TheStormGL

As someone who has never played the game, are there substantial differences from the Switch 1 version?

This is so cute!

Not surprising. Nintendo has always been viciously protective of their services and intellectual property. And the law is on their side.

I’m so confused. Why isn’t the dock available for preorder in Europe? It releases on the same day as the Switch 2 and all other accessories, but you can’t preorder it anywhere.

I’ll be honest. It won’t deter me. I’ll be getting the MarioKart Bundle day one.

I don’t like the higher game prices,but I’d rather pay the money up front than for Nintendo to start making terrible micro transactions like Capcom and Ubisoft do for their AAA games.

There is no chance at all, that we will get a normal Nintendo Direct this month. The Partner Showcase late August confirms this. I highly doubt there is so much 3rd party content for switch that Nintendo had to make an extra partner showcase just to present it all.

But it does beg the question: What are we getting instead? Because otherwise why not hold the Partner Showcase in September. As stated in the article, it is the traditional direct month.

Maybe we get a Switch 2 reveal. Or a game focused direct. A Mario+Luigi Brothership Direct maybe?

I do think it’s pretty likely because of the indie-world and partner showcase direct.

September is the direct month. But because the direct happened late August, I think something must be happening in September.

@N64-ROX No proper Mario game? I agree with Zelda, since BOTW was the last game for the WiiU and Cross-Platform.

But Super Mario 3D World was no spin off game and highly praised at the time. And the WiiU also had MarioKart 8, one of the best MarioKarts of all time. And I would argue MarioKart is just as much of a System Seller as Zelda or Mario.

The WiiU failed because it was difficult to develop for and its main Gimmick never really clicked. And it didn’t have a good launch title. New Super Mario Bros. U is not the game to launch a console with.

And Nintendo Land (which I adore) would never be able to capture the same audience that Wii Sports did.

So the Switch 2 reveal is in September huh?

I could be wrong. But September is the usual time for directs (and I’m counting partner showcases as directs). Them moving it forward to late August suggests they have something else planned for September.

$500 / 500€ seems pretty steep. I feel like the Switch 2 would need higher than base PS4 performance at that price point for future proofing.
If the performance is similar of a base ps4, then it should be 400€.

Give us Sonic Unleashed!

@Axecon what makes you believe they have bad blood? There have been a ton of Nintendo announcements at The Game Awards since Reggie left. The biggest being the Sephiroth Reveal in 2020.

A Great Interview! Well done.

@solarwolf07 Citra is made by the Yuzu Team. Part of the settlement deal was that they stop providing tools for emulation for any Nintendo system. So they had to discontinue Citra as well.

I think Nintendo have learned their lesson concerning Console names.

A new mode, or big meaningful changes to existing ones. The core splatoon experience has stayed the same for all 3 titles and for a casual player as myself, it’s getting boring.

Not quite game accurate as Link is right-handed in TOTK. But it still looks cool!

There’s a channel on YouTube called Moon Channel. It published a video a couple of days ago about Nintendo and their stance on emulators and the legality of emulators and why Valve is siding with Nintendo. It’s a very interesting watch, I highly recommend it.

Turns out the legality of emulators isn’t clear cut at all. If Dolphin challenged Nintendo in court there is a high chance it would have resulted in emulators being banned. I’m not surprised they backed down.

This is a great addition to the site! Well done! If more publications look at the accessibility features of a game and praise or criticize them, eventually the developers and publishers will follow suit.

I feel like this is another indication that we will get some kind of big news from Nintendo this summer. Be it a E3-Style direct or something else. We have absolutely no idea what Nintendo has planned for the second half of 2023 outside of DLC.
And I think the usual September direct is a bit late to announce AAA games that will launch in October or November.

That’s so cool! The Miniatur Wunderland is such an amazing place. This collaboration is awesome!

@InJeffable Jealousy? Revenge? Her comments about how she is the only real voice of Bayonetta indicate to me that she is taking this very personally. And now that both Bloomberg and VGC are reporting this makes me believe it’s true.

Regardless of what actually happened, Voice Actors deserve to get paid more than they are at the moment.

This sounds wonderful. The team clearly has a lot of passion around this project. I hope this does well!

Oh wow, a console that released barely two years ago and that has seen constant supply constraints finally managed to beat a console that’s more than five years old.

In all seriousness, this isn’t surprising and doesn’t mean a thing. The Switch has already sold so many units that it’s a huge success. If the Switch had released only this year or last year THEN it would be concerning. But it isn’t.

This is just another sign that Nintendo should release their next console soon (I’d say in the next two years). It would be a mistake too bank on the Switch for too long.

I don’t think Directs will go. Despite their drawbacks they have two very important benefits:
1) Nothing else draws as much attention from their community as the directs. In the days before there is so much speculation and hype surrounding the event. If you just drop a trailer you never get that building excitement.
2) People will watch trailers in a direct that they wouldn’t otherwise because they „have“ to. This allows them to give games a shot which probably wouldn’t be as easily marketable otherwise.

These two benefits you get only with this format. Partner-Showcases can do this as well but without the first party games many people aren’t as interested. As good as the last Partner-Showcase was, if the Bayoneta Trailer and the Kirby trailer were in there, then I’m convinced more people would have watched it.

This format works and other companies know this as well. It’s why Sony now has their State Of Play showcases.

