DanElectrode

I preferred the lighting style of the original, although obviously the increased resolution and draw distance and stuff of the HD remake makes it better looking overall - if we got a version that had the higher res but something closer to the original lighting model it'd be perfect, IMHO. Still my favorite 3D Zelda.

@EriXz That's the question though, isn't it? IF the 'Switch 2' is backwards compatible, then it doesn't really matter if they do a Wind Waker HD for the original Switch.

But if 'Switch 2' is not backwards-compatibile, I'd be a little reluctant to buy a second Wind Waker HD version (after Wii U) if it was for the Switch 1 and not playable on the Switch 2.

@RootsGenoa Yeah, if it were anyone famous they'd probably announce it, my money's on "some little-known voice actor whose name will mean nothing to 98% of people who play the game"

A Zelda movie that was made in this mode (a live action movie with 100% practical creature effects) would be pretty rad.

I don't think that's what we'll ever get, it'll just be another overly safe IP cash-in cartoon, where everyone looks exactly like in the games and the plot is exactly the same as the games, because Nintendo doesn't allow anyone outside the inner circle actually dictate anything when it comes to their big AAA franchises any longer.

One place they messed up with the Mario movie was having Anya Taylor-Joy play Peach, because she'd be the ideal Zelda, but they already burned her as Peach which probably would've been better with a more comedic actress.

I finished 3 of the 4 "regional phenomena," then I unwisely decided to activate all the lightroots. Which I have completed, but was such a tedious slog with zero reward that I'm kinda taking an indefinite break from the game for the moment. I'm sure I'll pick it up again, probably in the winter.

Yeah, I don't know that this really means much other than you won't have to create a new Nintendo username and password, sadly I think the "Nintendo Account" is a separate thing from the "Nintendo Switch Account" as far as Nintendo is concerned, and your game purchases are still tied to a Switch console and most likely won't carry over to the next generation.

I feel like that was Nintendo's not-so-subtle way of telling Ubisoft "you didn't make it distinct enough from the first game."

Nintendo has obviously released multiple Mario games on the Switch, but they're all wildly different (Mario Odyssey, Mario Maker 2, Mario 3D World+Bowser's Fury, New Super Mario Bros., etc) - what they didn't do is make Mario Kart 9 for the Switch, opting instead to do a series of DLC for 8.

The one time Nintendo broke that rule was Splatoon 3, which all the reviews dinged for not being different enough to justify a $60 price tag, so Nintendo might have actually been speaking from that recent experience.

Also, it just seems like turned-based strategy is always going to be pretty niche, market-wise, compared to something like a mainline Mario game. Just because they slapped Mario on it doesn't mean everyone who likes platformers is suddenly gonna be interested in turn-based strategy.

@alycon yeah, all the "proper dungeons are back, baby!" marketing way oversold what we actually got, which is four brief "dungeons" that all work by the same simplistic "find five buttons and then immediately fight the final boss" mechanic and are actually much shorter and easier than the divine beasts were in BotW

@TruthisRare yeah, I like the addition of the surface caves and exploring them is pretty fun, but the depths kinda just feels like cheap busywork, the environment never really varies for the entirety of the map and it's mostly just more empty expanse to traverse

TVs on the fritz and I don't love playing handled so I've taken a bit of a break, but I've got 3/4 "regeonal phenomena" completed and 80+ shrines completed. Currently working on the Master Kohga side quest

At this point I'm mostly just hoping Wind Waker HD makes it's way to the Switch at some point before they move onto the next console.

@BiscuitCrumbsInMyBed they got less annoying once I realized I could use Ascend on the giant mushroom tree things and mostly avoid the enemies.

Enjoying the game so far but it definitely has the same tendency as BotW to be like "what if you had to fight the same handful of enemy types... a million times in a row?" which gets tedious IMHO.

The ascend ability does lend itself to some pretty neat puzzles.

As far as being a "cheat code" to leave an area, it's not that different from items for doing that in previous games (e.g. Ooccoo in Twilight Princess, or just the warp portals you use to leave dungeons after defeating the boss), with the difference being that the whole map in TotK is one big 'area', so going to the surface is the next closest thing.

Didn't Ocarina of Time technically run on the Mario 64 engine (albeit heavily modified)?

Kinda makes sense that they basically have one "core" that they just adapt for each game, I'm sure they each have a ton of customizations for their special cases.

I mean, they also say that "the four Divine Beasts were the dungeons in the last game," so I'm not sure that they've really confirmed anything other than there will be something on that order in TotK.

@babadumbadum_YOSHI Yeah, I realize that's the official line, I just don't like it because Bowser Jr looks exactly the same as Baby Bowser, and I grew up playing Super Mario Bros. 3, where the Koopalings were referred to as being Bowser's kids, so suddenly scrapping them and having Bowser Jr. now be Bowser's only kid (who is basically just a smaller Bowser without as much individual personality as the Koopalings) was a weird move.

