BlueBCA

Nintendo have become insanely stingey and consumer unfriendly in recent years. Under the success of the Switch brand, they've changed. Less value for money in all of their products for one. Major games feel like they're being made with bloated budgets that other developers can't afford, in the same way that big brand Hollywood movies from Disney and Pixar do.

3D All Stars was already gross and egregious. People called it out, but it was a massive success regardless. This is even worse though. Screw off, Nintendo. I'm keeping my money.

@Coxula It didn't happen just once. Genki released several waves of marketing materials over several months that showed off the Switch 2. It can't be called a mistake.

It's the right outcome and Genki were stupid for doing what they did. They behaved in a very, self-serving manner and it deservedly backfired big time. But at the same time, as much as I hate 'leak culture', Nintendo didn't suffer. The Switch 2 was always going to be a massive success. The wind may have been temporarily taken out of their sales, but it didn't have any impact overall. Nintendo as a big corporation needs no sympathy and their launch was certainly not "ruined". They didn't really lose out in any tangible, lasting way. And Genki played stupid games and won a stupid prize.

@USWITCH64 As @Sonicka said, not on Switch 1. Switch 1 version sadly looks awful and runs at 30fps with poor frame pacing. GVG did a Switch and PS5 comparison video that you can look up. As yet we have no details about the Switch 2 version, but it will be available for a £/$/€10 upgrade fee when it releases, so you'll more than likely be able to carry any data across. I'm betting that it'll have performance a performance mode for 60fps and a fidelity mode the like the PS5 version, albeit neither will look as good for obvious reasons.

@HammerGalladeBro Okay so you aren't picking up understand the intended humour and sarcasm. He's not legitimately saying that he can't play the game if the cart isn't yellow, but he would like the cart to be yellow regardless. And it plays into the skit he's doing, which ended up going wrong.

All this for a cart that's not even the right even the right shade of yellow. Bloody idiot with more money sense and a craving for his 15 minutes of social media fame. He got what he wanted, I guess.

@Aerona Thanks I hate it too

@Misima Again, good for you but that's entirely subjective based upon your unique circumstances.

@chefgon @Misima Good for you both. Personally though, I find the JoyCon uncomfortable to as mice and couldn't find any set up where it was practical to attempt more mode at all. I typically play in docked mode sat on a sofa or bed. Getting to use the JoyCon on my lap, the arm of the sofa, the bed or some sort of mat/tray was awkward. If I'm going to use a mouse, I'd want to be sitting at a desk and that's just not how I play my Switch. But even if it was, I wouldn't want to be stuck to the small system screen and I would much rather use a real mouse instead.

DXD is not something I want to bother trying out.

No thanks. Out of curiosity I paid £8 for Welcome Tour and skipped a solid 75% of the minigames because it quickly became obvious that mouse mode suuuuuuuucks. I was really disappointed to see that practically all of the minigames were mouse mode only. It's a novel feature and yes it certainly works, but that's where the compliments end. DxD does not look like a fun game and I'm certainly not interested in any game that wants me to hold the JoyCon like that.

@KafeiToGo Consumer protection in this day and age is a joke. Just look at the gaming industry. We purchase licenses instead of games, and it's become normalised to buy access to gambling dressed up as "loot boxes" and content that's been stripped out of games so that they can sell it back to you. Believe me, I'm well on your side about consumer protection.

But regarding F4F, I think you're over stating it quite a bit. At the end of the day, they are a business and they are creating collectables. They're just marketing, and you've got to actively seek out the community if you want to engage. Just because the vibe is overly positive doesn't mean you can't speak up about something you dislike. Unless things have changed, they were always pretty fair in the past.

@KafeiToGo The Collectors Club is an official group. I helped get it started in the early days! (I was one of the original admins, predating the ambassadors that they have now). It's run by the guy in charge, that's Alex Davis, and his team.

Admittedly, I fell out of the loop and was more or less let go as the group grew and I couldn't keep up. Like I said, I lost interest in the products. They were becoming flasher and more expensive and it felt like small-time fans and new starters were being priced out intentionally.

I don't really have anything to do with the company at all these days. I think the ambassadors are basically just mods/admins though? Nothing dodgy about that. But it is very echo-chambery, no arguments about that. Makes it hard to want to engage when you just hear the same thing over and over. And the problem is that there's nowhere else to go to share your interest.

