Comments 1,150

Re: Talking Point: Nintendo Has Embraced DLC, But Must Resist The Worst Industry Norms

Haywired

Personally I'm against DLC. Maybe it's a little purist of me, but I see a game as a work of art and should be released as a complete work of art and then not be tampered with. I see a Zelda game as a whole, not just as a random collection of bits that can be added to whenever. I also think games have more than enough content (and it's not even about the amount anyway), they don't need to just become more and more bloated.

I have bought some DLC, not really because I wanted to, but because of FOMO and my completionist tendencies.

Re: Talking Point: Nintendo Has Embraced DLC, But Must Resist The Worst Industry Norms

Haywired

I remember when DLC was first becoming a thing. Of course, many of the more sanctimonious Nintendo fans, desperate to take the moral high-ground at all times for some reason, boasted about how great Nintendo was for not doing DLC and how Nintendo will never do DLC because they're so much better than that, etc. Of course, then Nintendo jumped on the DLC bandwagon and they had to desperately scramble around for a new moral high-ground, which was "Nintendo does DLC right!" Then Nintendo, having just jumped on the toys-to-life bandwagon ("Everyone always copies Nintendo!/Nintendo goes their own way!" etc) added amiibo DLC on top of regular DLC and I think they finally just gave up after that.

Re: Review: Kirby Battle Royale (3DS)

Haywired

Poor Kirby. Always seems to be just there to tread water and fill a gap in the schedule. All his recent (and frequent...) games have been decent, but they're all starting to merge into one in my mind now, which isn't a good sign.

Re: Talking Point: The Case for Super Mario Odyssey as the Greatest Mario Game

Haywired

@electrolite77
I don't disagree with you that there's dodgyness at both ends of the spectrum, but the overwhelming landslide victory for Odyssey, given the timing of the poll, suggests the force is a lot stronger with the recency bias than it is with the nostalgia bias.

It's like when NL did a Best Mario Kart Ever poll shortly after Mario Kart 8's release. Of course, Mario Kart 8 won by a landslide... But bearing in mind, this was before DX, so this Mario Kart was basically like all the rest except this one had a vastly inferior Battle Mode, so how does that make it the best one, other than "cos it's the one I just played" These polls are pointless.

Re: Talking Point: The Case for Super Mario Odyssey as the Greatest Mario Game

Haywired

The poll was a joke, given the timing of it. There was nothing remotely "eye-opening" about the results because the same thing happens every time with tedious inevitability. Your criteria for Best Mario Game Ever is whichever one came out most recently.

It's like asking N64 Kid on Christmas day what his favorite console is (except that he'd probably give you a more considered and thought-out answer than those in the poll...)

Re: Poll: Which is the Best Super Mario Game?

Haywired

Pointless poll. People just pick the most recent one without giving it any thought. It was the same when you did a Mario Kart poll, it was the same when you did a Smash Bros poll. Oh look, Mario Odyssey won by a landslide, what a bloody surprise... Useless. The poll may as well just be "What Mario game just came out?" because that's the amount of thought that these people have put into their answer.

Re: These Are The Nintendo Switch's Million-Selling Games

Haywired

People are surprised 1-2-Switch sold 1 million? It was a flagship launch title that Nintendo put a huge marketing push behind. Though considering this, they're still probably pretty disappointed that it didn't have a much bigger impact (as they clearly wanted it to be a viral Wii Sports-style phenomenon).

Re: Super Mario Odyssey Is The Best Rated Game Of All Time

Haywired

Gamerankings' and Metacritic's "all-time" lists are heavily weighted towards modern games, so I wouldn't pay too much attention to them.

For example, according to Gamerankings, Skyward Sword is better than A Link to the Past. Because Skyward Sword has the benefit of all the modern, sycophantic, hype-augmented "10/10 'cus Zelda" reviews (boy do they have egg on their faces...) Whereas A Link to the Past doesn't have this luxury, as it's mostly hype-free retro reviews for Virtual Console versions (years after the game's original release), which always get marked down slightly for age.

