Giberaltor

I was taken a little off guard by the Prowler's leitmotif from the Spider-Verse movies accompanying Bowser Jr. Definitely didn't expect that. Looks like it'll be a visual treat for Mario fans, like the first, but with the usual Illumination gags and writing; make of that what you will. I was also hoping they'd introduce Wario with a sequel, but that's looking extremely unlikely for this movie. Maybe they'll at least tease him at the end of this one. Also, I'd be happy to see Donkey Kong Country or Luigi's Mansion spinoffs. I could take or leave most of the other cast members, but I think Charlie Day was an excellent choice for Luigi. I'd love to see him headline his own movie.

@topher6490 @Friendly @SillyG
It is bizarre that they aren't updating the compilation. But as of the last time I checked today, the All You Can Eat version is still on Nintendo's list of games having compatibility issues with Switch 2. I have no idea why that's the case, but maybe technical difficulties are also part of the reason they went back to Overcooked 2 instead.

I'm late to the party here, but I don't think there's enough to go on in this trailer to jump straight to "seemingly confirming" an open world. There are a lot of otherwise constrained or linear games with sections that open up into larger sandboxes. For instance, Uncharted: The Lost Legacy had an uncharacteristically open level where you drive to various towers in a jeep in whatever order you choose. And the recent God of War games were mostly corridor-focused games with some metroidvania trappings, but also opened up at times into non-linear areas that you navigate with a boat or sled. MP4 might have a full open world, but it could also be any number of things in-between. For all we know, the bike could be limited to a few key areas or larger hubs. I just think it's a bit premature to be jumping to this conclusion, especially since (as far as I know) nowhere in the marketing have they used the term "open world"; you would think that would be a major bullet point to advertise if it was a core feature.

This day and age, I'm weary of any time a big publisher acquires smaller companies. Microsoft, Embracer, and EA have conditioned me to view acquisitions as a prolonged death sentence, but hopefully Atari will actually give them the respect they deserve. I enjoyed most of the SteamWorld games; I hope that this gives Thunderful the stability they need to thrive.

I'm part of the 2/3 that didn't get one. It looks like a solid refinement, but I already had a pair of the original Switch Pro Controllers along with my preferred 8bitdo Ultimate, which all work great with the Switch 2 (after updating the firmware, in the case of 8bitdo ones). I use most of my controllers on both Nintendo consoles and SteamOS/Bazzite PCs and the wake-up functionality isn't that important to me, so I just generally don't have a need to invest in any more expensive controllers that don't at least have Hall Effect/TMR sticks and Gyro support. The original Switch's Joy Cons conditioned me to be incredibly paranoid about stick drift, as every single pair I've owned started drifting sooner rather than later. For that reason, I'm hoping for some solid third-party Joy Con 2 alternatives soon, as it feels like a ticking clock every time I play Switch 2 in handheld mode.

Can't wait for my friends to yank my whole dock and console off of the TV stand because they forgot they were using wired controllers.

I know that continuity and lore is generally not something that Nintendo cares about, especially for Mario-verse type stuff, but I wonder if they'll even attempt to clarify the timeline within the game. Is this a prequel? A retcon that rewrites Pauline and DK's history? Or is it in the "modern" era, and adult Pauline got turned into a rock, and then came out of as a kid due to some magical de-aging malarky? Is time travel or time dilation involved? Will Doug Bowser come to my house and break my legs for being such a pedant?
Eh. Regardless of the explanation (if there even is one), it doesn't really matter to me as long as the game is good. I'm really excited to play it. Everything about the Direct just made it look even better to me.

Makes sense that since they're apparently not playable, they would be tied to some kind of recurring challenge. Judging from the screenshots, it seems like their main purpose is to host a rhino racing challenge. Kind of reminds of Luigi's appearance in Odyssey, where his role was to host the Balloon World minigame.

But yeah, now that we have modern designs for Diddy and Dixie, hopefully we'll get a Mario Kart World update next month to coincide with Bananza's release that adds them as playable racers, along with some more outfits for DK and Pauline.

My wife and I finished playing this on our living room PC around a week or two ago. We were both really blown away by it. Every level is something new and creative. An excellent co-op experience from start to finish.

Pretty much all of my favorites that didn't make the cut for the Booster Course Pass in 8 Deluxe ended up in World, and I'm happy that they held them back considering the twists and additions they added. I had no idea I wanted Dino Dino Jungle to be a Mario-verse take on Jurassic Park, but I'm so glad they went in that direction. Even a simple course like Peach Beach got a huge expansion, with each lap going to new areas around the town and coast. Shy Guy Bazaar, Airship Fortress, and Wario's Shipyard/Galleon were already thematically strong, and these HD renditions are fantastic updates.

Most of the new tracks are great too. I particularly like Salty Salty Speedway, Boo Cinema, Faraway Oasis, Starview Peak, and Great ? Block Ruins.

Plus, World's take on Rainbow Road is the single best version they've ever made, in my opinion. The big cosmic river was awesome, and the other sections all seem to take inspiration from previous iterations. It's like a best-of compilation of nearly every Rainbow Road dialed up to 11.

I think he looks good. The changes seem subtle and sensible. The retractable teeth on the Kongs were always weird to me, so I'm glad they both have persistent sets now. I don't generally mind "cyclops eyes", but it was always strange that Diddy was one of the only Mario-verse characters who didn't have separate eyeballs, so I'm okay with that aspect of the update too. Now I just want to know if he'll be coming to Mario Kart World and/or Bananza.

