Pak-Man

Well, that's every kind of Direct except Nintendo.

New 3DS. I love those faceplates!

Caves of Qud is a game where you can look at one screenshot and know if it's for you. If you look at this and think, "I could sink a few hundred hours into this thing," you're right. If you look at it and think, "This isn't for me," you're also right. You're missing out, but you're right.

Voting is right down the middle as of now. This is a polarizing one. I love the iconic gold boxes, but they are a bit dull compared to the Japanese versions.

As for the nostalgia, yeah I was there in the '80s. We didn't get an NES until it had been out a couple years, but everyone on the Playground had played or heard of Zelda. After renting it a few times from the local video store, I finally got a gold-cartridge copy of Legend of Zelda for Christmas that remains in my collection to this very day.

Note: If you have the Nintendo News app set to the Zelda theme, instead of the usual modern-art images, the calendar image today showed 8-bit Link, complete with lop-sided smile.

Gen 5 is a special one for me because it was the generation where I finally determined that I was going to Catch 'Em All. It involved playing both versions- not just of B&W but previous generations, catching Legendaries and exclusives from previous generations and trading them upward from Gameboy to GBA to Switch. I had to play that silly online webgame. I had to go to Toys R Us and Gamestop to download certain Pokemon. It took literal hundreds of hours, but I got all 649 of 'em.

Because of this Tepig will always be my favorite starter. I name him Baconator.

I use the full-size Widget calendar. It's fun to have a little Link (Or Kirby or Donkey Kong or Mario, depending on mood) on my phone. Definitely better than the default calendar.

There was not a lot for me in this Direct. The Bethesda announcements were a pleasant kinda-surprise. We all knew FF7 Rebirth was inevitable. I'm definitely in on the Super Bomberman collection.

This was the big announcement for me. A long-time Indiana Jones fan, this game has been frustratingly out-of-reach since my PC isn't quite up to snuff, and the Steam Deck can't handle it. Can not wait.

I want to see what Capcom's got up its sleeve with its pledge to give some love to some beloved games, like Ace Attorney.

I'm also going to go out on a limb and hope for a Fire Emblem Warriors Engage game.

The games are both great. Like hanging out with your favorite fictional characters as poker buddies.

@PKDuckman I ended up trading in my Max hat when prices were high for- I think- a preorder of Civilization V and a Steam Controller.

Pro tip from an OG Virtual Boy player: If you take it off the stand and kind of nestle it into some pillows on your bed and bury your face into the mask, you can play laying down for a good while without much neck strain. Or at least 19-year-old me could.

Hugh Morris is such a next-level pun that I'm surprised I haven't heard it a billion times before.

Darkwing Duck is made up of 80% Mega Man DNA, and despite beating all the NES Mega Man games, I've never conquered Darkwing Duck. (I even picked it up on launch way back in the day. I was a fan.)

Time to correct that!

Hoping for a fancy Steelbook Fire Emblem release, with Preorders starting "today." Other than that, I'm down for any new Nintendo news.

There's a lot of random, medium-sized news coming out this morning. Is it time to start speculating wildly about a Nintendo Direct?

Minecraft is my Son's fault, but my top two remaining games (Both tied at 56 hours) were Picross S - Namco Legendary Edition (Picross is fun. Picross that makes Namco characters is even more fun!) and Dragon Quest III 2D-HD, which I played all the way through in anticipation of the 1&2 collection (Still in progress).

Good year for games!

The vouchers were a good deal for superfans who were going to get all of Nintendo's big titles anyway, HOWEVER, superfans like me also want physical copies, so I never took the bait.

There is a stance that exists somewhere between "Everything AI Touches is pure unmitigated evil" and "Let's use AI for every facit of our lives." Probably several. Should we replace all our creatives with algorithms? No. Should we burn AI to the ground and refuse to use it to benefit society in any way on sheer principle? Also no.

@gojiguy I think a better summary is it's a game where your goal is to not have to focus on the game so much so you can focus on the metagame of unlocking neat stuff and getting big achievements and combos. There is strategy and rolling with the punches to get yourself into that godlike state, and then you can focus on finding coffins or racking up kills.

The game itself is just brain-candy, but the games within the game are some compelling stuff.

@dskatter Hope springs eternal for a Legends collection. Tron Bonne would have to be there too. Maybe throw in odds and ends with stuff like Mega Man Soccer and Power Battles.