If I had to guess, everything is just symptomatic of the audience largely being hardcore collectors. They're as interested in having a full set with matching numbers as they are in collecting statues of the things that they genuinely like. I remember when a new line was announced (for the sake of example let's say it was the Banjo Kazooie) and there would be multiple people in the group happily saying "I've never played the series before/don't even like the series, but I NEED to buy this so that I have a complete F4F series". That's the audience that F4F appeals to these days, the people who can and will throw their money at the brand. And don't get me wrong, cause I know first hand that the brand creates amazing products. I've got shelves full of them. But they really have quite expertly built a community of collectors.

The penny kind of dropped for me when I missed out on a statue that I really wanted, one that I even had a small hand in designing (only in terms of suggesting ideas, I'm no artist). The courier delivering it messed up royally, and ultimately I never recieved it. I had every single Sonic statue up to that point and more already order to come after it, but I missed that one and it hurt. It was permanently sold out. The next few statues that they announced didn't quite match the style of the existing statues. I was on the fence, but went with my gut and decided no. And then they started releasing re-colour status. I was glad I stopped. Missing that one statue by accident was a blessing in disguise.

I bear no ill will to F4F. I think they're pretty awesome. It's been years since I've spoken to Alex and, unless he's had a lobotomy since then, the dude's not only a great businessman but also just a genuinely really cool, really nice and very down to Earth guy. The last time I had any interaction with the company was when, out of the blue, I went on a rant on the Collectors Club about charges/tariffs F4F were imposing on UK orders. Admittedly I still think that those charges sounded very unfriendly, but I don't know the full details.

The company ain't dodge or sketch. Just keep your wits about you. Don't get sucked in. What they sell shouldn't be seen as collectables. They're too expensive for that, and you kind of get yourself into a sunk costs fallacy. If you see one or two things that would make a nice centre piece though? Save up and treat yourself.

@KafeiToGo Dodgy how? I don't know them to be dodgy at all. Dodgy implies they're involved with bad practices, which they're certainly not.

I used to do a bit of social media work for F4F. The guy in charge is ridiculously hard working and puts a ton of effort into this stuff, and it shows because the products are consistently fantastic. But I personally lost interest as the products became more and more expensive with ever more elaborate exclusive and definitive editions creating artificial FOMO. I understand why prices had to increase over time due to inflation, increased production costs outside of inflation and real dedication to increasing quality over the years. Like I say, the products are seriously good. But they really lost sight of the fans of the licenses they hold and started appealing directly to hardcore collectors of merch, people who would buy for the sake of the F4F brand instead of the product.

This Sonic title screen statue I know is an idea that that was floated at least a decade ago. I'm glad that they finally found a way to make it happen and it looks really cool. The price though... Oh boy, that scares me. I'm not looking guard to finding out that.

@Gryffin Nintendo could not foresee a scenario in which people would want to have fun their own way instead of the Nintendo prescribed way.

@3LapTrad lol, we all have a straw that breaks the proverbial camel's back and makes us sign up for an account. But I think that those tracks in particular are out of the question. They're longer than the standard and are specifically designed to only be single-lap affairs, regardless of mode. Whether you play DK Spaceport with or without a preceeding intermission, it's exactly the same. If it had multiple laps, it would last ages. Rainbow Road takes about 4 minutes to through all the segments, so that would be about 12 minutes for a full 3-lap run. No thanks!

I'm definitely on Team 3 Laps here, but everyone saying either "intermissions are boring" or "I like intermissions" is missing half the point here. The way that intermissions and course selection works in MKWorld means that you routinely get stuck in the same corner of the map, going up and down the same intermission routes with the same courses on rotation. Fortunately, some courses only have two connections and a third is randomly selected from the map to help mitigate this, but it's still very common to find your stuck around somewhere like the desert corner for example.

No matter which way you slice it, the solution to this problem is obvious and Nintendo are very pig-headedly choosing against it. Give us a Classic GP/VS Mode and Touring GP/VS Mode. Everyone would be happy!

Nintendo really saw people playing the game that they found the most fun and said "can't be having that now, can we?"

Wasn't quite sure which answer to pick for how many times I've won. I've come in first several times now, but never through sheer skill. Knockout Tour online is basically the ultimate game of bagging, and once you realise that it rapidly starts to lose its appeal. You skip so much of every checkpoint by boosting work boosts that you way ahead, and this even works for some of the final tracks too (looking at you, Desert Hills). Stick to the back of the pack until you've got a gold mushroom and a another boosting item, then spam them both towards them end. It's the safest strategy.

