Pak-Man

It's a social media phenomenon. Every fan group on Facebook is posting their creations. And while things aren't quite as dire as they were when Animal Crossing came out, I think this is another case of "We need a game like this."

For $10, how can I not?

So did y'all add an extra just to bump the total to 69?

Nice.

Puts it closer to the He-Man movie date, so that might do it some favors.

I have reservations. Like- I'm 90% reservations. But the other 10% of me knows it's not going to NOT see a live-action Zelda movie.

The Super Metroid wall-jump really is the only teensy flaw in an otherwise perfect game, and it feels like Nintendo knew that and was never able to get it where they wanted, so they made it only necessary for one little optional section for the 100%ers.

Already preordered Tomodachi and That He-Man game is a sure thing. Vampire Crawlers is by the Vampire Survivors people, so that's a pretty sure bet. I have my eye on Mouse: P.I. I like what it's selling.

I want to combine these two designs into a big multi-case holder with one labelled slot for every Mario game.

Don't know WHY they would have waited until today!

Wonder what movies are out this weekend...

I liked Sega's announcement that they're making their logo 3% more blue.

It's all a little TOO big of a spoiler to be revealed this widely.

I'm on-guard for April 1st shenanigans, but thrilled if this is true.

It sounds like it's more accurate to say they're lowering prices on digital releases, since Yoshi was probably always going to be $69.99. I won't be paying more than I thought I would for a physical copy of Yoshi.

The $10 is worth it to me. I've always known that my whole physical media deal costs me more money in the long run, because nearly every game goes on digital sale regularly.

Now if they start charging more for Game Keys, we have a whole different kettle of fish.

@UpsideDownRowlet Justice for Hugh Morris!

Wow. They left comments on here? Did not expect that.

So without getting into all that, the only real place these Tariffs have manifested is Amiibo prices, which are darned near ridiculous. The price of the games themselves has only shifted maybe $10 in the last 40 years, so that increase feels inevitable and I'm surprised it didn't happen ages ago. (Or maybe it did, and it keeps getting pulled back down by a market that doesn't want to pay $90 for a video game.)

Awesome! Wanna give us Shenmue 1&2 while you're at it? It's not too late!

Man, I just got all the Changeables. I thought I'd get a break from Happy Meals for a while.

@Justaguest There is not a Switch Lite 2 yet, so I'm still using my Switch Lite for times when other people are using the Switch 2, and I feel a little bit better traveling with it.

Just confirmed that Tropico 6 no longer looks like garbage in Handheld mode!

So I can play Tropico and Jurassic Park in handheld and it won't be a blurry mess?

If I were either half of the phrase "Metroidvania," I wouldn't be too keen on acknowledging the other half either. You'll sure never hear Nintendo call a Metroid game a "Metroidvania."

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!