Papasophagus

The popularity of Pokémon has always been far out of proportion to the technical sophistication of its games. Expecting a handheld only developer to put out something comparable to a modern console game within a timeframe dictated by The Pokémon Company's multimedia schedule was unrealistic. It's clear Game Freak wanted to do something different for the first mainline Pokémon title on a console but weren't allowed to (see NL's article on that: https://bit.ly/3t5mEeQ).
That's why I am glad we got Legends: Arceus and that it did well. Its existence is so out of line with what we've grown to expect from Game Freak's past releases.

Glad to see the biggest shake up the series has seen do well.

It's exhilarating to think about what this means for Pokémon going forwards.

@RadioHedgeFund
Lightning fast loading times goes beyond just convenience. The ability to have games like Breath of the Wild are dependent on having short loading times to render the large seamless world. It's the big reason why they couldn't speed up sailing in the release of Wind Waker on the Gamecube, and why Twilight Princess couldn't have an open world. Or Skyward Sword for that matter.

The need to have a game run on lowest common denominator may be one of the biggest obstacles preventing streaming services from supplanting local game hardware.
Since specialized architecture will likely become a bigger driver of increasing game performance in the future over the general hardware improvements seen across the electronics industry in the past. Which means dedicated hardware will be a must for some games.

I also expect machine learning to change the kind of games we can make and how we can make them.

I could see something like Neuralink being the future of controllers. Especially if the hardware can be made less intrusive.

Anyone wanna clue me in where Spingapore is located?

There's a typo in the otherwise great article.

While I like the origami theme, the character design definitely has that Sticker Star smell.

@dux

How similar are European and Brazilian Portuguese? I am aware of substantial differences in pronunciation, word choice, and pronoun placement, but I'm wondering if intelligibility is an issue.

I find it funny that no one cared about the cheap animation quality when the game was unveiled earlier this year. It wasn't until they said that not every Pokémon would be in the game that people started to point to the game's low technical merits, and even then it was only to find a way to scream about Game Freak ditching the National Dex.
Really shows the fanbase's priorities: Caring more about brining the past games with them than pushing the series forward.

Never trust the post office. The postmaster in my town was fired for the unending theft of cash, checks, and lottery tickets sent in the mail on their watch.

Is Nintendo the only company that could have managed to make us surprised with a direct sequel? But on another point:

The weapon durability system was genius.
Any player could get lucky and happen upon a high end weapon early-ish in the game, but most won't be able to shortcut the system and use it to sustainably gather more top tier weapons without spending time beating shrines and earning rupees. Very skilled and tenacious players can, and that's how Breath of the Wild avoided the doldrums of grinding while maintaining a meaningful progression system.

I would see this as a benefit to the whole consumer base if this were an option alongside purchasing games. I think a shift to streaming would change financial incentives for publishers though. If one needs to constantly pay to play, I expect developers would prioritize MMO-style grind fests and online multi-player games over other kinds.

It's an inevitability that this would happen again,(look at Ruby and Sapphire), and it would be insane to hamstring progress for the sake of having all the Pokémon in the game at launch. If there is something to be complained about, it should be the bland idle animations during battle. The world's most valuable media franchise shouldn't settle for something so insipid. At least the Wild Area seems to be a stride in the right direction, one that's well worth allocating developer resources towards.

In the article this is sourced from, Inaba talks about the desire to have the freedom to make the games they want without having to rely on the approval of publishers. Though he says there might be co-publishing options with bigger companies down the road.
I hope they'll stay close to Nintendo because I'd like more potential Smash Bros. material.

The "ageing" issue GoldenEye has is about the controls:
https://youtu.be/a4qJ8wNfgXY?t=121

Which is a shame. Some elements of design that set GoldenEye apart from where the genre has gone are the non-combat objectives that the levels were designed around and the somewhat meandering layout of the levels, which lend themselves to objective based design. These two traits make the game more than a string of combat scenarios, it's a spy-movie simulator, and that makes it even more of an off-rails experience than most modern shooters.

"this focus on handheld play suggests that the final product might be even more similar to its 3DS counterparts than we first thought."

But not in price.
I'll wait until I can pick up a used copy, or hold off on this generation and see how the next one shapes up.

@Preposterous

Same here.
Given the short development cycle, my expectations were modest, but what they've shown (fixed camera angle, low resolution textures, static and sterile environments) is not enough to justify this being a full priced console game. I think that the fact this IS a console game is holding them back because they have to build up game assets. I'm hoping their working on this game will give them the infrastructure to make the next Pokemon generation on Switch (there will be another one) worth the price of admission, but as it stands I'm very underwhelmed. Maybe there'll be a cool gameplay hook, but Game Freak probably sees being able to play on the big screen as a hook itself.