MysticX

I think it's looking very interesting, i lost some of my reflexes and tolerance for frustration over the years, so if a game isn't difficult, that's actually a plus for me.

@eaglebob345 If people believed rumours that Switch 2 would be coming in 2024, then rumours that say "Nope, it will be 2025" is pretty much the same as a delay, whether Nintendo deigned to tell anybody anything official doesn't really come into it.

The stock market is just a jittery, rumour-fueled mess, and let's be honest here, 7 years old is ancient in hardware-years, so it's not just gamers thinking "Get on with it!" by now.

@The_Blue_Mage You mean... never?

Big companies are always (At least partially) driven by stockholders and their short-term interests, maybe it was different in the late 70s, when most computer makers were small companies, but that's ancient history by now.

Day-to-day, stock markets don't change much, although it does show people are getting nervous about the meagre release slate for 2024 and Nintendo's silence...

If it means there will be enough games (And consoles) by that point, i suppose it makes sense to release in 2025, 2024 is looking to be a meagre year though, few first-party releases (And half of those are remakes)

All we have is a partner showcase to look forward to (Which is pretty much an admission of "Yeah, we've got nothing"), oh well, complaining won't change anything...

@JackieCMarlow Problem is that official news is pretty thin on the ground right now (As usual when a console is this late in its lifespan), so NL can either cover rumours, or only have "Best games in category X"-articles.

Also, if the rumour proves true, people would complain "Why didn't you cover that when it was rumoured?" afterwards.

@nocdaes For "need to upgrade" the good old "Everything new is for the new system only" will do just fine, has done since SNES...

Sure, the new system needs some must-have games for it to work (New SMB-game, new Mario kart, Zelda, maybe "Animal crossing"), but that's also been that way since the 80s, and is probably the reason the Switch first-party lineup for this year is so meager. (And rich with remakes)

For me, more powerful hardware, and maybe controllers that don't drift will be enough (The whole Switch concept is innovative enough), sometimes it's ok to not re-invent the wheel...

@KingdomTears Nintendo always relied on first-party games for success, but those games could also do with less dinky hardware for a change, keep in mind that Switch wasn't spectacularly powerful when it was released, 7 years ago.

Imagine what Nintendo could do for an Open-world Zelda or 3D Mario with an actually powerful console...

@KingdomTears What problem?

People buy "The device i already have, but more powerful" all the time, phones, tablets, PCs, TVs, minor stuff like, you know, the competitor's consoles...

On the flipside, going for some "Gimmick" is risky, if it catches on (Like Wii or DS did), great, but if it doesn't, like Wii U, 3DS (Which had a very rocky start, even if it was a success later on), or... [shudder] Virtual boy, the gimmick (And the costs of components for it) are just a burden.

"A profound sense of urgency", as in "Cell phones are getting more powerful than our hardware now, we better do something"?

I know, hardware power isn't everything, but Nintendo are lagging far behind (No, further than that... a bit more... keep going...) on that front.

That's... pretty meagre, two remakes, one game that after multiple trailers, we still don't know what the gameplay is, and two others.

Switch had a good run, but that release schedule is not going to carry it another year...

@LikelySatan Okay, the art style is a bit... divisive, i'll admit (It was the best way to remain true to the visual style of a Gameboy-game though), but the gameplay additions are great!

My vote is for "Link's Awakening" for Switch, it doesn't mess with the main formula or storyline of the game too much, but adds improved graphics and some QoL-features that really improve the experience, like placing markers on the dungeon map, which makes dungeons with multiple underground passages, like the last two, a lot less frustrating.

Why all the articles about Palworld? It's not even on Switch.

I know that gaming news in general isn't particularly plentiful in the first month or so of the year, but articles like this aren't only irrelevant to a Nintendo fansite, they just invite Pokemon/Palworld tribalism and arguing in the comments...

That's a bit odd, the fixes are welcome of course, but i doubt it takes 4.9GB of data to implement them...

So either there's more content coming, or it downright replaces a whole bunch of files instead of patching them.

@Lofoten Yeah, that's what kind of worries me, so far we've just seen single screens of (Albeit fun-looking) action, how does it all hang together?

I prefer lengthier levels, but how does that work with what we've seen for Cowboy or Patissiere Peach?

What's holding Pokemon back is two things:

Switch hardware, sorry, but Switch's specs weren't all that amazing when it came out, and that was seven years ago.

The constant rush to bring out new games: The merch-side of Pokemon is a ravenous beast, always needing more pokemon to make cards, plushies and other random stuff of, which doesn't give GF the time to optimize/test the games.

