NoxAeturnus

@Stocksy I think that there's plenty of room in the market for F2P experiences. If mobile and F2P were truly the death of deep gaming experiences, most of Nintendo and Sony's first party lineups would be struggling.

I don't think the expectation of a good experience in Fortnite is unreasonable either. Fortnite's issues on Switch are frustrating because they largely weren't there when the game launched. They've already shown they can provide a good experience on the system, then they broke it with future updates.

@geheimxy I just don't see any reason to be salty about Dark Souls on Switch. They were under no obligation to bring the game to the system at all. I don't care about an overpriced bundle on another system. That doesn't detract from the fact that DS is a great game and I'll be able to play it on my lunch break at work. I'm happy it's coming, and I'm not bothered having to wait for them to get the port right. Guess I just don't have enough pride to pass on a great game over such a minor (perceived) slight.

@CaPPa Nintendo's cardboard is better than average, but if you just want the templates so you can make them at home, they make those available for free. The real cost in the kit is the software that comes with it.

Looks kind of bland to me all around - colors, gameplay, the works. Maybe it's just not for me, or a later trailer might convince me. I think it'll find its niche.

Yup, looks like Diablo III.

@Spectra Except ME was never owned directly by a console maker. But hey, I'm not trying to stop you from keeping the dream alive. Maybe Sony will sell Demons Souls and Bloodborne eventually. Stranger things have happened. Like Nintendo bankrolling Bayonetta, which for me was a truly unexpected and weird gaming industry occurrence. I guess there's faint hope for anything.

@Spectra Demons Souls would be nice... if Sony didn't own it. That's the whole reason Dark Souls exists, so From could go multi-platform.

@Audiobrainiac I want portable Bloodborne so bad, but it can't happen on Switch for the same reason as Demons Souls.

@gcunit I've sunk some time into NMS, and from what I've seen of Starlink the only major thing it has in common is the art direction.

Everspace has the same feel as this game, I wonder how they will compare.

@Ralek85 Yeah in this case I appreciate that those features of other games are missing here. Definitely sold on it now. Never played Mushroom Wars, but apparently it has a sequel that's been out on Switch since July? Have you played it? Any good?

@Ralek85 I thought it looked like TW boiled down to only its essentials, and based on your review it sounds like that's kind of what it is. I think you just sold me on it, especially if I can issue orders while paused. All depends on if I talk myself out of it before I get out of work. Thanks for sharing the early insights!

August Fools!

Totally got me on that one guys...

Wait, wrong A-month.

So uh...jk?

Mega Evolutions? That's so gen 6.

Seriously though, the target audience for this game is not likely to care about Megas. Show us more of the co-op. Is it just all double battles all the time or is it tag team style?

@Quarth Yeah, I too love that he's The One True Gamer. The last bastion of hope from the good old days that no one here is old enough to remember. I certainly don't have memories of playing Top Gun on my NES as a child, or that back in my day we called Call of Duty Contra, and we counted ourselves lucky if we had a friend over to co-op it. Oh man, now I want to boot up some Contra.

@Quarth Nah man, I'm bored. Happy to feed trolls when I'm bored. It's fun. They get what they want, I get to see more of their ridiculousness. You know how it is, it's the internet.

Edit: Call it Whack-A-Troll. Bonus points if you can draw them into a strawman argument or make them talk in circles. You win if they repeat the same points three times running. It's a hat trick for you, and they're clearly out of vitriolic fuel.

@EightBitMan You're living in the past. Wii-U was a laughing stock. Switch is everyone's second system of choice. All of my friends game extensively on PS4, but I don't know a single one who doesn't have a Switch at this point. It's replaced 3DS in the market.

@EightBitMan This elitist gaming stance is extremely narrow minded. If having the highest specifications was that important, the console market wouldn't exist and everyone would do their gaming on top of the line PCs.

In what way will Doom Eternal be watered down? It's going to have all the game modes and content of the other versions. Based on Panic Button's stellar record on Switch, it's likely to play quite nicely, and with motion controls as a bonus. For people who don't care about the highest visual fidelity, portability and motion controls might make the Switch version the superior one FOR THEM.

