StuTwo

Hyrule Warriors Rise of the Demon King is a shoe in surely?

Also definitely Fire Emblem of some description.

If I were speculating on weirder things a Punch Out reboot (or Wii port), something in the Splatoonverse (I always suggest a MOBA or Diablo alike) or an Arms belt scrolling brawler.

Switch version of Hogwarts being the top selling version ongoing is a real shock. I think you can count on one hand the number of times that’s happened with a major best selling multi platform game since the days of the SNES. Unthinkable in the WiiU days.

It’s a huge success story that’s likely to help Nintendo find broad 3rd party support going forwards.

It’s a game design mentality. If the game was made in a way that they just don’t any more then it’s a retro throwback regardless of how old it is necessarily.

So there is kind of a cutoff in the late 2000’s when developers moved to middleware and production teams dramatically increased in size. That made a huge difference in game “feel”.

Some Wii games are definitely retro.

I think a team of specialists who know exactly how modern AAA games are working under the hood (& have the tricks to make it seem like these are happening with more modest hardware) is not a bad buy at all.

In theory they could do just about any job - even if porting 3rd party games to Switch is most likely.

Let's face it - this is a bad idea that will bankrupt us all and prevent us from achieving our adult life goals. Hopefully it's just rumours.

@Fizza it’s a logical idea though. I mean he’s made of paper and so are stickers. I bet Nintendo could integrate them into the gameplay somehow. Someone should suggest it…

I still can't believe that Switch has done so well here. It's really astonishing - for decades Nintendo has had a foothold here (obviously) but they've always been a distant second behind Sega/Sony/Microsoft. Often a very, very distant second or third.

Seriously and unironically these are the sorts of games that NSO needs. Good but not great games that are representative of the system (never played Iggy though it was always interesting - magazines all said it was inspired by Uniracers. Extreme G is flawed but the sequel is really good).

What we’re really missing with N64 is “unlocked” save files. I think Blast Corps is a great game but I don’t particularly want to spend 20 hours mastering backlash so I can play the levels where I pilot a mech on Mars or do the Pac-Man levels etc. N64 games often gated cool things behind a long skill based grind. They could do better to present the bits of these games that people really love.

I also think we’re missing historical context more generally.

Steamworld Heist was fantastic but, as everyone knows, pirates improve everything so this is certainly a day one buy.

I'd say Mike Ashley completely misjudged the clientel of Game - perhaps not unreasonably he assumed that there was a huge cross over with his existing business because "games are just bought by chavvy teenage lads who want FIFA and COD" (this is the main target audience of Sports Direct).

..and maybe he was in some ways right - FIFA and COD do still dominate game sales in the UK. Who needs a big shop with diverse stock when you only really need 2-3 games on the shelves for most of your customers?

That said I'd guess that the high margins in the market are either driven by the more niche enthusiast market or now locked up digitally as micro-transactions that bricks and mortar stores can't access.

Most of the gaming community has taken to online sales for various reasons but in theory a good premium, community focused chain could take video games back to the high street. It would just have to look more like Waterstones - a larger destination store to experience, test and browse (with a cafe) - than GAME.

Franchises like Zelda are so malleable. I mean “Zelda” covers everything from grimdark 3d adventure (Twilight Princess) to bubblegum cartoon (Wind Waker) and goofy co-op multiplayer to hard as nails 2d platformer.

Just about any good dev could do something with Zelda.

I’d say the same about StarFox (how/why no one has managed to make a successful game in the series for more than 25 years is one of the real mysteries).

A MOBA using Splatoon or Pikmin or StarFox. A “Diablo-like” using Splatoon. These are ideas that would be interesting but I’d rather see Nintendo handle them in house. I mean if you look at the original Splatoon - sure Nintendo could have hired any of a dozen multiplayer FPS devs but their own ideas were more considered. Do you really just want an existing model with a Nintendo skin?

That said something left field like F-Zero coming back in the hands of an Indie dev who specialise in sports simulation games (manage an F-Zero team!) would be more exciting.

An Excitebike rouge-like.

A Fire Emblem card builder. Etc.

@GravyThief I used to think the same but as my kids have got into Lego I can see the big advantages of the "new Lego".