I've read that the Koopalings being Bowser's kids may have actually just been a mistranslation of the Japanese SMB3 instruction manual all along, where they were called something more along the line of "lieutenants" rather than being his children, but I do think there were quite a few other places that referred to the Koopalings as his kids semi-officially (Super Mario Advance instruction manuals as noted above, the Super Mario Adventures comics, etc), so it's still a little weird to just retcon them out of existence in the newer games.

I think I'm just not a fan of Bowser Jr. altogether, because all the cinematics with him in Mario Sunshine were annoying. I also don't like the way that every Yoshi now makes the "baby" noises from Yoshi's Story despite that being the only game where the Yoshi's were actually supposed to be especially young.

@EarthboundBenjy I think that's good, though. They could totally do a similar remake of Zelda 1 and 2 with similar quality of life improvements like they did for Link's Awakening, and still keep the original version available in the NES Online for purists.

The only issue is when the original is not made available via legitimate means, which is the problem with the Star Wars special editions.

I wouldn't really say Breath of the Wild is "missing" something, but the fact that you get all four runes right off the bat and can basically complete the rest of the game in any order you choose is certainly a departure from the traditional formula of linear progression through a series of dungeons, each containing a new item or weapon when then allows you to reach the next.

@FroZtedFlake I wonder if Gleeocks are a new type of overworld "boss," like Taluses or Hinoxes in BoTW

My first thought from the faun/goat looking thing in the trailer was that it was some kind of form Link could change into, not really based on anything other than the design looking similar to Link's "bionic arm," but upon closer inspection it does seem like it's maybe Zelda transformed, and the other "half-transformed" picture is from the middle of the process? I wonder if that fits with some of the "prehistoric Link" screenshots we've seen in the past.

It seems like there's some kind of transformation or time travel component that Nintendo hasn't revealed yet, maybe Zelda is a Zonai in the "past," and Link is some kind of prehistoric version of himself?

@Bret Mine was Link to the Past

@Bret Yeah, I mean I've already pre-ordered it and I fully intend to play it, just kind of made me think "I bet this is what my parents felt like when I was playing Ocarina of Time in the 90s"

@john_lennon999 Very much in the same boat - I'm glad that in BoTW you can at least mostly just avoid enemies in the overworld, since I find fighting them to mostly be tedious and repetitive.

Watching this trailer makes me feel old because all I can think is "dang, it looks really complicated."

I'm curious about the faun-looking character (in the last screenshot above) - is it actually a form Link or Zelda can change into? The design looks suspiciously similar to Link's "bionic arm." That'd be a heck of a reveal for Nintendo to keep hushed up, though. Maybe that's what the Zonai look like?

@Not_Soos I feel like Nintendo probably severely hamstrung the movie's script writers on a lot of these points - sort of like how after Thousand Year Door, Intelligent Systems hasn't been allowed to introduce any new types of creatures or characters in the more recent Paper Mario games, so all the NPCs are just different colored Toads, and the enemies are all just palette-swapped versions of existing enemies from mainline games.

Doesn't seem that crazy for a highly anticipated, AAA mainline game in a hugely popular franchise IMHO.

I remember back in the day when Chrono Trigger was selling for $75 at Toys 'R Us, that felt insane because most SNES games were like $35 at the time.

But, like it or not, $70 seems to be the price point that most AAA games are releasing at now, Zelda is not unique in this regard.

@Eagly I think it looks good and I'm interested to play it, however I'm a little concerned with all the delays and being from such a small studio that we're going to get a RiME type situation, where the Switch version has really bad FPS/visual issues compared to the PS5/Xbox versions.

@XCWarrior isn't drift caused by gunk getting trapped inside the control stick's inner gubbins? Not exactly something you can fix with a software patch.

@RappinRootbeer I actually agree with that criticism of BoTW in general: too much time spent scrambling over terrain and engaging in repetitive enemy combat versus actually making game progress - but in this case if you're just considering "central Hyrule" as the area analogous to OoT's Hyrule Field, there's just objectively way more to do in BoTW. There are four shrines, a tower, three Hinoxes, and two stone taluses. Also multiple recovered memories to be found, horse stables, etc.

In OoT outside of a couple fairy grottos there's not really much to do other than cross it to go from point A to point B. I guess if you really like Big Poe hunting that probably colors your appreciation of the field in OoT, I always found that to be tedious and annoying, personally. Especially as kid Link, there's nothing to do except roll across it and then get stuck with it being night and wait around fighting/avoiding Stalfos until the castle gate opens.

@BrianJL Good point RE: the main "hub" being in the center in Majora being part of what makes Termina Field feel less like a connective area you just have to get through versus Ocarina (also helps that there's just a lot more stuff in it).

If Hyrule Castle town had been in the center of Hyrule Field in OoT instead of Lon Lon Ranch, it'd probably feel much less like essentially just a bunch of flat roads that you need to take to get to the actual place you need to get.

This is one area where I feel like it's kind of impossible to make a case for anything other than Breath of the Wild, seeing as having interesting outdoor environments was kind of it's whole thing, whereas in OoT, Hyrule Field is basically just an empty expanse you have to cross back and forth over a bunch of times.