Re: Super Mario Odyssey Is The Best Rated Game Of All Time

Haywired

Sites/reviewers who give a game slightly less than the others (like God forbid, an 8 or something...) aren't always necessarily attention-whoring. They might just not be sheep who get sucked into the "BEST GAME EVER!" hive-mind like all the rest. People who complain about them lowering a Metacritic score never seem to complain about all the biased sycophantic pre-programmed fanboy reviews who are going to give certain hyped Nintendo games 10/10 even if they turned out to be just a title screen.

Re: We Could See Another 3D Mario Game On Switch, According To Yoshiaki Koizumi

Haywired

Well hopefully not too soon. One of the reasons Odyssey has so much hype and excitement and inevitable success is because they showed some restraint and waited for 4 years before releasing another mainline Super Mario game. Unlike in the previous few years where it seemed like they were in danger of churning them out (like New Super Mario Bros 2 and New Super Mario Bros U coming out within 3 months of each other...) which inevitably led to a big decline in sales and interest (despite what the "You can never have too much Mario!" brigade were saying at the time).

Re: Talking Point: An Era Ends As Nintendo Continues to Ignore 3D on the 3DS

Haywired

Never really used the 3D effect after the first few weeks of the console's life. Though would often quickly put it on with a new game out of curiosity, and each time it would be like "No, still makes my eyes bleed." It's certainly an impressive effect, but it's not really worth it for all the ghosting, strobing, blurring and general headaches it caused me. Even on the supposedly better New 3DS I didn't notice much improvement, unless "slightly less awful" is a selling point. It's been the same story with 3D for decades now; it comes back, there's huge hype around it, then it fades away again, because ultimately, once the novelty wears off, people don't really care, it's not worth the extra investment and it's not why people enjoy games, movies, TV, etc.

I'm guessing all the people on this site who said they could "never go back to playing games without the 3D effect!" are the same people who said they could "never go back to playing games without the Wii U Gamepad!" who now think the Switch is the best thing ever. Maybe stop saying that...

Re: Mario Party: The Top 100 Trailer Showcases Modes and amiibo Functionality

Haywired

I was dismissive of this game at first, as it seems like the epitome of all the phoned-in schedule-filler titles that Nintendo is using to stretch out the 3DS's life for as long as they possibly can (I'm sure we've probably got like 5 more middling Kirby games to come... the poor guy), but actually I think it's a fairly neat idea. I'm vaguely interested.

Re: Here Are the Key Lessons that Nintendo Learned from the Wii U

Haywired

@rjejr @BlueOcean
I've read that piece before and it's deeply troubling, but surely even Nintendo knows by now that shoehorning in mandatory motion controls isn't going to do them any favours, considering the amount of people who can't stand waggle. Unless during the entire development stage they all forgot about the whole point of the Switch... I think it's pertinent though that he said that he hadn't played it in handheld mode and I have heard from others that all motion controls can be turned off for handheld mode/pro controller play etc. Hopefully that's true. Otherwise, God... talk about a fly in the ointment...

Re: Here Are the Key Lessons that Nintendo Learned from the Wii U

Haywired

Well I guess they can't really say "because it was a terrible idea". But OK yeah, it was because of the OS, sure...

I suppose at the time they felt that gimmicky controllers was they what they were all about, but the Wii U Gamepad was almost entirely pointless. A couple of neat ideas here and there, but most of the time it was contrived and often just made things needlessly clunky and convoluted (Star Fox Zero being the epitome of this). A solution desperately looking for a problem. No one actually cares about screen clutter or having a map/inventory on a second screen (because you still have to pause from the action to look down at it, so it makes no bloody difference...)

I remember playing Nintendo Land with some friends shortly after the console released. The amount of times I heard the words "Which screen am I supposed to be looking at?" I knew this thing was DOA.

Also, I suppose the Wii branding didn't help. The Wii's momentum had fallen off a cliff long before the Wii U came out. The Wii brand was basically a joke to most people by that point.