So the best case scenario would be if the next game came out in a few years (Maybe some more SV-DLC to bridge the gap), and on new hardware.

Ok, i was giggling childishly at the "Big DK energy"-bit.

It's important to note that it's Ubisoft's "Director of subscriptions" saying this, so he's just promoting his own gig, like a fishmonger telling people "You should eat more fish!"

I don't see what's wrong with "Switch 2", Sony established that sticking numbers behind a console is a valid way to discern the old console from the new one, so why can't Nintendo do the same?

Especially if it's in essence a more advanced Switch console without outlandish gimmicks tacked on.

@Vil While i agree that pirating for systems that are still being supported is wrong (I only hacked my 3DS once the e-shop was closed down), i doubt any layoffs would have been prevented by people not pirating games.

@rushiosan I agree, ruining somebody's entire life (Good luck ever paying off 10 million dollars!) for something that has a pretty much neglegible effect on the gargantuan bottom line of Nintendo is medieval-level stuff.

What i find most off-putting is the sheer number of people cheering this on, i know this place is called "Nintendo life", but there's some next-level Nintendo bootlicking going on in some of these comments.

@Thief Two points: "If he's still involved" is a big "if", IMO, Nintendo ruined his life once, and they're litigious (and spiteful) enough to do it again, i doubt anybody would be that stupid.

Secondly, you admit that they're just making an example of him, piling a huge damages-claim on him that he hasn't got a hope of ever paying off, which amounts to "Yeah, it's disproportionate to the extreme, but it might scare people off", not really fitting the crime then.

@Croctopus But that's what Microsoft and Sony have been doing for several generations now: "It's a Playstation/Xbox, but a more powerful one!"

I hope Nintendo are going for a more powerful Switch TBH, "Revolutions" (In other words: Gimmicks) can pan out great, like the Wii, or flop like a dead fish, like WiiU or... [shudders] Virtual boy, one might even argue 3DS succeeded despite, rather than because of the 3D.

Just put out a console that isn't outdated on release day for a change Nintendo, that's all the "Revolution" i want.

@ZeldaCupcake While i think this year is very fast (We don't even have an announcement yet), but dragging Switch out to 2027 would be silly, they won't have any third-party support left at that point.

Nintendo is very conservative in that regard, so if they think they can milk Switch for another year, they will.

I think it's high time for a new console though, let's be honest here, Switch wasn't amazingly powerful at release, and that was more than six years ago.

@Altaria_97 I was pleasantly amazed, no, downright shocked that the game played right off the cartridge, it has been a while since that happened...

Nintendo has new Switch bundles planned, of course they won't come out and say "They'll be old news in half a year", between not wanting to mess up holiday sales and the Switch being pretty old in console years, i'm guessing they'll announce Switch 2 next Spring.

I'd like a place like that in a modern Pokemon game, that was something that struck me in Pokemon Sword and Violet, ghost pokemon don't spawn in particularly spooky places, they just crop up along a road at night.

Put an abandoned, derelict place in game, and put the ghosts there, let's be real, the modern pokemon games can use such a change of pace, the open worlds are rather featureless and plain.

@dil_power Yeah, swings and roundabouts, since at that time, Sony's Playstation took all the metaphorical marbles, just as Nintendo had with NES in the 80s.

History definitely has a way of repeating itself, and some people end up on both sides of the story when it does...

The Advance version for me, in part because i have the e-cards with the extra levels and for getting free power-ups, also adding the throwable turnips from SMB2.

SMB Wonder, i rarely buy games day 1 anymore, but i couldn't let a really good 2D Mario game slide.

I prefer the new version, it makes Princess Peach more of a character, not a blankly smiling prop. (As she is in most Mario-games)

The sets look fun, the houses are a bit small, but i find most recent building sets to be fairly small in terms of surface area compared to earlier sets. (Yeah, i'm a lego-boomer)

Nook's cranny would be better as one single bigger building IMO, but i love the attention to detail, the recipe cards, the plates with the K K Slider record covers on them, i'll be getting a few of those sets.

@Tanookduke What can they make Lego-sets of?

Able sisters store, some version of the nooklings' store, villager houses, the town hall building from either ACNL or ACNH, a set of some villagers and some outdoors items (Bench, lamp-post, fountain), even a series of minifigs (Those blind bags of one figure and some minifig items) of the more popular villagers, and that's just off the top of my head.

@steely_pete This is Nintendo we're talking about, they never got online right (It's a big blind spot for them, somehow), and insisting on re-inventing the wheel every single time...

So? NES games still came out while SNES was on the market, and the same for every generation since, doesn't mean it will be a lot, though...

