BoilerBroJoe

I'm about as cynical as they come, but this looks quite good to me. Not like cosplay, in my opinion. Obviously it looks like a modern movie, but it's got that '80s fantasy vibe to it, which is about as much as I could have hoped for. Let's see how well it actually comes together!

I was also born in 1984, and I have to say... I don't see it. Maybe it resembles British TV more than American TV? Or a community access channel, perhaps? But not plain old channel surfing, in my opinion. '90s TV was weird but... in a different way. This feels more like an AV club or something.

Alas, you can't go home again, as they say. But it's a cool concept regardless!

For the record, I'm almost certain the musical arrangements in all three games have existed since 1986, 1987, and 1988 respectively: Koichi Sugiyama was among the first to arrange his game soundtracks and record them with a full orchestra, and I've been listening to them since at least 2001 or so, so they're quite recognizable to me. I do think some of the shorter bits of music got arranged more recently, and some may indeed be new for this release. But most of what you're hearing are some of the oldest video game music arrangements in existence, which is pretty cool in and of itself!

I'm sure Virtual Console will return just before the Switch 3 turns out to not be backwards compatible, making them instantly obsolete. The time for VC was when the Switch launched and we could have gotten 10+ years of value.

But yes, Virtual Console should come back. If Steam can recognize your purchases over twenty years and across platforms, so can Nintendo. I know the "complain if you want, Nintendo will do what makes money" argument will rear it's ugly head every time this comes up, but it doesn't change the fact that a shift to rent-only markets is anti-consumer and something we can and will complain about at every opportunity. And I do think that more and more people are slowly starting to acknowledge it, especially as AI makes it increasingly clear that the endgame for the largest businesses is the ownership of everything. So there may be hope yet.

Let's goooooo!

Isn’t there a little cursor in the middle that never goes away? I know it’s silly as hell, but I never bought the Switch version for that reason. If I’m correct in remembering that, I’d love an update that lets you toggle it on/off.

Did they get Ron Jones to do the music?

It’s also lizard-brain to expect consumers to gladly pay the same amount for a game that they paid twenty years ago, when the number of games released each year was a tiny fraction of the number being released today. I spend astronomically more on games today than I ever did BECAUSE games are routinely on sale for $10/$15/$20, not in spite of it. And considering 90% of what I buy goes unplayed forever (no joke, and a phenomenon common enough that we all make collective jokes about backlogs), I’d say developers have gotten a pretty good deal out of me and everyone else.

If they’re annoyed that people won’t pay even more than they already do, perhaps they should tell some of thousands of their competitors to get out of the business. Otherwise, they should probably just appreciate that they’re literally the largest entertainment industry in history, that their customers are buying more than ever before despite arguably more income insecurity than ever before, and that any problems in profitability and job markets are the result of their own over-speculation and corporate greed rather than any big, mean customer.

I remember this. I think I rented it several times and eventually bought a used copy, though I never got very far. But it’s a cool game and I’ve actually been hoping that Nightdive would bring over their remastered version, which is based on the PC release but includes the N64 levels. Hopefully that’s still in the cards.

I assume this was never meant to be comprehensive, hence the name. But I do really wish more of these collections tried to be as definitive as possible, especially with a series like Gradius, which is almost impossible to explore in any official capacity without owning half a dozen systems. I would love them to have the various PC and console ports, specifically the MSX spin-offs, and the later console releases. Hell, put Gradius The Slot on there too (though I’m sure that would require more work). I’d be fine with these collections adding games as DLC over time, as long as there was an expectation of something reasonably comprehensive at the end of it.

I want them to sell the soundtracks just like I want them to sell the legacy games. Enough of this rentier capitalism.

@Asaki Yeah, Dragon Quest III looks pretty, but it’s not the HD-2D that I love. I was worried that they may be abandoning it for something simpler and am glad that these new games look like a return to form.

Hah. My 1TB Lexar was got a surprise delivery just two days ago and is already half full as I continue to redownload. It's gonna be a wait for those 2TB cards.

I think it’s only a matter of time, honestly.

I had ordered a nice fancy screen protector months ago, that still didn’t arrive for several days after I got the Switch 2, so needless to say I was walking on pins and needles handling it before then. Also, without a carrying case (which also arrived late), I only took it out of the house once to show a coworker, wrapped in multiple shirts and in a plastic bag (which, knowing what I know now about the easily scratchable screen, was probably not a good idea). On top of all that, the screen protector instructions insist on installing it in a pristine environment and not the dust-ridden basement hell that is my apartment. But despite all odds, I got the screen protector on and as far as I can see, not a scratch or bit of dust in there, so I’m quite relieved.

As for the commenters scratch-shaming with their boasts about knowing how to treat tech, relax. We can’t all be gods among men like you, apparently.

My only gripe, as mentioned above, is the map. I know @IceClimbersMain mentioned that it’s not supposed to be a giant open world collectathon, and I agree, but hunting for things is clearly the major point of Free Roam, and having a map with next to no detail at all is way too far in the other direction. At least let you zoom in to see some topography and give some indication of where you’ve found things, so that you don’t have to just rely on memory. The game is great and the music is amazing, but that one aspect of Free Roam is frustrating enough to make it an 8 for me. Hopefully if enough people are bringing that up, Nintendo will patch in some more mapping options down the line.