Don't mistake your wants and needs for the wants and needs of the entire gaming community. You're not wrong that Switch isn't getting top name 3rd party support. Some of that may be due to technical limitations, some of it may not. Where you are wrong is that Nintendo's console is inferior because they decided to cater to a different market rather than engaging in the specs arms race. A decision, by the way, that has largely worked out for them and for the people who are having fun with Switch.

@electrolite77 Nah, but it doesn't need to be. It doesn't have anything like that for competition on Switch.

Hey look guys, Solaire has a yellow sun, just like that yellow chair behind Sakurai in the Smash direct. Solaire for Smash confirmed.

@8-Bit_Superman Incorrectly. Yes, I agree with you. In this case, with Fall of Light, they used souls-inspired, which I think is accurate. The visual tone of the game seems a match for souls. It definitely took some inspiration, but it's not souls-like. Neither are those other ones. Anyone who described them as such was stretching that term to the breaking point.

@8-Bit_Superman All of those are 2D aren't they? My argument was that souls could be said to be the 3D equivalent of Metroidvania, so none of those could rightly be compared to it. Personally I don't think that Souls-Like and Metroidvania can or should really be compared except in broad strokes, but yeah, I agree that people way over compare games to Metroid, Castlevania, and Souls. If nothing else, they have that in common.

@roadrunner343 Compared to a typical action RPG it might be a step slower, but its fast enough that going back to Demons/Dark Souls was hard for me after. Even DSIII's increased speed wasn't really close to Bloodborne. Depends a little on what weapon and playstyle you use too. Occasionally it's a little like trying to land a Falcon Punch.

I hear you about that intangible quality, and knowing it when you feel it. It's a similar feeling that I get from a good fencing bout (real-life). The feeling of physical chess. Souls is one of the few games where I can look at an enemy, watch their animations, and then tear them apart based on their weaknesses. Generally speaking, early game enemies telegraph their strike by hauling back over their head then coming down hard, while late game enemies strike quick from a neutral position with hardly a tell. It takes pattern recognition, distance control, and tempo to win. Not a lot of games elicit that feeling.

@roadrunner343 I agree that the combat is methodical, but doesn't have to be slow, and it doesn't have to be heavy. Unless by heavy you don't mean the physical weight of the strikes, but rather that every strike has a lot of weight (importance). Bloodborne is not a slow game, but there's no arguing that it's souls. That's the main idea I was trying to get at when I said skill-based, you just summed it up in a single word. Methodical. Good WC.

@hatch Haha, nice. Also, love the Goldblum pic. Off-topic, but a friend of mine was at Boston Comic-Con this past weekend and said that the room was filled with thirsty Sattlers for him. Jeff called one on stage and gave her the water drops.

@hatch @roadrunner343 @8-Bit_Superman My definition for souls-like has nothing to do with difficulty. "Prepare to die" was a marketing campaign. Difficulty in games is achieved in very different ways, and most of them are not souls-like in their methods. Here's what defines a souls-like experience for me:

1. Fair Play: The game is consistent - enemy placements are never random and they never change. The game is fair - when I die it was entirely my fault, not the result of an RNG. The predictability and repetition (read: dying) are what allow a player to learn and develop the skill needed to overcome challenges. This fairness is best expressed in the top-notch level design within the games.

2. Skill-Based Play: It's technically possible to beat any souls game with an un-upgraded character if you have enough skill and patience. When you die, you lose everything, BUT YOU CAN GET IT BACK. If you die twice, and lose everything for real, that's on you. If you could make it to the place that killed you the first time, you should have been able to make it back to recover your souls. If you can continuously regain what you lost by reaching your last dead point, death actually acts as both instructor and built-in reward; every time killed is like going double or nothing to get those souls back, and the only way to succeed is with skill. The die-lose-learn-recover gameplay loop is the series' signature.