I wanted it to be good. I was prepared to buy season passes and everything, but after a couple hours I realized it just didn't have anything I wanted. I don't know how they managed to top "You're a summoner who can summon any character from any Fire Emblem Game. Sometimes in different outfits!" as a fan-servicey story gimmick, but "You happen to run into furry versions of Fire Emblem characters" is so much worse.

I got a car this year that's capable of streaming music from my phone, so I've been listening to a lot of Nintendo Music while I commute. (87 hours worth!) Lots of Mario Odyssey and Fire Emblem songs. They go real well with a long drive.

The Nintendo Calendar has been a treasured addition to my desktop ever since they introduced them a few years back. Switching to a new game each month (I never peek!) has become a fun ritual. I don't want them to ever stop releasing them.

I loved Shovel Knight and Link's Awakening is still one of my favorite Zelda games, so a Yacht Club game inspired by Link's Awakening is totally for me. Can't wait.

I still remember downloading Vampire Survivors after hearing it called the best game ever and being completely underwhelmed. "So this is it? You just kind of move around and whip enemies?" 135 hours later, I have to admit there might be something to the formula.

If they can make lightning strike twice, I'm there.

I was there, 10,000 years ago. You kind of had to be there to really appreciate what a gamechanger the original Dragon Quest was. Up until then, we'd had some PC RPGs that were sort of close, but all of the conventions we'd come to associate with JRPGS - the Top-Down perspective, the random encounters leading to turn based battles, the little convenient interface that makes it all work (Even if you had to choose it to go down stairs back then) all started here.

Katamari, Power Wash, Simon the Sorcerer, AND Two Point Museum? It's like they honed right in on my most niche game interests!

I got myself a repro cart and my Hyperkin Supaboy ready to play in all its unofficial glory, but I haven't sat down to take the big plunge yet.

I had submitted my entry through the Contact Us section when there wasn't any open call out for reviews. I'd remembered they were a thing and wanted to get it in while I was thinking about it, but couldn't find any of the articles with instructions. So I was unaware of the character limit. Thanks for putting it up anyway!

I wouldn't say I'm "Price Insensitive" but when you have a hobby you budget a little bit for it.

If I know my Nintendo, this is going to lead up to months of speculation and finally the announcement that this was the short that will play before the new Mario movie.

I keep forgetting that game exists and I need to get it. The same fate befell Super Princess Peach back in the DS days.

There goes a perfectly-named Nintendo President.

So is "Free to start" the same as "Free to Play?" Does it mean there's a literal game with a beginning, middle, and end, and I have to pay to see the end, or is it just another way of saying, "Play all you want for free, but if you want the good stuff it'll cost you?"

I would just like to note that Nintendo Today notified me of this game before any of my fan sites or game sites. It actually works!

I was there 3000 years ago. I bought the Virtual Boy with high hopes when it came out. The gimmick itself was sort of headache inducing, but the games were actually rock-solid. The system flopped because nobody wanted to try it. I've been wanting a second chance at them for years. I'm legit excited.

Oh, this is a sequel to Strange Horticulture? I had no idea and now I need it.

@Dramlin The news blurb on Nintendo's website says the preorders will be available "at a later date" and gives you a link to be notified when they become available.

Nintendo, you absolute maniacs.

I'd love a Sunsoft Looney Tunes collection. If they could get that licensing.

There's a whole '90s gaming vibe about all of these that I dig. Ground Zero Hero looks like a fun Survivorslike. Super intrigued by Pixel Washer. I'd give any of them a shot for $10.

Fire Emblem also had a recent anniversary...

I get Fridays off and I don't wanna wake up that early on a day off! I'm just gonna have to wake up with the knowledge that something big may have went down while I slept.

@The_Nintendo_Pedant To be fair: Is there a critic that is a fan of the Bubsy series? And if there is, should we trust their judgement about ANY video game?

I wanted to like these games so badly. Much of my childhood was spent with the idea that a video game should be as close to an interactive cartoon as possible, and Bubsy embraced a sort of cartooniness I loved. Fortunately, I was smart enough to rent from Blockbuster first. I was a very forgiving child, but even I could tell they were duds.

Bubsy is proof that Mario could have gone as fast as Sonic if Nintendo wanted to, and a lesson in why they didn't.

Do we know if there's going to be a Switch 2 upgrade?

So stable, I'm gonna start keeping horses in it.