Ah yes, the old "you must reforge the sword to restore it's true power" gambit that they go to in like 75% of the games!

But will you have to retrieve 3 macguffins from defeating dungeon bosses before you can re-forge it? 🤔

@Sonicvic not being able to use a custom name was a casualty of having actual voice acting, I suppose

I usually just go with "Link." I had a friend who would always use different random, totally banal sounding names (I remember his OoT file was named "Jim"), which struck me as really funny

Diddy Kong Racing and Donkey Kong 64 seem like no-brainers since they're both Nintendo IP anyway

It seems like there are two different goals here:

• The Switch version is part of the N64 emulator, so I wouldn't expect it to have upgraded textures or draw distances, I'd expect it to replicate the experience of playing on an N64 as closely as possible.
• Whereas the goal of the Xbox version seems to be to make it look as "modern" as possible, by upscaling it to 4k and removing the fog and such.

I wouldn't expect them to look the same as each other, but it would be interesting to see a comparison of each next to the game running on an actual N64 to see how they compare against the original hardware.

Normally when it comes to these sorts of questions, I usually say that Nintendo, being Nintendo, will probably forgo the obvious "Switch 2" and do something out of left field, but they were so snakebit by the Wii U's lack of success that I think they might actually just do a straight up sequel console this time.

I also think there's just not a ton of other places to go as far as control schemes, outside of VR or something, but I don't really see them forgoing a traditional TV console in favor of a dedicated VR thing at this point.

I really love the Gamecube controller and would totally jump at a "pro controller" with the CGN layout, but the following are non-negotiable, IMHO:

• Rumble (doesn't necessarily have to be "HD rumble")
• Gyro/motion control
• Bluetooth (not a Smash guy, I just like the controller's shape/button layout)
• Built-in rechargeable battery

Doesn't seem like anyone makes one that ticks all of those boxes.

@GX_64 My guess is these screenshots were probably pulled from an in-progress build running on development hardware, and they added the scanlines to give more of an impression of what it would look like running on an actual console.

@Ade117 I guess there's also Donut Plains and Choco mountain and stuff, but those are mostly just the names and the courses themselves don't really have much dessert-themed aesthetics.

Probably just for the sports/kart games, where it'd be weird if Pauline was like twice the size of Peach and Daisy.

Doesn't really matter in New Donk City since you never see them in close proximity to each other.

Same reason Bowser is closer in size to Mario in those games than he is in Mario 64 or Bowser's Fury.

@mr12calvin Yeah, making a sequel that's also for Switch that looks basically identical is kind of a weird choice IMHO, seems like it could've just been DLC for Splatoon 2 or something.

@Greatluigi Probably why he "couldn't remember" the name of the character he's playing - all we know is that it's apparently a Goron (not too surprising if the same voice actor who voiced a Goron in BoTW is returning) who is "Daruk's ancestor," so basically it could be any Goron from before the events of BoTW.

I chose B, but mostly because I prefer the SNES style layout of Y=run, B=jump for Mario games, with A being an auxiliary button or secondary type of jump.

Having the run button to the upper left just feels more natural to me, easier to hold it with the top of my thumb pad and still jump with the lower part of my thumb pad. Never been a fan of the revisionist B=run, A=jump controls.

@JakedaArbok on whatever the next console winds up being called!

To be fair this is also the case with Zelda, even if there's some "official timeline" on a website, it doesn't really make a lot of sense and has tons of internal conflicts if you actually try to fit them all together.

I think I put in about 90 on my first save, but that included doing all the shrines and getting the master cycle (I never bothered with the Trial of the Sword). However, the idea that you "haven't really played" the game if you didn't get all 900 korok seeds is just about as ridiculous as claiming the average person could beat it by running straight to Gannon with 3 hearts.

@Arawn93 I think mostly the difference is that you can straight up ignore Navi if you don't want to listen to her, while Fi is much more non-skippable (at least in the original version, they remedied that pretty well in the Switch version).

I think people wouldn't even mind Navi's hints being "stupid" if the sound they picked for her alerting you to them was less intrusive, nobody complains about Tael in Majora's Mask despite it being essentially the same system, but they replaced "HEY!" and "LISTEN!" with a tinkling sound, so you don't feel like somebody's yelling at you the whole time.

@mr12calvin I think that Splatoon 3 will probably also be for the next console after Switch.

@mr12calvin Well, I think they've already been working on it for a while. The Switch launched 5 years ago.

There's not really any reason for them to do a second Mario Kart game on the Switch, seeing as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe already continues to be the best selling game on the system week after week anyway, and they've never done more than one Mario Kart game on a given home console generation before, so I think it's a fairly safe bet that if a new Mario Kart game is coming, it will be on the next console.

I think Mario Kart 9 is coming next holiday season but it won't be on Switch but rather whatever they end up calling the Switch's successor (which I don't think will be "Switch Pro" or "Switch 2," but something different).