It relies far less on huge one-off base plates (everything is made from smaller pieces now), there's much more interior detailing on every set and more consideration is given to using different building techniques. It makes the sets more flexible and interesting - even if it makes them look less impressive in profile at first glance.

Lego Animal Crossing doesn't hold any appeal to me personally (I've never played an Animal Crossing game) but it'd be interesting to see how it does. In some ways you'd assume that Animal Crossing has died out because it was so huge in 2020 but I'm not sure. It's obviously not at that same peak but I suspect it's still very very big. A variety of sets (with clear room for more to be added over the next few years) suggests it could become a healthy long term theme.

What does surprise me about modern Lego - and Animal Crossing may have a particular issue here - is that it is clearly targeting two completely separate audiences; children who want a toy and adults who want an ornament/display piece.

These Animal Crossing sets are clearly "toys" but I wonder how many children are really playing Animal Crossing. If you haven't played the games and you're looking at the Lego sets in isolation the aesthetic is "young child" but I have my doubts if they're going to get that market. It feels like the sort of thing that might sell almost exclusively to adult Nintendo fans. In which case a larger elaborate (and expensive) display piece might have made more sense.

Wind Waker. That last scene.

18-M rated.

I don’t really understand the complaints. These aren’t out of the typical Lego pricing policies (all Lego is expensive - even when you buy it on offer or discount - of which many are to be expected), the mini figs look very good and the sets - though small - are quite detailed.

As others have said - the mini figures and few special pieces are the main part. They make it possible for more impressive modifications.

I’d also say that a range of several sets at different price points like this is very good for Lego. The alternative would be a £100+ set with half a dozen mini figs but nothing else ever. Being set out like a range allows scope for bigger adult focused sets in the future and/or gradual replacement of the smaller and mid sized sets over time.

If it’s successful then this could be a long running theme. The initial pitch seems good for that.

@Qwiff Honestly I'm not sure if I'd echo the "internet consensus" of Super Mario World. It was an unbelievable achievement at release. It had the roughest edges of earlier 8-bit platformers sanded off and it's more approachable than - say - Super Mario Bros 3 but if you haven't grown up playing very hard, very tough and very unforgiving platformers you might find it's hard, tough and unforgiving.

DKC is in a similar position. The atmosphere and ambiance is excellent but it's not and never was in the top tier of platform games in my opinion (DKC:R and DKC:TF on the other hand are exceptional).

Yoshi's Island by comparison is a very modern game in a design sense.

On the SNES mini I'd recommend Earthbound. Like Yoshi's Island it was many years ahead of its time and the art style is deliberately stylised so it still looks great. I'd also argue that Super Metroid is almost a perfect game (some players today react against the "tankish" controls and floaty jump arc of Samus but I think they give an appropriate feeling given that you're controlling a character in a combat space suit of metal)

Nintendo is never going to release Wind Waker HD on Switch. You might not have read it since it was announced in small print at the time of the Wii U release but they did make a legally binding declaration that that would be the final and only ever remaster of Wind Waker. I know it sounds crazy but they even explicitly stated that they'd never re-release the original either.

The game dies on Wii U. It was always time limited. Sorry.

Of course on the positive side they were clearer with the Mario 3d All-Stars so Nintendo is getting better all the time!

Yes. I expect to see "F-Zero vs Donkey Kong" a new franchise. The manatee balls say it'll be a farming simulator (but I think this is because all of the balls that say anything other than "farming simulator" have been removed from the tank).

@Not_Soos everyone is always “dying” from the moment we’re born.

Change happens. People get older, retire, die etc. the general principles live on and there is continuity. Especially with very large organisations like Nintendo.

They’ll either release a 2DS/Wii mini esq. entry level system (think less “Switch Lite OLED” and more “Switch Lite Dot Matrix”). They will want an entry level system around for a couple of years while the Switch 2 costs upwards of £350.

The question is whether that’s enough to see them over the line. I do think Switch will continue to sell in a way that 3DS didn’t quite manage though.

@Maxz tbf if they pitched it to Nintendo as “New Picross” the that would be right on brand for Nintendo. I’d imagine more like:

“So it’s Picross 10!”

bored Japanese execs flicking through their phones a few murmurs hand waving etc.

