough for people into that genre.

@Xeraphis August 2019...

Looks nice, but Neowiz has dirtied it by simply being name-dropped in the trailer. I'll pass.

So Ghost of Tsushima got GOTY. Nice.

@scully1888 I've been waiting a long, long time for a NL review as thoroughly MARINATED in quality as this one.

Thank you. Absolutely magnificent writing.

Ah, a clickbait article. Who is reporting on this, I wonder?

Ah, Damo.

Ah.

If you haven't jammed to Limp Bizkit - Rollin' at least once in your life, you haven't experienced life.

Not a fan of Descenders or Limp Bizkit outside that one song, but this is pretty cool (the hidden world and including Limp Bizkit soundtracks).

@Fudgeyman I see you forgot how to spell hellspawn, but that's ok.

Geez. What a bad plan.

I don't know if the limited availability thing generated a lot more sales, but I bought it simply because I wanted to force myself to actually try out Mario games again. I used to enjoy them back in the day, and trying out Super Mario 64 again sounded like fun.

Haven't actually played any of the trilogy yet but I'll get to it, eventually.

@TheDavyStar Whether it is unethical or not is another matter entirely - but if we just think of the train of thought I presented as realistic, that still means that they do indirectly support these emulator devs, whether they like it or not.

I agree that it is a problematic idea, but sometimes, instead of considering everything from the standpoint of "is it right or wrong", maybe it's better to think of it as "We could report on this... But if we reported on it, would it benefit our readers?"

If the answer to that is "no" (like in this case) - maybe they shouldn't be so busy thinking about whether they can report on emulators, but more whether they should.

People, in general, come here for Nintendo stuff. That someone made an emulator mimicking the Switch which nobody should be using anyway coz, well, they should be using their Switch (until it goes out of production)... is kinda pointless and not something that matters to people who play on Nintendo Switch, aka their readers.

@TheDavyStar While they aren't directly "supporting" it, level with me for a second.

Does reporting on the existence of this emulator increase the likelihood of more people using it? Yes.

Does knowledge of the existence of an emulator increase the likelihood of more people pirating games? Also yes.

In short: Does the existence of this article reporting on and spreading information about the emulator and what it can do (and how you can support its devs)... Support them?

Yes, yes it does.

Therefore, without being too unreasonable, one could claim that NintendoLife is supporting the creators of the emulator, and therefore the risk of increased piracy as well.

Of course you could counter and say that increased knowledge of the existence of the emulator could lead to a swifter demise for it, since Nintendo will find out about it earlier... But until they do something about it, well, this article does, albeit indirectly, support the creators of the emulator.

@Alienfreaks04 No. This one drops it all on the floor, steps on it, lights it on fire, then pees on it.

Avoid.

@DarkLloyd I mean you CAN make a game like The Missing Link and then approach Nintendo and pitch it.

You just shouldn't be foolish enough to tell a single soul about the game or, worse, publish it on github.

That's just asking for trouble, and will get you nowhere.

This pleases me greatly.

A well-placed middle finger to all pirates, I love it.

Shrug. It's a big company. Can't fix it all. Also, sigh. Another easy way in for underrepresented groups.

Why bring the best person for the job when you can bring some diversity to bolster your SJW rating?

The skin color of your employees does not matter. Their sexuality doesn't matter. Their genders do not matter. Their physical health does not matter unless there's a specific reason it would compromise their work. Their mental health matters tremendously.

Invest the money in mental health instead of diversity.

Not sure what I should start with, but thinking Sunshine. I played SM64 back in the day, but I never finished it.

Haven't tried the two others at all.

Personally I don't think the game looks ready for release as-is, in terms of gameplay. I hope the few months they have left can be used to polish it more. The video showed a lot of issues that need to be taken care of for it to be a quality release, especially in combat.

Unfortunately the game probably goes gold in less than a month, meaning what we just saw is probably what we will get.

Oh well.

4 pairs of lovely joy-con and they don't drift <3

Meh, Bloomberg is the source. Not credible.

Bull. Pure bull.

It wasn't too difficult. KH games are less demanding than several games we already have.