I'm glad they expanded the roster so much. I'd rather have these new guys here than not have them; but I still find it strange that there are so many generic enemies and NPCs while many actual characters who arguably deserve a spot have not been revealed/added. I hope there will be some free updates with more characters, though I wouldn't put it past Nintendo to charge for DLC on top of the $80 price tag. Either way, if I got exactly what I wanted, it'd look like this (ordered from most to least wanted):
E. Gadd, Diddy Kong, Poochy, Lumalee, Dixie Kong, Funky Kong, Petey Piranha, Lubba, Foreman Spike, King Bob-omb, Toadsworth, Koopalings, Broodals.
I could take or leave the crossover characters from 8 Deluxe; I think the Mario universe is more than rich enough to pull from without needing to go outside of the franchise.

Yes please. It's hard to stress how perfectly this concept fits my tastes. I just hope EA doesn't wreck it somehow.

I'm pretty excited for an open world Mario Kart. In the older games, I'd sometimes find myself going in to Time Trial mode just to go off road and see how much of the courses I could explore. The free roam mode seems like the realization of what I always craved. Plus, I think it will be really neat to explore a huge, open map of Mario's weird world; we've never really gotten a truly open and seamlessly interconnected map to explore in a Mario game.

@Axecon
That's a good point. It would make sense that strong magnets could interfere with the output of sticks that rely on magnetic readings.

@sanderev
Regardless of where the magnets are, they seem pretty powerful. Maybe the proximity of the attachment magnets to the sticks ruled out the use of Hall-Effect or TMR sticks.

Either way, I hope they did something to deal with drift. I've had like 4 different sets of Joy-Cons, and only 2 individual units still work correctly.

From the looks of it, this does not appeal to me at all. I don't know if I could imagine a blander looking game, and I would probably force my brain to fall asleep if I tried to. I don't usually like to be negative towards experiments and gameplay innovation. But this game has pretty much no discernable identity. ARMS wasn't the most fleshed out for a full price game, but at least it had a vibrant world with a lot of very distinctive characters. I enjoyed it for what it was, but I agree with the general consensus that it was an overall underwhelming package. I understand that it's too early to tell if the amount of content or the mechanics can justify its price (whatever that ends up being), but every instinct I have makes me think that Drag x Drive is making the same mistakes as ARMS, but without doing any of the things it got right.

Everything they've shown on the Treehouse stream has looked great to me. I had no idea I wanted a Donkey Kong take on Mario Odyssey, but this looks like a lot of fun. I'm happy DK is getting some proper attention again, and it looks like this might neatly fill the void of the Odyssey sequel or DLC we never got.

The DK art looks great, but it is difficult to overstate how much I dislike the gaudy red and massive amount of empty space around the Switch 2 logo. I find it baffling that this is what they decided on. I know they want to make it obvious that it's a Switch 2 product and reduce the odds of consumers getting confused about which Switch the game is for. But golly geez, man, they could have gone in any number of directions that would look better than that. Between this design and the apparent extra cost of buying physical versions, it kinda seems like Nintendo is trying to force us to go all digital by making physical purchases as unappealing as possible.

I'm happy about the Prime 4 stuff and the new Rhythm Heaven, but it was otherwise pretty underwhelming for me. I was really hoping for some remasters of Prime 2 and 3. The whole thing was maybe a 5/10 for me. Here's hoping they've been saving all of the bombshells for the Switch 2 Direct next week.

I have had very little exposure to OLED screens until very recently, when we had to replace our TV and sprung for an OLED. But I've been entirely content with both my launch-window LCD Switch and Steam Deck. OLED is definitely an upgrade, but the lack of it isn't a dealbreaker for me.

This kinda makes me want a proper 3D Shovel Knight game.

I liked the design changes for the movie, and I like this version as well. I think it makes him more expressive and goofy. I didn't really have any problems with the DKC design, but I feel like I always wanted to like it more than I actually did. He always felt a little limited in his expressiveness, which this new design seems the remedy with the extra brow space and bigger lips. If they lean into the cartoony and bouncy animations, I think this version has the potential to convey a lot more personality.

It doesn't necessarily look like a generational leap forward from MK8 graphically. But that doesn't really bother me, because I think the base tracks in 8 Deluxe already look fantastic. We still don't have official confirmation of what the Switch 2's specs are, but even if the Switch 2 is significantly more powerful, there could be a couple of reasons they aren't focused on graphical fidelity for this game. Keeping a similar detail level and style would make it much easier to port tracks forward from MK8, if that's part of the plan. It would also allow the game to allocate more resources to having more characters on the track, if the speculation is correct that it might support up to 24 racers.

@sanderev Yeah, that's a fair point. It would definitely complicate things when they're split up. If the hypothesis is accurate at all, I would guess it would mostly be for gyro recentering, since computer mice don't need a recenter button; you just pick them up and plop them where you need them. Maybe interfaces or games that accomodate a gyro cursor would just require a full pair of Joy-Cons. But I'm just spitballing here. Knowing Nintendo, the button could be for any random thing.

If using a cursor is a core part of the UI and games, as the mouse-like optical sensor seems to suggest, maybe it's a dedicated "calibrate" or "cursor" button to recenter it on the screen. Perhaps it could work both as a mouse using the sensor and as a gyro cursor. A dedicated button might make a gyro cursor more manageable without needing to allocate one of the other buttons as a recenter button on a game-by-game basis.