3. Deep World Building Lore: The storytelling behind the scenes and world building are well fleshed out. The lowliest items have their own stories. None of this is on the surface, but it can be discovered and read about in the game. This adds to the world's consistency.

Interestingly, a lot of what makes souls great (top notch level design, behind the scenes lore, fair and skill-based play) are also hallmarks of "metroidvania," except in a 3D game instead of a 2D one. In that way you could argue that souls-like as a term, probably just refers to the 3D version of the metroidvania formula.

But yeah, tl;dr: both terms are way overused.

FPS is like acceleration in a car. When you're going at a constant speed, you don't feel the speed, but when the car accelerates or decelerates, you feel the change in speed.

Stable FPS is far more important than the actual number of frames per second.

@Tank207 #104: Yes. This. The PS4 was just coming off the success of PS3 and riding the wave of MS hate post-XB1 announcement, while the Switch is trying to redeem Nintendo after Wii-U, but still. Those first couple years of PS4 were pretty much void of anything, then there was an endless stream of ports.

All Switch did different was drop a couple heavy hitters (Zelda, Mario) in the first year, and then lean on the ports while they got their house in order.

I've never been so excited for a demo before.

Make it in great ball color scheme and I'd consider it.

Nintendo's online has always been free up to this point, but I seem to remember a bevy of complaints about its quality as well. If the money from the paid service improves the service, it's worth it.

As for f2p, following Sony's model over MS is the right move here. One of those is the market leader.

@BulbasaurusRex Responding to #18, yes the straight value comparison is bad. However, the 3DS and Wii-U rewards are worthless when they're for games I'm either not interested in or that I bought and played forever ago. At least the Switch rewards can be applied to new stuff. For me, getting a $2 discount on Switch is better than the alternative: absolutely nothing.

@Mountain_Man I'd settle for more solitude on my pokemon adventure. Sun and Moon's helicopter professor and ultra-supervised adventure were very off-putting for me.

@Alucard83 A leveling system is all it takes to be considered an RPG? Not a personal attack, not even really disagreeing with you, I'm just feeling philosophical about the term.

The usage of "RPG" has gone so far afield these days from "Role-Playing Game." You know, as in a game in which you play the role of another person by making decisions as that character?

I suppose in its purest definition, most games are RPGs, but seriously though, what does that term even mean anymore? Whenever I see "RPG elements" what people usually mean is: it has a leveling system and relies on equipment for a sense of progression.

Sigh...

I keep wondering who this game is for, and I keep coming back to 30-something year old lapsed adult players.

It's not for the hardcore Pokemon crowd, as should be painfully obvious.

It's not really even for the children. Children don't mind repetitive tasks like battling wild pokemon. Children also have the most amount of free time and patience (yes, patience, when a kid is really into something, they throw a lot of time and energy at it) to learn new game systems and trial and error their way through things. Core pokemon was always for children, and has never had trouble capturing and entertaining that audience despite the perceived "difficulty" of getting into the games.

You know who doesn't have time or patience to learn type matchups? Or deal with random battles? Or the other various things they've changed in Let's Go to make it more accessible? Adults. Adults are the ones that don't have that time or patience.

It's not even really for the Pokemon Go market. That's a completely different market in a lot of ways. Go players largely don't own a Switch, and probably aren't going to shell out $360+ to play Let's Go when they can continue playing Go on their smartphone for free. But there is a crossover sub-market in the greater Go player base: a lot of Go players of a particular age are lapsed players who probably haven't played core pokemon for a few gens at least, maybe not since original R/B/Y. That's why the Go connectivity features are there, because that crossover audience is the target audience.

That's why these games are in Kanto, not Alola. They're a nostalgia grab at lapsed players, and the co-op mode is intended as a parent-child mode. Grab the lapsed player by the nostalgia, make them remember how great pokemon was in their childhood, and allow them to share it with their child.

Let's Go has a lot of potential to grow the overall Pokemon fan base, but they're not really being built for children. They're being built for adults.

Joke
@roboshort's head.

