Grumblevolcano

A huge shame, GAME instore preorders made getting the Switch extremely easy back in 2017. Getting a Switch 2 in its launch year will probably be harder than getting a PS5 in 2020.

Impressive seeing TTYD so high, it's really nice to see more turn based RPGs outside of the inevitable Pokemon releases be higher up for a change.

Interesting, with this timing it seems like the 2nd half of summer is completely devoted to Splatoon 3.

Undecided considering I finished LM2 a few days ago but with next weekend being Splatfest and then Nintendo World Championships the week after, I'm leaning towards starting Tomb Raider 3 and its DLC (TTYD would be a good fit for August).

Maybe Echoes of Wisdom is a prequel to the Zelda movie?

Golf and Urban Champion now means NSO has every game that was in the NES Remix games.

Just Nintendo World Championships and Outer Wilds. Definitely a backlog and Splatoon 3 focused few months for me.

Interesting that they priced it cheaper than the Splatoon 3 + Expansion Pass eshop pricing. Physical is £59.99 on the My Nintendo Store and digital is £72.48 (digital doesn't include 3 months NSO either).

Just Nintendo World Championships but I've got lots of backlog to catch up on and making the most out of Splatoon 3 while it's still being supported.

I had to go for the Tomb Raider 1-3 collection, it was so fantastic being able to revisit 1 and 2 (I'll play 3 later on in the year). I really hope a 2nd collection happens with at least The Last Revelation and Chronicles.

As for announced games that could potentially overtake it in the 2nd half of the year, Sonic X Shadow Generations feels the most likely if any. It's really exciting to be able to play Sonic Generations on a current console that's not Xbox and the new Shadow campaign looks a lot of fun too.

Continuing with Banana Rumble until I've finished or the difficulty gets too frustrating, I think the difficulty curve was kind of fair this time (Banana Mania got way too hard too early on). Afterwards, I'll start Luigi's Mansion 2 HD.

I'm really looking forward to playing it for the first time. I did own it on 3DS but never got around to playing it because the lineup was so packed back then that it got sent to the backlog (haven't played a Mario & Luigi game before either for the same reasons).

The traditional Zelda games aren't even all on Switch yet so I'd want those to be brought over with the Wii U remasters being the most important of the bunch.

@GrailUK I guess it's about what happened to PS5. PS4 had huge support in its later years even from Sony but then PS5 had some game droughts. One way to reduce the PS5 game droughts would've been to delay PS4 games to be PS5 games instead so as a result, some people are applying that logic to Switch 2.

The Prime 4 announcement in the Direct made me want to replay Prime Remastered again, I'm nearing the end of the game and undecided what I'll play next considering Banana Rumble is on Tuesday.

@rjejr They are probably referring to the gap between the final Splatfest and the release of the new game:

• Splatoon 1 - Released May 2015, FinalFest was in July 2016
• Splatoon 2 - Released July 2017, FinalFest was in July 2019, final bonus Splatfest was in January 2021
• Splatoon 3 - Released in September 2022

So if the pattern was to continue, Splatoon 4 would be announced whenever the Switch 2 is revealed and release in the Switch 2's first year.

It's an odd situation, I thought we'd at least have gotten 1 last batch of Splatoon 3 amiibo considering Splatoon 2 got a batch connected to its single player expansion. Splatoon 3 wasn't even in the Direct so it seems Splatoon 3 will get the already announced Summer Nights Splatfest, FinalFest and then that's it for the game.

Maybe Sora was the end of amiibo. Considering amiibo started in 2014 as a Smash thing, ending in 2024 with the final Smash character would be a fitting end.

Nice that we have an airing date now, really exciting especially considering very little is known about the future much like last June.

I finished Endless Ocean Luminous so I'm just waiting for the Direct to happen now (surely it's less than a week away because Directs have 1st party shadow drops and outside of LM1 it wouldn't make much sense to shadow drop something the same week as LM2?).

Leaning towards playing Sonic Origins while I wait considering I haven't played Sonic 3 & Knuckles in that collection yet.

I don't think Summer Game Fest is a good replacement to E3 but considering E3 is gone, I think it's a very good strategy that Nintendo chooses to be completely absent from Summer Game Fest and do their own thing later on in June.

Reveal in the June Direct, release in Fall/Holiday 2024 would be my guess.

Considering Splatoon 2 got 3 sets of amiibo, I figure we'll get one more batch of Splatoon 3 amiibo (probably connected to Side Order) announced in the June Direct. After that, I think amiibo would depend on the future of Smash.

I think Unleashed would be best for the next one considering the only modern hardware that can play it is Series X|S (it didn't even come to PC).

Splatoon 3 for Big Big Run and Endless Ocean Luminous for the event dive. I noticed that event dives make the mystery board a lot easier to fill in.

Hopefully the other games stuck on 3DS/Wii U VC like Mega Man & Bass and Battle Chip Challenge also come to Switch.

@OctolingKing13 Last year had the first stop of the tour occur before the Direct (June 15th - 18th with the Direct being on June 21st).