“…or we could go with *NEW Picross

*excitment ohs and ahs and “wah wahs” fill the room

I think he is right to a certain point. A lot of the contacts and sway to instil his vision is tied up with him as an individual. Another director might have an equally strong (or stronger) vision but they won’t have the goodwill and political sway to push it through uncompromised as he has.

I think that a stripped back game focused on a slightly smaller cast would be fine. Then again a “Ultimate Deluxe” release before Square/Konami/Capcom get gobbled up by Sony would be a good idea.

@kobashi100 Of course it's a huge gamble - but so is maintaining a franchise at the level of CoD. Microsoft is saying they're taking that gamble (and all previous evidence suggests that a lot of the time Microsoft buys something to buy the zeitgeist that they fail to maintain it).

Sony is one of the premier video game publishers. They own some of the most talented AAA studios and many of their in house games do emphasise graphical fidelity with some shooting mechanics. It is a big jump to make (see Microsoft's struggles with 313 - and that's with a very strong pre-existing franchise to play with) but - unlike say Amazon or Google - they are in a position where such a jump could be realistically made.

Though it might mean doing something like putting the Horizon team back on Killzone - which obviously means losing a key sales point over XBox and Nintendo for the cost of having something that can compete with a series (CoD) that they currently already have on their console. It's tough but then it's clearly a very tough business.

I get why Sony is desperate to stop this - it's a threat to them but more in the sense that it creates uncertainty about their market position. Just the idea that Microsoft might pull CoD from PS in the future and switch based on that possibility makes PS5 or PS6 a harder sell to some people.

Realistically though they (Sony) have numerous large internal studios. If they need a "CoD" and Microsoft ever did pull it from PS they could always pull one of their studios from making other stuff to make a fully fledged competitor. If "CoD" is so important and critical to the market they're surely better off making their own instead of investing in first party exclusives in other genres? Like it or not sometimes you have to take defensive measures instead of bulking up your armory of "exclusives".

It's not like this is without precedent - Microsoft and Nintendo have both had to put teams on RPGs seemingly in part because Sony has money hatted Final Fantasy.

Aside from which - why is it assumed that CoD will even be relevant at all 10 years from now? (it's never been relevant to me!) Franchises rise and fall - even huge ones.

@Picola-Wicola Yes - there are some in the depths. I think it is really easy to miss. If you've fought the leader of the Yiga clan and claimed auto build then you've been in the place.

...and I still don't understand why they can't just fix up my batteries whilst I'm there.

@Coffeemonstah Or you could have put out the fire with water...

The game does offer you a lot of possible solutions - which is why I think they assumed it was appropriate to leave some (even seemingly major things) to "chance".

That said I did have to google how to turn the taps off in a temple because I'd assumed it would be an ultrahand job or that there'd be some other option (it actually requires a slightly unintuitive use of a special ability and can't be done in any other way). It really stood out as a moment that breaks the game design.

I feel like there are a few fiddly systems tied to specific (missable) characters/completing optional quest lines. In particular the paraglider, Hetsu, auto build and the great fairies.

BoTW was all about freedom and exploration so - like many - I chartered my own course through the game, deliberately ignoring the signposted first major quest (though I got the paraglider) and trying to avoid fast travel for immersion (though not religious about it if I could get there some other way I’d always do try to do it). That’s a mistake in this game because you miss out on almost everything you need to play the game effectively and sometimes consecutive tasks on a quest line are on opposite sides of the map!

There’s no reason why the random Koroks couldn’t offer to “take the seeds to Hetsu for me and bring me the weapon expansion” for instance, it would streamline things greatly. It’s definitely something that’s overlooked because not having enough weapon storage spots was a huge complaint from the first game and he’s so easy to miss (I googled his location when I had ~50 korok seeds).

If you’ve not picked up the glider then various other characters (like Impa or a random character stood inside a sky view tower) should just give you one (then again maybe this was a deliberate thing from Nintendo to give sequence breakers something to figure out workarounds for).

The great fairy quests are also fiddly and spread out more than they need to be. You have to zig zag long distances over the map even to get the first one. I’d say this is a problem because even getting armour upgraded 1 level makes you far more durable.

Likewise batteries. The upgrade process isn’t clear at all and it’s easy to not spot the battery upgrade station (which is separate from the - also easy to miss/never find - Zonite charges shop for “reasons”). It’s not as big of an issue but it still seems like an unnecessary process. Again - like Korok seeds it could have been done passively or redeemed from speaking to any construct.