Okay, an update for @Coxula and anyone else who’s interested. After spending about thirty minutes slowly canceling the downloads that were queued, the system finally seemed to figure out what I was doing and canceled all the others from that point down (as well as not canceling the few that I had allowed to continue). So I don’t know if it’s because I canceled about half of the queue or what, but it finally got the message and at least saved me the time of going through the rest. Everything else I tried - disconnecting from the internet, ejecting virtual game cards, powering off and on, didn’t work. In each case the games that were still on my home menu remained in the download queue. Only canceling (or deleting) them individually works.

I don’t know how to avoid this for future digital-only Switch 2 buyers, unless you’re willing to archive most of your games BEFORE doing a system transfer. But of course if you want to keep those games downloaded on your Switch 1, then you’re out of luck avoiding an auto-download on the Switch 2.

So it’s still pretty bad, but maybe if you cancel enough, it will finish the job for you? I guess I can’t say for sure. Best of luck!

So all my games are digital, and after doing the system transfer it is queuing every single game up to download until I turn off the system or disconnect from the internet. I definitely do not want to fill up every bit of system storage right now. Is there any way to cancel all the downloads at once or do they all need to be canceled individually? This is kind of annoying to be honest.

EDIT: I just noticed someone else discussing this problem. Selecting virtual cards doesn’t work: even when the virtual card isn’t loaded it will try to download. And there’s no option for mass archiving either. As far as I can tell this is a pretty ridiculous oversight. I can either spend an hour canceling every download I don’t want or let it go and waste bandwidth until the system capacity is full. Not fun.

@dartmonkey any suggestions?

@Res462 Yes. Losing customers. And it would be totally justified. We’re allowed to criticize corporations sometimes.

From what I can tell in the screenshots, this will look like what I had imagined a Pokémon game could be on a PC in the early 2000s. And… I kinda like it actually? Sure it’s very simple geometry and of course I’d like to see a nice, pretty BOTW style aesthetic down the line, but honestly I’m fine with these visuals. I may finally play these games at some point.

As for for what I take issue with, it may be this line: "Square Enix has never been one to shy away from a Nintendo release".

@Zeebor15 Is it though? I bet there are a few pre-WWII headlines that might be worse than the "here's what the average person not following Japanese media might recognize".

Capitalism sucks; people get fired. Sounds like we could all really use some Medicare for All, guaranteed minimum income and labor unions in every workplace.

@Banjo64_Switch Yes, I'm definitely one of those lefties you're talking about. But, for the record, I agree that too much youth and culture oriented media like gaming sites take liberalism for granted and mock or disregard conservatism. The important thing to me is that people express themselves in good faith, respectfully and with compassion. I happen to think that's been lacking more in conservative spaces, but I totally acknowledge it's on the decline among liberals as well. To the degree that political discontent among readers contributed to the decline of the websites in question, it's certainly a possibility. But as for what I think is actually a solution, see my first point above.

I've said this before, but they really need to add an "hours played" section, or something equivalent, that shows you which games have been played the most hours by Switch owners collectively. Within that, you could then divide it up by last week, last month, or all time, etc. It would go a long way to showing you which games are the most actively popular, as opposed to just which ones tricked enough people into a purchase and were never played again. And while the "all time" numbers would probably privilege puzzle games and free-to-play stuff, weekly or monthly numbers could give you an idea of what's currently in the gaming zeitgeist. It wouldn't be perfect, I'm sure, but it would likely have a nice balance of AAA and popular indie games, and let people find the well-loved games that they may be missing.

Understandable or not, a very wealthy corporation getting bad press because of their prices is A-OK with me.

Well, in a way this makes me happy that I bought as much as I did on the Switch, and that the Switch 2 is mostly backwards compatible. I have such a mountain of a backlog that I may very well only want to buy a handful of games for the Switch 2. Of course, I would buy more with lower prices or sales, but I suspect that I and many others will be demonstrating to Nintendo that you’re simply not going to be able to sell as much when your prices pass a certain point.

Ugh, can't Nintendo just stick to the leaked dates and not move them by 24 hours out of spite? I was working from home today and could have watched it live!

@Not_Soos Yep. I had to look it up myself, but it was called the Super Duper Graphics Pack and was announced in… 2017. It was canceled in 2019. I remember being very excited about it and checking in every once in a while, only to find radio silence. Eventually I forgot about it.

The Super Duper Graphics Pack actually looked quite a bit more impressive than this, but it was probably something that just wasn’t feasible for most devices. I think this looks pretty nice though, so I’m hoping it works well on Switch and/or Switch 2.

For those who may not be aware and are into game/anime soundtracks, Yoko Kanno did the music to three of these four games (I believe Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV was someone else). The arrangement albums that came out for these games in the early 90s are still to this day some of my favorite music of all time. If you have any interest at all, or would like to check out Kanno’s early work, do yourself a favor and track down these albums as well as the other game soundtracks she did in that period. They’re simply beautiful.