@JohnnyMind @Goat_FromBOTW Could be the Xbox showcase considering Square Enix appeared at X018 and X019 with KH news. Outside that, you're probably looking at D23 in August.

I finished Unicorn Overlord earlier this week, very good game overall. So now I'm focusing on Splatoon 3 for the new content and Endless Ocean Luminous.

Considering the State of Play on Thursday officially started event season and there's a load of showcases next weekend alongside Big Big Run, I think I'll hold off starting a new single player game until after the Direct whenever that happens.

Fantastic to see it's confirmed for the current Switch, the long gap in announcing info made me think it may have ended up being Switch 2 instead of the current Switch.

Back to Unicorn Overlord and Endless Ocean Luminous. While I did buy the TTYD remake day 1, I figured it made most sense to send the game straight to the backlog so I could finish Unicorn Overlord.

Just Splatoon 3 for the Splatfest, want to make the most of Splatfests before they're gone. FinalFest may only be around 3 months away from now.

I like the look of the new stage and Big Big Run sounds like a really fun concept. It does feel bittersweet though as the end of the trailer does suggest FinalFest so the June Direct will probably be where we find out the final unannounced Splatoon 3 info.

Glad to see Super Mario Land, was a really weird omission from the original batch of NSO games.

Considering the extra game Japan got, all the Direct NSO announcements now are 100% completed (Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru was in the Japan version of the February 2023 Direct). Which suggests the June Direct will have another roadmap.

@JohnnyMind I think it's do with the voucher program. SMTV (the 2021 release) is published by Nintendo so you can get it via vouchers.

Octopath Traveler got delisted earlier this year and when it got relisted it was Square Enix as publisher with no voucher eligibility. What we're seeing here is similar except instead of relisting the exact same game, SEGA are releasing an expanded version.

@GrailUK Yeah, that's why I don't want the Switch 1 era to end anytime soon. Nintendo haven't delved into the greedy tactics of the PS4/XB1 and PS5/Series X|S eras but Switch 2 may change this.

Same as last weekend, Endless Ocean Luminous and Unicorn Overlord.

It's very promising that Nintendo wants to continue doing physical releases though I'm still very concerned about the future of physical releases as some retailers are shutting down and others are stopping selling physical (instead choosing just to store prepaid cards like vbucks).

@Not_Soos The only way I could see the June Direct not providing a lot of 1st party announcements would be if they pulled an E3 2018 and dedicated like 20-25 minutes at the end to Metroid with Prime 4 acting as the big holiday title (E3 2018 did exactly that with Smash Ultimate).

While I think it's likely that Prime 4 is Fall/Holiday 2024 and it would end the June Direct, I don't think it's likely that it would be treated in the same way Smash Ultimate was. Feels a lot more likely we get a situation like last June where the 2nd half of the year is packed.

It would be an interesting concept but given what Mario Maker 2 ended up being, I get the feeling you'd just end up with a load of "Refreshing Special" levels but in 3D.

The game lineup is a bit disappointing compared to NES Remix Pack, NWC is Ultimate NES Remix but with 4 fewer games and without the Remix mode. I'll pick it up but I would've much rather had NES Remix Pack ported over from Wii U.

@JohnnyMind It's to do with the physical release, those generally need at least 2 months between announce and release.

That's a shame, was hoping for a proper physical release rather than Limited Run.

I think there's 2 likely options:

• Proper reveal in Fall/Holiday 2024, release in March 2025
• Proper reveal in March 2025, release in Fall/Holiday 2025 (maybe even extend to March 2026 release instead)

Which it ends up being I think will depend on the June Direct's content.

This is very exciting news, can't wait to see what's coming in the 2nd half of 2024 for the current Switch.

@Don They'll probably do an overview trailer revealing any quality of life improvements after TTYD has been released.

More Unicorn Overlord and Endless Ocean Luminous. The latter is very relaxing but I do want to continue the story in the former.

Very busy:

• Endless Ocean Luminous
• Sea of Stars
• TTYD
• MH Stories
• SMTV Vengeance
• SMB Banana Rumble
• Outer Wilds
• LM2 HD

A shame that Capcom messed up physical release for MH Stories though.

The current timeline is: Rumoured for Switch -> Rumoured to be Switch 2 instead since it wasn't in the initial multiplatform announcement for the current Switch -> Rated for Switch

Which gives the impression of 2 outcomes. Either Switch 2 is delayed long enough that it doesn't make sense to wait for that console or Switch 2 isn't actually a Switch 2 but rather a Switch Pro.

I'd probably go with Muncher Marathon from DKC Returns.

Continuing with Unicorn Overlord though the difficulty is starting to get to annoying levels. Will be taking a break from it when Endless Ocean Luminous comes out, that game looks like the kind of calm and relaxed type game I need at the moment.

That's quite a nice surprise, these are the first N64 NSO additions since Winback back at NSO Expansion Pack in October 2021 that I've never heard of.