LastFootnote

Stop patenting game mechanics, Nintendo! It shouldn’t be legal.

@dmcc0 It just occurred to me: what if Game Pass no longer exists before Silksong releases?

"Expect nothing and you'll never be disappointed."

At this point I'm still subscribing to the theory that the devs have enough money to last them two lifetimes and will continue to add features to Silksong forever because they have no strong impetus to ever finalize and release it.

EDIT: Or, less charitably, they're sick of working on it and don't need to (due to the aforementioned money), so they're not doing so (à la George R. R. Martin).

@gcunit Sadly there are many other reasonable explanations. For example: the game is in development hell and is nowhere near releasing.

No, it won’t come out this year, or in 2026. The devs clearly have zero incentive to finish adding things to the game and release it. I’ll be surprised if it ever releases.

EDIT: Just to not be a total downer, I will say that I have faith Mina the Hollower will be out before the end of 2026, despite that not having a release date yet.

@MH4 I guess this isn't constructive, but: Cry some more!

The existing Mario sets are great, and Mario minifigs would be ugly and stupid. So many Lego fan tears shed over this asinine whining for Mario minifigs. Maybe not every Lego set has to be for you.

@LordDieALot For one thing, the Switch technically has mouse support already. If you mean that the Switch 2's Joy-Cons can be used as mice, then that's also basically already been confirmed by the reveal trailer and various patents that have been made public.

@Dang_69 Interesting! If he's super connected to Retro and getting info from them, I think we can assume he is somewhat biased toward them and toward Metroid Prime 4. That's good news as far as I'm concerned since it means that 1) Metroid Prime 4 will probably be in the Direct and also very cool, and 2) there's probably other great stuff too, and I shouldn't worry about it all being much less cool than Metroid Prime 4.

I'm actually worried that the Direct will somehow announce NO games, or at most just the launch lineup. I mean I'm probably crazy, but it's conceivable that they just concentrate on showing off the hardware in more detail and we have to wait until e.g. June for a Direct that actually announces several games (for both Switch and Switch 2).

@bones I mean I'm hoping for at least two "real" first-party launch titles, though that's probably just wishful thinking on my part. It'll probably be Mario Kart and some tech-demo thing that you're done with in two hours.

@Xenoblade-Fan Well let's not take that report at face value. It's possible that Metroid Prime 2 won't appear in the April Direct at all, and that other rumor has no foundation.

I love Metroid Prime (the series), but I think I’d be pretty disappointed if Metroid Prime 4 is the most exciting thing in the Direct. Mostly because we already know about it, as folks have said.

Maybe there wasn’t much competition? I mean I played Emio through to the end, including the epilogue. Granted the story is affecting, but the gameplay is so awful that it’s hard to believe there wasn’t something better last year.

@SwitchForce We’re talking about two different things here. I don’t think the Switch 2 will fail. I plan to buy one ASAP. I’m just hoping games run well on it. I’m pretty tired of devs not bothering to make sure their games actually run well on the Switch for the last year or two.

@Porco I see. Thanks for the info. I had to make do with an internet search since I couldn’t find hard historical data.

Well a Switch 2 is much smaller than a PS4 Slim, but your mileage may vary on how much that’s worth to you. Personally $400 seems reasonable to me assuming it’s roughly comparable to PS4 capabilities. At $450 I’ll blame the chaotic tariffs and suck it up. $500 feels extreme.

This is a tangent, but I am worried that a lot of games won’t run well even on Switch 2 just due to developers not bothering to optimize for it.

@Porco Looks like a brand-new PS4 currently costs about $310. Adding your estimates for screen and speaker costs brings it up to $380. So, $400 seems spot-on? I don’t understand your argument.

@Porco The PS5 doesn't need to include a screen or speakers, for what that's worth.

Haven’t I read this article on NintendoLife two or three times already? How many “analysts” need to predict this exact thing before it stops being news?

I really wasn't a fan of Cursed to Golf.

I'm still salty that Commodore 64 Virtual Console was only available in Europe, not in North America. When can I play Jumpman on Switch?

@arekdougy Bated breath, dude. You can’t bait your breath.

But yeah, great to have this soundtrack on the app.

@ChakraStomps Wait, so you have first-hand experience with these tariffs on US goods? Is that what you mean? You seemed very sure that they existed and that the current administration is just evening the playing field. You got that info from somewhere, right?

@ChakraStomps I would like to learn more about the tariffs that Canada and Mexico had on US goods. Do you have a link to some specifics?

@Not_Soos I appreciate your civility. If I may make one plea to you, it's that you stop watching Fox News and other right-wing media. Or at the very least, start also getting your news from another source that isn't a propaganda network. That is not hyperbole. Fox News is the media arm of the Republican party, and they have been extremely successful at warping the worldview of many Americans, perhaps a majority. If you are only getting your information from right-wing sources, you have an extremely inaccurate view of what's going on.

The administration has not uncovered "loads of government waste". What they have been doing is slashing federal jobs fairly indiscriminately. I'm guessing you have a perception that government is fraught with waste due to the right wing beating that drum for decades, but with some exceptions (the Pentagon), it's not actually true. Most of the government has been "doing more with less" for ages, and slashing these departments further just hurts their ability to keep the American people safe, healthy, and prosperous. There is certainly government corruption in Washington that should be curtailed, but Elon Musk is not going after that waste. The "waste" that DOGE is cutting is your livelihood, America's standing in the world, and the ability of our children to receive a quality education, among other things.