While it is a shame that they've had to give Splatoon 3 a slight visual downgrade on its native platform, it makes sense in context to maintain overall performance parity between the two platforms. As long as the visual downgrade is only slight and virtually negligible on Switch 1, it shouldn't be a problem. Otherwise it would be be quite the shaft to Switch 1 players and basically strong arming then into upgrading.

@HalBailman Until a few years ago, GAME a big retailer. They've lost their market to competition online and other retailers that aren't focused solely on video games. They still have a reputation as a big retailer. People might not have a local GAME shop anymore but they're not necessarily going to be aware of the state of the company just by looking at the website. If you wanted a Switch 2, it makes sense for many people to order one there.

Personally, I just went with Amazon. I'm part of the problem. 😂

Eh... A case for the Pro Controller sounds nice if you really want extra protection, but I typically just bung them in my shoulder bag or rucksack and they're fine. With the insane battery life on them, a charging case is entirely unnecessary.

This is exactly why I didn't order my Switch 2 from GAME. Anyone who's aware of GAME's current reputation could see this coming. But not everyone's in the know, so I feel bad for anyone who's left affected by this.

I'd love to go to a midnight launch... But I know me and I'd be falling asleep in the queue outside, nevermind being too tired to set it up when I got back home!

Got my pre-order in with Amazon (and my Pro Controller from Nintendo's online shop), so it'll be delivered sometime in the day and that's good enough for me. Anyone going to the midnight launch, woop! Have fun!

@ryancraddock Hey buddy, I've subscribed to the channel (YouTube is the only social that I use) and have a question. When you say "negativity free", what exactly do you mean? Cause as far as I'm concerned, Pokémon games have have plummeted in quality criticism of them somewhat inevitably forms the backbone of discussion amongst people such as myself who haven't really enjoyed them for several years. That kind of negativity I understand can get tiresome, especially when you don't agree in part or in whole, but it's warranted to talk about. If you're trying to avoid that, you run the risk of veering into the "toxic positivity" trap that everyone is talking about. That are prominent names in the Pokémon community who are very guilty of that behaviour. But if what you mean is that you just want to create a welcoming and friendly environment, I can respect that. And I would hope that you can still talk about your passion without only praising everything about it, cause not everything is perfect.

@KoopaTheGamer Every wireless standard controller is also a wired one if you simply connect it via the USB, the same USB that the one connects with.

For most games, I could deal with the fact that it's lacking gyro. It's essential for anything with gyro-enabled aiming however, so it would force me to go back to my Switch 1 Pro Controller sometimes (and begs the question why I wouldn't just continue using that). No NFC and HD rumble? Sure those are nice things to have, but I'd get used to not having them. I rarely scan what few Amiibo I have anyway.

But being wired? No way. Absolutely not. Not in this day and age. Gaming setups just aren't what they used to be. TVs are bigger and I sit way further back from the screen. Especially with the flimsy little Switch docks that have no weight to them even with the console inside, one wrong tug and the whole thing is coming down. Also those button placements are looking awkward AF.

Hall effect sounds nice and reliable, I get that. But I've yet to have any issues with the Official Pro Controllers despite how much I use them (not the case for the Joy Con, sadly...), so I'm confident that the Switch 2 Pro Controller will only make things better.

@Tayrailbridge lol, I really don't like the decorated designs either. The all black one looks fine though (not that I'm interested regardless)

Honestly? I don't like either. The art is kind of a blurry mess. But what really throws off the Japanese one in particular is Captain Falcon's teeth. Is he smiling? Angry? Constipated? It looks like the latter...

@Zufolobelisk Don't put words in my mouth. I don't expect Nintendo to make good use of their existing character rosters. But that doesn't change the fact that I would like them to come up with a better selection for a game with a line up as large as MKW.

@Zufolobelisk Loved BIS, but didn't like Fawful. I don't know what to tell you...

Regardless, MKW's roster is massively disappointing. One or two joke characters like cow and snowman would be funny if they didn't account for like half of the roster. They ran the joke into the ground before the trailer was even finished. I'd gladly take Fawful and other characters from RPGs and Mario sub-series (Yoshi's Island, Donkey Kong, Wario Ware, Luigi's Mansion etc) over the rubbish we've actually got.

Who doesn't like Fawful, you ask? Me. He's an intensely unfunny and irritating character.

Achievements/trophies on a system wide level are an intrusive commercial and social aspect of modern gaming that I could do without. Please just let me enjoy a game for what it is, and stop tracking and scoring my fun.

I'm entirely with Nintendo on this. Game-specific achievements are fine. But anything else? No thank you.