It doesn't strictly need backwards compatibility, but having a ready-made library of great Switch games on day 1 will help during those always meagre launch months.

They fixed the exploit with the new version of the hardware anyway, so actually there's no reason not to have backwards compatibility.

Ok, that's a bit weird...

I can understand a package deal of the base game and all the DLC, but with only the first part of the DLC, and download the rest later seems rather superfluous to me.

@mr_somewhere Merchandise, that's the reason they can't (Or rather, won't) put more time into the games, i doubt money is the problem for the biggest entertainment franchise around.

There has to be a constant flow of new pokemon to make and sell plushies, cards, and other stuff of, pure and simple.

I think a system of releasing one mainline game per generation, and expanding that with DLC every (half) year to add more pokemon and stuff along the way would work better, gives GF the time to polish the game (Not having to develop an entire new game would save a lot of duplicated work), and provides the constant stream of fodder demanded by the ever-ravenous merchandise machine.

@RootsGenoa Now i ask this without intending to insult you, but how many people actually used the 3D-function regularly?

I tried it a few times, had to strain really hard to even see the 3D-effect (In my case, i have a lazy right eye, so maybe i'm the outlier), and after 5 minutes, i just switched the 3D off and just played it as a more powerful DS.

I'd have traded the 3D for less crummy screens in a heartbeat.

I'm impressed with the SV sales figures, one would think that at some point, everybody who wants the game already has it...

Same goes for MK8D, BTW.

Don't expect too much IMO, we'll probably get some more snippets of information about the upcoming games we know about, maybe a trickle of virtual console titles, that sort of thing.

Definitely no mention of Switch2 or whatever they'll end up calling it, not this close to holiday season.

@VoidofLight That’s the main issue plaguing the Pokemon series now, the killed schedule mandated by the merchandise part of the franchise, that’s ever hungry for more pokemon and other characters to sell assorted junk of.

I consider myself a moderate NatDexer, i see the improvements to models (Mouths aren’t painted on anymore) and textures (Metallic pokemon look metallic), but still wonder: Once all pokemon are updated, why not put them all in one game?

At some point, i hope GF just gets more time, or goes to a “One game per hardware generation, and longterm DLC support”-model.

@nhSnork I wouldn't say we're "Supposed to know" about the next one, and that by now it will be for [whatever comes after the Switch] is a shoo-in. (Fingers crossed they'll have it as an early console-shifting game)

But it's still a shame they dropped support for ACNH, especially since it's a relatively easy game to update, add some furniture, update a holiday event or two, repeat every now and again, and it will keep going...

Just to give that dead horse another beating: I find it kind of sad that Nintendo knows "Animal crossing" sells, not just copies of the game and DLC, but also in related items like amiibo cards and these Switch models, yet there's nothing new in the series coming (That we know of, anyway.)

Yeah, probably future-proofing, still mentioning the previous generation of consoles on the packaging (When the current generation itself is nearing the end of its lifetime) was a bit silly, let's be honest here.

@Lizuka I agree, "Let's go" knew what it wanted to do, and didn't fumble doing it.

Sure, the visuals were less impressive than the mainline games, but sometimes setting modest goals and achieving them well is better than setting lofty goals and falling short...

Like @Dom_31 said, the big open areas (Wild area in SwSh, pretty much everywhere in ScVi) don't pan out well, whether it's due to hardware or developers, it's empty, a bit soulless, maybe it's the sheer size of the area, since the DLC-zones in SwSh are, while smaller, more interesting...

I understand that TPCi want to crack down on cheating (As far as skipping busywork is cheating, but i digress), however, in that case, players should have access to the same checks the tournaments use in-game, so they can check their teams beforehand, if anybody still fails the checks when they can check for themselves, that's on them. (Extra upside: It removes the "I didn't know!"-defense, which looks better PR-wise, too)

Trading is very tricky, with hacking and genning tools being so commonplace, any traded pokemon is suspicious, and for a series that has had trading pokemon as an important part of the whole experience, that's ridiculous.

I once read an article about consumer discontent, the gist was that by the time you start noticing a change in consumer behaviour (They buy less, buy a competitor's product, or they return more products), discontent has been brewing for a long time, and getting those people back will be very difficult.

Now i know people aren't buying fewer Pokemon games yet (As some people will no doubt smugly point out), but i wonder how widely-held the brewing discontent is by now...

As for me, Violet is the first Pokemon game i haven't finished yet, and i stopped "day 1"-buying since Dexit (Every game before was either pre-order or day 1), so at least in myself i'm noticing that shift.