Re: Feature: 20 Games That Aren't On The SNES Classic Mini, But Really Should Be

Haywired

Definitely. The SNES Mini line-up has some strange omissions. I certainly think Donkey Kong Country 2, Super Bomberman and Chrono Trigger should have been on there. Killer Instinct as well, but I know it's not possible due to Microsoft (plus perhaps too violent/bloody anyway).

Plus, while I realise sports games aren't really doable (both because of licensing issues and the fact that different sports are popular in different countries), in an ideal world, I would have had any of the following: International Superstar Soccer, Sensible Soccer, Super Soccer, NBA Jam, NBA Live 95. But yeah, they were never going to happen.

Re: The Nintendo Creators Program Now Rules Out Live Streaming on YouTube

Haywired

I don't care for livestreaming, so this doesn't really bother me. When I was a kid, seeing screenshots of a game in a magazine was exciting, seeing video footage was an incredibly rare treat. So when we got a new game it was hugely exciting, rather than just "here's that thing that you've already been shown 90% of..." Nowadays you can just watch the entire game from start to finish online for free. Everything is so overexposed now. Good on Nintendo for saving people from themselves I say (though I'm sure that's not their reason).

Re: NES Title Golf is Hidden On Every Switch Console

Haywired

If Nintendo crowbarred motion controls into classic games on virtual console, I think it would be an absolute disgrace. The Virtual Console games are sacred classics and should be left untouched. One of the reasons retro games are great is because they're free of vulgar modern gimmicks like motion controls. If they must insist on ruining their new games with their weird obsession with waggle then fine, but don't go back and scar the classics. I hope this does not happen. It's a truly disgusting thought.

Re: Pokkén Tournament DX and Pokémon Gold / Silver Make Their UK Chart Debuts

Haywired

@FredBiletnikoff
A little while ago one of those awful 1-2-Switch adverts came on TV (where two people were just furiously waggling their joycons at each other...). As the resident Nintendo fan, my whole family mocked me for it and I had to assure them that this isn't what the Switch is all about Nintendo is determined to make 1-2-Switch a thing like Wii Sports. It's not going to happen.

Re: Metroid: Samus Returns Makes Top 10 Debut in UK Charts

Haywired

"Stupid UK gamers and their terrible taste in games. In my country the top 40 is comprised entirely of Nintendo games every week. The PS4 and Xbox One have no presence in my country because in my country they were crushed by the dominant Wii U." Every deluded non-UK commenter on these articles every time...

Re: Poll: What Did You Think of the Nintendo Direct?

Haywired

Mario Odyssey looks great. Impressed with some of the stellar third party titles coming to Switch (almost feels like old times when such things weren't an anomaly).

And weirdly impressed with Nintendo's apparent determination to keep the 3DS on life-support for the rest of time... Drip-feeding it as many phoned-in schedule filler titles as they can possibly come up with...

Re: Doom Will Bring Hell to Switch This Holiday Season

Haywired

Wow, incredible news. Weirdly, I had a feeling this would come to Switch. I don't quite know why, maybe because the franchise does actually have a history on Nintendo consoles (on the SNES and N64). While I await with trepidation the follow-up news that it "will feature tacked-on waggle for Switch!" which seems to be the disturbing trend... in any case, I'm super-excited for this.

Re: More UK Gamers Picked Switch This Year Than Xbox One

Haywired

@Peach64
Exactly. People here always bashing the UK market seem to be under the illusion that their country is some sort of real life Nintendo Land. I mean, the US market hasn't had a dominant Nintendo home console since the 80s. NES (dominant), SNES (dominant overall thanks to Japan, but in the US; pretty much tied with the Genesis), N64 (lost), GameCube (lost), Wii (lost), Wii U (lost). It's hardly a record to brag about. Plus, Nintendo's handhelds have always been dominant in the UK, so again, there's not as much difference as some people here seem to believe.