(And as a side note, destroying USAID may save us a very small amount of money in the short run, but it almost completely eliminated America's soft power on the world stage and drastically weakens our ability to detect and stop disease before it gets to our shores. China is now stepping in to fill that power gap; they will soon be the de facto global superpower thanks to this decision.)

Those savings numbers coming out of DOGE are 1) wildly inaccurate; instead of the 15 billion in claimed savings, it's closer to 2.5 billion, 2) targeted toward government departments we really should not be cutting, and 3) are a tiny drop in the bucket when it comes to government spending. Large cuts to Medicaid will be necessary in order for Trump's tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations to be renewed.

Yes, let's remove harmful food additives that are banned elsewhere. On that we can agree. But RFK's vaccine skepticism is already hurting America's ability to prevent and fight disease. He didn't send a team to deal with that measles outbreak in Texas that already killed one child (the first USA measles death in 10 years) and cancelled a meeting about which flu strains should be in this year's flu vaccine. America will be a much more disease-ridden country with him in charge and it won't take very long to see the difference.

Trump is definitely for "stopping the bloodshed" in Ukraine. He is doing so by giving Putin everything he wants. Russia, the country that unilaterally started the war, will be gaining territory AND assurances that what's left of Ukraine will never join NATO. This will embolden Russia to bully and attack its other neighbors. How is us abandoning an ally to help an enemy "firm but gentle"?

I mean, this isn’t apples to apples at all. This year Nintendo was 22nd out of 37 companies. Were there 37 companies in the ranking in every other year? I doubt it.

@MrCarlos46 That is basically what I said, yes.

@johnedwin This makes no sense. A trade imbalance just means that we import more from them than they do from us, or vice versa. But you understand that we're not literally trading one good for another, right? When they buy from us or we buy from them, there's money exchanged. Just because there's an "imbalance" there doesn't mean anybody is getting ripped off.

@MrCarlos46 I really doubt it. Last time the government was mostly run by Republican elites and businesspeople. This time it's all incompetent loyalists.

I honestly wouldn't be surprised if they did unite again to ask for an exemption this time and were either rebuffed or ignored.

Since the poll asked what I was HOPING for from the Direct, I included Silksong in my vote. But if it were for what I'm actually expecting, I certainly would have voted differently.

@solarwolf07 I thought Apple pioneered that feature in iTunes, back in the day. They called it “Sound Check”, I believe. How is it not available on their streaming service?

Oh man, I was just lamenting this not yet being on the app. Awesome!

I’m really hoping for Paper Mario:The Origami King or Thousand Year Door sometime in the next couple of months.

The real answer to the poll is, I’ll wait to see their final forms. I will be shocked if they don’t have regional variants, mega evolutions, or both.

I'm really hoping that Mega Meganium has something to make it more interesting than Meganium. Like a useful Ability.

Also I hope Z-A has Abilities (unlike Legends: Arceus). That's what makes a lot of existing Mega Evolutions cool.

@HammerKirby I mean it looks that way. I trust The Pokémon Company to screw it up though.

Of all the Pokémon Presents, this was one of them.

@Justifier Honestly, if it’s only double battles then I’m even more interested. Single battles are a snoozefest, especially if they’re 6v6.

So, they've commented that this is going to use the traditional battle format. And it notably teases a battle with both Mega Evolution AND Terastallization. That's a new one for sure. Hopefully they'll bring back a lot of discontinued moves.

Not even a mention of Yoshi's Crafted World? That game really gets a bad rap. It may not be quite as true to the original Yoshi's Island as Yoshi's Woolly World, but it's still a good time. My kids love it and still come back to it, and even I've 100%-ed it (which is not trivial).

Really the only thing I dislike about it is the music, and even that's not ear-wrenchingly awful. It's just not nearly as good as Woolly World. Man I hope they don't hire Kazufumi Umeda for any more soundtracks.

@YunoboCo Really? Is it worse than all four NSMB soundtracks? Even if it is, it’s still got some great tracks.

As for the release cadence, one per week is at least consistent. It sure beats the random drip-feed of NSO games. But if it were any slower than one per week, I’d be complaining too.

@BrazillianCara I just call ‘em like I see ‘em. I don’t think it’s productive or counterproductive.

For what it’s worth, I’m optimistic about Z-A! I loved Arceus and I’m hoping this next one will be at least as fun.

The Pokémon Company never learn or improve, so I’m fully expecting a Gen 10 tease. There will be zero gameplay shown, and the final game (out this November) will be even buggier and uglier than Gen 9.

Cool. Time for Arcana to come to NSO?

https://www.nintendolife.com/games/snes/arcana

Nintendo aims to “surprise and delight”. The Pokémon Company seems to be taking the opposite approach with a boring presentation on the same day every year (and games that get worse as time goes on).

@obijuankanoobie Heart Gold is a DS game, so I wouldn’t expect that on NSO.

Well if they keep on their three-year rotation, they’re about to (foolishly) tease Gen 10. Or did they announce they were waiting an extra year this time? I can’t remember if that actually happened or if I just dreamed it.

Welp, looks like no Nintendo Direct this month after all. If it were this week we’d know about it by now. And next week is the Pokémon Presents.

@PtM Huh. So it exists, but it doesn’t come up when I search “Silksong”.

Is the game still in development? Yes. But that is no guarantee it’ll ever actually release.

@PtM It isn’t back up as far as I can see.

Oh well if an analyst says so…

Seriously though, I’d also put my money on $400.