Loving the game though!

I thought that Necrodancer was a very fun little game. I enjoyed CoH too and it was nicely polished (although tbh I didn't think it was as good as Necrodancer). Rift of the Necrodancer looks very nice but I'm not a fan of rhythm games so it's not one for me personally.

It's clearly a very difficult industry to survive in and indies that try to make the jump from "one or two man bands" into a more mid-sized studio face a lot of challenges.

I think the thing is that playing Zelda 1 in the late 80's/early 90's was an experience that can't be replicated by playing it fresh today. So much of it was the fact that there was a lot of mystery about how to do certain things and the information on where to go/what to do/where significant secrets could be found just wasn't there on demand.

You can't replicate that easily in 2023 and the story and puzzles are so slight that any "remake" ends up being "in name only". As noted by others Oracle of Seasons was effectively this kind of remake but you kind of only know if you know.

I'd also disagree with the article - Zelda didn't come into the world fully formed. alttp was a fully formed Zelda game with a recognisable gameplay loop but not really the original.

What the original Zelda does still have going for it is the gorgeous hand drawn art that appears in promotional literature and the manual. I'd love to see a Zelda game with that kind of aesthetic.

A Zelda 2 remake on the other hand would make sense in a lot of ways. I think it's actually a great game to play moment-to-moment with some very satisfying moves (the chunky feedback from when your sword connects is still great - and the downward thrust is excellent) but it clearly has some very rough edges.

You missed Punch Out!

Of course you’d have to boilerplate it with notes about culturally sensitive depictions.

"...and this time you can go straight to fight Gannon within the first 5 minutes and be at the end credits in about 9 minutes 48 seconds. Now please hold my coat..."

@Dm9982 there is the odd EA game on the service (but not any good ones…). I wouldn’t rule out Sim City entirely.

I do find topics like this amusing though. It doesn’t take long to fill out a bingo card:

“Not interested unless I can buy them individually”

“The problem is Nintendo releasing insert name of now obscure third party game instead of the games that we all really want like insert name of SNES JRPG 1 and insert name of SNES JRPG 2”

To tie both of those points together - I do honestly think that there’s little point to releasing many 30-40 hour RPG epics on the service. For a start off they’re mostly very very niche but more importantly they are:

1: exactly the games that hardcore fans (the only type of fans for these games) would buy separately

2: unlikely to be played at all on the service. Short arcade experiences that you can be into a satisfying round with in less than 5 minutes are the games that work best on this service IMO.

@Martijn87 Those should be Link's first words when Nintendo finally decide to give him a voice.

Ironically standing up outside in a slow moving 2 hour long queue is one way to burn calories.

@MonadoBoy while I’m not the OP I will say that in some ways I agree with him. Odyssey is a very very very good game and I had a great time with it but personally it wasn’t what I most want from a Mario game. I enjoyed 3d World more.

I also think NSMBU is an excellent game undervalued because it has the bland recycled art style. The level design and control - especially in Luigi U - is super tight. It’s not a popular opinion I know but I personally think it might be the best 2d Mario game.

When it comes to pure platforming action it’s more intense than Odyssey (which isn’t entirely lacking of course but has strengths in other areas).

@BlackenedHalo aside from the obvious - VI has a better story, graphics, music and much better developed characters - it’s also one of practicality. V was never released on the SNES in the West so most have no nostalgia for it.

By the time it was available officially in English in a good port V was archaic.

@Buizel surely the bigger things than the size of the country are:

1) it’s a country with terrible public transport outside of that one city that gets about 20x the funding so everyone drives or is packed like sardines onto trains without the room to read a phone let alone play a game.

2) it’s a country with terrible weather year round so you can’t reliably play games outside.

@ZapNCrap because they don't have the rights to Glover. It was never a Nintendo developed, owned or published game. It was just a game released on the N64.

For games that Nintendo actually does own I think the answer is clear - they see a greater long term value in attracting subscribers to NSO. Those subscribers are not tipping their money up just for second or third tier games (they know that hardly anyone would buy things like Pilotwings 64 because they have the VC sales data) so if you let purchasers go in and cherry pick 3 or 4 of the biggest games then the service lacks value.