@SalvorHardin The only reason people exclude Dream Team is because it has such a limited reach. Everyone seems to agree that it looks like a good game at worst, but the problem that only Apple who also subscribe to Apple Arcade can actually play it. It feels like such a massive tease. Crossworlds is the real comeback for Cream, even if it's only a party kart racing game. People were choosing her because she this was the first chance they had to do so in many, many years, because the roster was limited in the demo and because she had some of the most fun emotes to use in the lobby.

Item spam, over powered items and similar seems to be what everyone is saying from all over the four corners of the internet. SEGA are aren't only using using using this as a network test for the game, they're also sending it surveys to everyone who played so that they can collect opinions and adjust adjust the game accordingly before it's released. It's still in the middle of development, don't forget!

So yeah, the items are currently totally overbearing and are waaaaay too common. But I'll be dammed if that doesn't change. And I expect that there'll be another network test/demo of the final build, possibly on all platforms, close to launch so that we can see the adjustments for ourselves.

Been playing it as much as I can this weekend, and it's great fun. But like everyone's been saying, it's way unbalanced at the moment. Too many chances to get and store items, and items are over powered. The races are insanely chaotic. SEGA are really coming up something great here though. Despite being very different to the trilogy of Sumo Digital racers, Crossword is shaping up to be a fantastic continuation of the series. It's just different.

Hey Nintendo Life, could you post the statement in full for the benefit of those of us without a Blue Sky account? Any time I get to click on the thumbnail it tries to get me to login.

Lol. I'm glad this article just tells it like it is. My tolerance for cute is pretty low, whereas NL generally seems to gravitate towards it. So when the headline called it boring, I knew it would be REALLY boring.

It's not offensively dull, unfunny or egregious in any way. It's just a 33 second animation after all. But like... Wow. Whoever made it wasted their time.

@JoeyTS Agreed. Jamboree buddies are a fun but half-baked idea. They can be insanely overpowered or borderline useless, and rarely anything in between. I was playing earlier in Pro Mode and won Peach in a Showdown after reaching her space on the board myself. However, all players were bunched together on the map. The next player took their turn before I had a chance to roll again, and because they went by me they took Peach with them. In a single turn they took two stars from me at the Boo Space, and then claimed two stars from the Star Space for only 20 coins. The next two players took the rest of my coins via Boo, juggled the Jamboree buddy between them and swanned off down the board. I had no chance. For winning the Jamboree buddy, all I got was an extra few coins for landing on a blue space once, and lost all my stars. Didn't even get a chance to roll!

I wish they would be rebalanced. Maybe apply a 50% markup to secondary actions with a Jamboree buddy? Or somehow limit the actions they can perform twice, because you get way too many coins, opportunities to use Boo and double stars for minimal investment. Peach is just broken. And for all the time and effort it takes to win the showdown minigames (Waluigis pinball lasts forever), you can lose the buddy immediately afterwards simply because other players are nearby.

Pro mode is actually really nicely ball for Mayo Party... Except the bloody Buddies.

@roy130390 Chances are that it'll run fine in the Switch, just like like Frontiers and Forces did. Shadow Generations, Frontiers and Forces all run on the same engine, which has never been a problem for Switch games in the past (and the Sonic Generations portion runs on an older version of the same engine). My guess is that you'll get a relatively stable 30fps at 720p on Switch with dramatically reduced visual detail/fidelity, but the game will be perfectly playable.

Honestly, the game isn't very impressively visually even on the high end consoles. This was also a problem for Frontiers. SEGA have to design their Sonic games with Switch in mind, because that's where the largest portion of the audience for them is. That can't take full advantage of the most powerful console hardware available because then the Switch audience would almost certainly suffer.

@mikegamer Yes I do say so.

They're a studio of currently 19 people. Before letting these six staff members go, they were still only 25 people. They have had one product, and said product was likely a financial flop. What else do you expect them to do when they have no money left?

The CEO of Evening Star announced this news publicly and is personally vouching for every single one of the team members he's had to let go. That's not behaviour you'll see elsewhere from companies that don't care.

@Drew250 I think a lot of people here have something of a soft spot for both indie studios and Evening Star in particular because of their history with Sonic. This news has struck a chord because it's upsetting to a lot people that a studio that they root for has fallen on hard times.

@mikegamer Evening Star are a very, very small indie developer with only a single game to their name as a studio. And said game was likely not much of a commercial success. Having to make staff redundant does not mean that they don't care.

@larryisaman I've seen plenty of people who absolutely adore Penny's design, so it's not something that's totally unlikeable. It's just something that's got, you know, a divisive and limited appeal.Just like the rest of the game.