@Bruh Maybe Square thought it wouldn't do well because people didn't have to wait a decade in anticipation.

Should have been:

1. Preying on nostalgia.
2. Not restarting development to take it in a new direction.
3. Releasing the game in a reasonable amount of time. Actually releasing the game.

You know, the exact things Squeenix can't seem to do well with Final Fantasy.

All I want to know about Let's Go is how battling in co-op works. You know, the one potentially compelling new feature? How about we talk more about that?

If they want to convert Go fans into Let's Go fans and then into core fans, they have to have some sort of forward compatibility, so it's not a suprise. What is a surprise is how cagey he's being about it.

And honestly, needing multiple switches for pokemon was always expected. There isn't much news here.

@Painkiller_Mike That's true, but I'm more worried about the sheer size of the game. The file size alone makes it an iffy proposition because of the way Nintendo handles cartridges and storage space for Switch.

@notnetlink Easily better than BotW. The quality of Witcher 3's sidequest narratives put many game's primary narratives to shame. Including BotW. BotW is still a great game though. Not sure Witcher 3 is possible on Switch.

@Hyrule Please no. Panic Button is bringing some much needed 3rd party content to Switch. If Nintendo owned them, that avenue would be closed for 3rd parties, and that would be unfortunate.

I know everyone wants to see Fallout, but Panic Button is not a subsidiary of Bethesda. I'm curious what other studios came out of the woodwork after the Doom port that were interested in hiring them. I mean, Warframe is nice, but they could be working on literally anything, from just about anyone, it doesn't have to be Bethesda's back catalog.

Too busy. Looks like the XMB, which I hate. I don't need all that crap in there. I want the ability to make it look more like 3DS, or Wii-U, or you know, any mobile device. I hate the single-line-of-icons approach.

I'm disappointed it turned out to be a game that's not for me, but it's a great addition to Switch's library.

@Ludovsky I have seen the game in motion and I understand and am squarely part of its target demographic. Again, I'm not sure why it's not pushing those nostalgia buttons for me, but the visuals feel like they're dragging it down for me. Not a big deal though, most would disagree with me. (Edit: That shrug really didn't work out, so I'll just say it: Shrug).

There are two things putting me off this game, and one of them is the name, which I think is stupid. The other thing is the art style. A lot of people really seem to like it, but it just looks so ugly to me. It's not pushing my nostalgia buttons for some reason, and I can't put my finger on why. Otherwise it looks amazing. I'll probably get it anyway, because gameplay trumps visuals for me.

So it was more of a survey than a vote, who cares?

@NEStalgia NoA can still do better. Agreed on Yoshiaki Koizumi. In the early switch days it felt like he was being positioned for that role. Shuntaro Furukawa concerns me, though admittedly we don't know enough about him yet. From what I've seen so far though, he seems more like a risk averse shareholder puppet, and the shareholders have proven constantly that they don't want what I want. If the shareholders had their way 5 years ago, switch wouldn't exist and Nintendo would be a 3rd party, primarily mobile, developer. I wouldn't be surprised to see Nintendo blow the switch momentum in the next couple years, but I'll be happy if they don't.

@Kevember Reggie is just a PR robot. NoA could do better.

Panic Button should rename their studio.

Witchcraft Games
Voodoo Studios
Satanic Panic...Button.

Or just Voldemort, because there's definitely some dark arts going on behind closed doors there. The port is impressive.

This sounds like it's more likely to disrupt Microsoft than anyone else. It feels like Xbox is already becoming the 3rd party streaming box. With PS Now, especially since it's allowing downloads, Sony is dabbling with a Spotify-like service for streaming games, but I think if they really want to push that it'll need to be a stronger feature of PS5 and it'll need to be cheaper. Nintendo isn't even in this arena yet.

I can see a Google console going the way of Dreamcast - ahead of its time, but streaming services are the future and it's a shame as far as I'm concerned.

@JaxonH Good enough for me. VC1 is definitely one of my all time favorites, so my excitement levels for VC4 are now reaching 9000.