I never played it but I’ve DEFINITELY heard of the game. It’s not a title you easily forget.

Any of those happen to fall off the back of a truck?

Live action movie with people in anthropomorphic animal costumes, or bust.

@Bigmanfan Guilty as chaaaarged!

@CaptainCluck I agree that increasing the value of NSO would be great. The problem is that Nintendo has demonstrated an either/or policy of either putting a game on NSO or letting you buy it, hence my resistance to seeing any more systems added to NSO. This would all be solved of course if they just gave consumers both options, like other companies do. And what I can't understand is why people wouldn't support simply having more options. Then we could put this whole debate behind us. For the record, no, I don't want NSO to go away for the people who enjoy it, and if every game on there had the option to buy, (or simply keep one per month - remember how subscriptions USED to work?) then I'd say, go to town Nintendo!

"But Is NSO The Way To Go?"

Nooooooo! No, no no! Don't even SPEAK it!

@TKundNobody Fair point, though don’t physical games have some kind of weird license as well? It’s all pretty draconian, and we need a fundamental rethinking of IP in modern society. But in this case, the option to download a game like any other digital purchase would still be superior to a paywall and online verification process.

@TKundNobody I don’t want it to be either/or for ownership/rental. I get that, for many people, subscription is the superior option. I just want both options to be available. I’m glad you’re happy. I wish I could be happy too.

@PessitheMystic Some of us did. Some of us warned against a “Netflix of games” on this very website!

One of the greatest “ones that got away” for me is that I never bought the official 1996 soundtrack to Super Mario RPG. Back in 2006 it was selling on eBay brand new for about $100, but being just out of college it was just over what I could justify spending. Now it’s more than ten times that amount. Ah well.

I will definitely be getting this box set though. Second time’s the charm!

@jake1421 Trust me, I'm not trying to start an argument here; I'd just point out that it's possible to oppose both U.S. imperialism and Chinese imperialism. I'm sure you're right that American economic hegemony is primarily the goal in these types of disputes, but working with the military of a different jingoist state (which also happens to be the world's largest military, btw) is a little more complicated than just being "closed to U.S. imperialism". Superpowers are, generally speaking, not good people.

I'm no fan of any company that's headquartered or primarily operated in a dictatorship, and I don't think anyone should feel guilty or hesitant about such opposition. That said, I'd only be half-joking if I were to ask what company **doesn't** have ties to a military or otherwise murderous entity somewhere in the world. Companies are, generally speaking, not good people.

All these leaks and the announcement seemingly taking forever are actually making sense to me now. I’m pretty sure it was reported that Nintendo planned to ship way more units at launch than previous launches, in order to meet demand and reduce scalping. And Nintendo probably wants a relatively similar window between reveal and release as they’ve done in the past. Which means a much longer production period between the beginning of manufacturing and the reveal. So now there are magnitudes more consoles being made and handled across China and wherever else they might be made, and more opportunities for a few to “fall off the back of a truck”, or at least have a few pictures taken before they’re shuffled back into the shipping process. So we can expect more of these, and their frequency doesn’t necessarily indicate an imminent reveal, sadly. But I’m generally in agreement with the fellow above who is predicting a brief reveal in the next two months; I’m thinking even before the end of January, myself.

Hamster could have gone and made these only available via a subscription service. But after 11 years, they’re still going strong, releasing one new game a week for customers to buy and keep like any other game. The fact that Nintendo and others can’t offer this same option is shameful.

@OzMikey Or as I like to say, Mr. Dooooooooo!

@Juga_Juga British English, maybe? Anyway, wishful thinking, but I voted for January.

No more subscriptions, arrrggh!

2017 - remake every RPG in HD-2D!!
2024 - is eight games too much?

No, HD-2D doesn’t need to a break. In fact, I’d say Dragon Quest barely qualifies, since it seems to use a lot of standard polygonal assets. Of course the market will have the last say, but in my opinion, it’s a beautiful art style that can have just as much freshness going forward as pixel art did for an entire generation (and continues to).

Trends can get tiresome of course, and breaks can be warranted. But give me another 30 HD-2D games first; then we’ll talk.

Maybe someone mentioned this but I didn't see it anywhere. Wouldn't the best solution be to toggle a filter that hides games with fewer than a certain number of downloads/wishlistings?

Maybe that's confidential information or something, I don't know, but I think that would solve the problem much more than hiding certain publishers or genres, which will almost certainly be worked around by developers. Sure, some cheap stuff may sucker enough people to break a given threshold. But for the most part, consumer knowledge, word-of-mouth, and sites like this will do the job of separating the wheat from the chaff, as long as there's some convenient way for us to see what everyone else is playing.

The same way we were convinced we'd get Super Mario Galaxy 2 as long as we all quickly shelled out $60 for a predatory, artificial scarcity release?

[grumbling intensifies]

Nintendo should release a line of NinTelevisions: various sizes of 4K TVs that can easily be rotated on their stands to Tate mode.

I jest… mostly… but it’s the only perfect solution.

Give us the option to download and keep a couple games each month and I’d sign up in a heartbeat.

Seriously, Nintendo Life. We won’t let you pull the Wool over our eyes!