Personally, I didn't start to "get" the game until the 4th World (the volcano/food/restaurant themed place), which would have been either the 15th individual level. Really, 15 levels in before a game even began to find it's footing! That's not great design. Players should not have to invest so much time before a game starts to become enjoyable. I only stuck it out because I bought it whilst waiting for TTYD to be released earlier this year.

@Druidsbrook You've got it right. It's designed for technical play, and casual play isn't even considered. It's rare that a game has such a high skill floor. Standard movements, like running, jumping and the most basic of Yo-yo moves, are really, really slow. They're tedious and boring, but advanced movement in PBB is unique, so it's fairly difficult to transfer skills from other casually-played games into it. The game will not be fun unless you're an expert. I get the impression that there was a lack of diversity in skill levels during play testing, or that the team was just too focused on being technical.

As disappointing as this is, I really can't say that I'm surprised. PBB was a niche game with some big problems, despite being creative and very impressive technically. Like a lot of other indie titles, it tried to re-invent the wheel for no good reason, and ended up being painfully cumbersome as a result. The gameplay has a steep learning curve. So steep, in fact, that I don't know how I managed to push myself through it. And it still felt like I didn't fully get it, even by the end.

The odds were always against it being a financial success. And was it the publisher's decision to shadow drop the game one day after a Nintendo Direct? Cause that was almost certainly a bad idea too. The game had limited appeal, and with a shadow drop you take a huge gamble hoping for viral success whilst also bringing your marketing campaign to an end. PBB was not the right game for that.

I hope that the studio and these now-former members can find success in the future because they deserve it. Should Evening Star want to work with SEGA again on Sonic (or other SEGA IPs), I'd be so excited for that. But the studio is full of creative talent who don't want to be tied down to and known for working solely on someone else's property. PBB was a swing and a miss though. A very valiant swing, but a miss all the same.

Also, I have to put this out there - the character design for PBB was dire. I don't think Penny was a great a mascot for the studio to launch themselves with at all.

I'm personally quite a fan of most of the current voice cast of the series. Smith is my favourite Sonic, which is a fact that never ceases to surprise me considering how perfect I think that Drummond and several fans with similar styles are for the role. Amy is great, Tails is great, Eggman has been great since X, Knuckles was actually really solid solid in Frontiers too... Thornton isn't my favourite Shadow however, but I'd be lying if I didn't now just much he had improved 2010

Stephanie Sheh as Maria just isn't sitting right with me from this first impression though. She's sounding very, very, generic sweet and sickly anime girl. It's such a change from her previous choices and I feel it makes her character come across as much more one note. Not that she's ever had enough time to even develop much character, but I can't see that they're going to do much with her here, unfortunately.

Took them long enough. I loved way that that the trailer started with Link wearing his BotW hood and slowly slipping into the void without his face changing from a look of boredom. He must be tired of saving Zelda at this point.

The gameplay looks interesting. It could definitely go two ways though, being either incredibly deep and thoughtful or very shallow and overly simplistic.

What rubbed me up the wrong the way was the second half of the trailer with the voice-over guy. Everything came together to make it look and sound like this is going to be a more casual affair. It felt a bit like a Game for Girls™. That's not helped by the fact that they're using the LAS artstyle, which is very cute and gentle by design. It re-enforces the vibe that they're aiming for. I almost expected the game to be called "Princess Zelda: Showtime!" when they introduced Tri and the Trirod.

I understand that none of these concepts are foreign to the TLOZ series. I could be totally wrong. But it definitely gave me an particular impression that's rather disappointing. Gonna have to hold off before I get excited.

@Maxz Have I fallen victim to April Fools'ception? 😂

@Devann The absolute absurdity of the article itself should tell you enough about the fact that this article is not supposed to be taken seriously. Nintendo Life.com may be a legitimate news site, but it's also one that's supposed to be fun and community focused. Don't get bent out of shape over them taking part in the festivities of April 1st. They aren't trying to pass this off as legitimate; this is a bit of fun, a joke that everyone is in on and it comes at nobody's expense. It's called April Fools for a reason, and you're playing the part of "fool" perfectly right now.

Spirit of Justice and Dual Destinies are by far the weakest traditional games in the series, with only MEI being worse. I'm pleasantly surprised to see the ranking putting them rock bottom, and TGAA right by the top.

That list is more predictable than the sun rising each morning.

Pretty sure Lizalfos' debuted in OoT, so that question actually has two correct answers.

I don't like the Wind Waker artstyle at all. I can tell I'm unpopular already!