Most people bought about half a dozen VC games and they were SMW, Zelda alttp, Super Metroid, Ocarina of Time, Mario 64 and Pokemon. The rest of the service - hundreds of games - might as well not have existed for the vast majority.

Glover being a case in point - I'd try it out for an hour on NSO where I already subscribe (for the really good stuff) but I'm not spending extra money to own it.

@rupert_the_giantbear Oh there's definitely a constituency that hates 3D World because it's too close to the 2D games (I disagree - I think it's a logical next step from Galaxy 2 and a phenomenal game in its own right. I think it might actually be the peak peak Nintendo game where their design ethos is expressed most clearly and executed most confidently).

I think its main problem was always that it launched so soon after NSMBU and NSMB2 and NSLU and Mario 3D Land and it was named so similarly. The 3D World pattern is - to me - preferable to the open world "explorathon" Odyssey template but I can see why some people felt they'd overplayed it in a short space of time.

@Purgatorium It was ok. In hindsight we had a poorer experience but, then again, the companies that were more successful in Europe were Sega and Sony and their games were much better converted to work on PAL (and of course then benefitted from the higher resolution).

It's not a coincidence that they were more successful here - the attention on the local delivery of their games was just one symptom of a bigger underlying focus. Nintendo didn't really care as much as Sega/Sony so they were always second place here.

Smiles & Tears from Earthbound.

@Purgatorium In many, yes, cases pretty much.

PAL was 50 fps refresh rate (slower than NTSC at 60 fps) but with a notably higher resolution than NTSC. A lot of games were badly localised - they just slowed the speed down 15% but never bothered to increase the resolution.

So the leftover space was black borders around the action (which was of course slower and at a lower resolution than in the US and Japan). Waverace 64 had particularly big borders top and bottom.

@Purgatorium it was to mentally prepare you for the way that pal games would actually display.

I hope it's a worthy follow up to the original. I've been waiting 30 years to see where that storyline goes next.

Still gutted that they've recast Bob Hoskins though.

@Markiemania95 It might have been. Or maybe the author just has a cruel attitude towards people with speech impediments.

On balance the second option seems more likely. For shame NL.

@Darknyht I’d be distraught with a line up like that…

…it’s clearly missing Wii Music 2. Imagine how great that could be now the best songs of the 1930’s are out of copyright!

@eaglebob345 Yes I get that but don't we kind of expect a little more of Splatoon - a series that was almost effortlessly innovative and effective from the very beginning? The original game completely tore up the "online shooter rule-book" and made an absolute mockery of it. So there is a question of why do the sequels have to subscribe to "online shooter rule-book rule #896 - sequels should basically be the same"?

I hope that it's good, I hope that people love it, it clearly refines a lot of "backroom" things that Splatoon 2 could have done with in a way that will make it feel essential for big fans of the first games. I don't think it's for me personally (I played plenty of the first 2 games but haven't in a while and I think I wouldn't play much of this one at this point in my life). Thankfully not everything needs to be made specifically for me!

In terms of innovation I'd like to see (honestly) - something completely different from the Splatoon franchise. A Splatoon MOBA for example or a fully fledged Splatoon RTS or a Diablo esq. Splatoon overhead "looter shooter". I think that the team that was so innovative with the original game would bring something unique to each of those genre's using the basic Splatoon toolkit and style.

@Rika_Yoshitake Yes - A Splatoon visual novel is exactly the sort of experiment they should be doing with the franchise. Not as a replacement to a Splatoon 3 but as an aside. It should also be a franchise fast tracked into having films and TV series - it's such a unique property that it could and should be bigger than just the core shooting game that spawned it.

@Fizza There's always the excuse that it was 30 years ago. It's getting to the point where if you're old enough to remember the GameBoy you probably can't remember the GameBoy anymore!

Playing s7 it does kind of stand out how little the pictures actually resemble what they're supposed to be any more. I suppose they used the most easily recognisable objects in s1 and s2.

@Fizza birthed on 3DS? It was a GameBoy game originally!

@SwitchVogel I’m not sure. I think if Nintendo wants that record they’ll get it at this point. A budget Switch with a pack in of MK8 at a price of £150ish will eventually be possible and if they release such a console as an entry point console then it would continue to sell for years to come.

Basically what they tried with the 3DS late life. But tied in to the long term Switch ecosystem.