I think they’re keeping one character secret. A special surprise.

@SwitchVogel I'm still mad that they never brought Dragelia Lost to Europe.

BEHOLD: The Switch Pro!

I really don’t see the advantage of a PRO model now. 1 or 2 years ago? Maybe. But now. Just so you can AI Upscale your video to 4K? (One of the rumored features of the PRO model.)

Many People wish for a PRO model because they want more graphically beautiful games. But the PRO model would never deliver on that because all developers still have to develop for the original model. They would just give you a slightly higher resolution and more stable frame rate. The PRO model won’t make the trees in Arceus less ugly or give you Ray-Tracing all of a sudden.

I think the next switch we see that has faster internals will be a Switch 2. Only with a new generation will we see a true jump in graphical quality.

I really hope that we get a splatoon specific direct at some point. While I’m liking what I’m seeing so far, I’m still missing what truly sets it apart from 2.

YEEEESSSSSS!!!!!

I am intrigued. I do think this Partner Showcase will probably be the best one we've ever had. Mario+Rabbids Sparks of Hope is a given. If Persona shows up that would also be amazing!

But now I'm confused about when Nintendo will showcase their own games. We still don't have a big holiday release title (other than Pokémon) and Nintendo usually has at least one.

More importantly: The sequel to Breath of the Wild. The game releases next spring. And if we follow the promotional cycle of BotW1 then they would have to reveal the game proper around now. The way they are talking about it, it sounds like it will be even bigger than the first one. And for such a big game the promotional time also has to be big. You want people to talk about it.

So how will they show it? The first day of Nintendo's E3 2016 focused only on two games, and for the largest part that was Zelda. A classic Nintendo Direct doesn't fit that bill. So if we get more Nintendo News this week (which I doubt) or in the next couple, I think it will be a video dedicated solely to the next Breath of the Wild.

I do think that Nintendo has to do a Direct soon. But the fact that there was a Xenoblade one this week makes me uncertain if the general Direct will already be next week. Usually Nintendo likes to space these out.
But a Direct is coming. I think Nintendo will not ditch the format anytime soon.

I'm nervous about the game. The Gameplay didn't look finished yet. And I'm not just talking about animation. We did not see any UI. For a Gameplay Showcase. I found this very odd. It did not help in conveying what was going on.
I'm also not sure what to think about the art style. It looks way too bland. The landscape didn't look very interesting. The Color pallet was strangely.... muted? It didn't feel warm or vibrant, something I usually associate with Sonic.
And lastly: Sound Design. We have the soft ambient piano music and then the way too loud sounds of sonic dashing, ground pounding, jumping on springs etc. The sounds feel so out of place.
I want it to be good. I want a good 3D Sonic game. But I'm not sure.

I’m very let down on this. The fact that it has NFTs, Crypticurrencies and Gatcha Mechanics is already a huge bummer for me. But what really put me off is that the game plays itself. Like they teach you about combat and it looks fun, they have a nice colorful world and it looks like a lot of fun. But then the character walks to the next destination without your input, battles the enemies without your input. What is the point of this???
And not only is the game doing this, it practically forces you to play this way. If you’re or on autopilot then there is no destination marker. And at the beginning there is a a huge „Touch Me“ button on the autopilot command.
The combat in the first hour was quite fun, too bad I could never play it as the game constantly did it for me.

I’m so disappointed, that Disneys Free to Play Racer will probably be better received than this one.

The only good news from this merger

This looks adorable. The original trailer had me on the fence, but now I’m definitely getting it!

In terms of games I find it extremely funny that all of the game franchises listed (except space invaders maybe) have had at least one if not more entries in the last ten years. They are not dead at all.

Doesn’t this make the North American version the speedrunning capable one?

For Nintendo, we have been on the same power level for about ten years now. The Switch doesn’t have drastically improved improved performance compared to the WiiU for a number of reasons.
But I agree that the current switch doesn’t need a pro version. I don’t think it will get a pro version anymore. I think we will get a switch 2.
The reasoning is simple: Even if we would get a pro. Could we actually use the power? All the games would still have to be able to run on the original switch, so it would never reach it’s full potential.

@VoidofLight The thing is, at least in Europe the price isn’t that bad if you’re an animal crossing fan.
The normal subscription costs 20€. Before they unveiled the price I was prepared to pay 10€ extra for N64 and Genesis. The ACNH dlc costs 25€.
So for me. The yearly subscription price of the expansion pack (which is 40€) makes sense for 2 1/2 years.
But I do agree, if you’re not an AC fan, it’s very expensive. Too expensive.

@MrGawain Well done!

YEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!

I just don’t see a switch pro happening anymore. It will probably be a Switch „2“. A new generation of switches rather than a pro model in the old generation. Because even if we still get a pro model, it will be held back by the limitations of the standard switch.

@Maximumbeans Yeah that’s exactly it.

The only way Nintendo can throw us a curveball now is if it is someone who we never ever ever expect. And since the roster is already so diverse, that's really hard.
Maybe a Sony character? (But that is super unlikely. I don't think it will happen.)

I'm starting to get nervous. Sakurai wants everyone who plays games to watch and states that we might not know the character... So it must be someone super obscure?
But with Nintendo telling us to "let our predictions run wild" they're hyping this up incredibly, making me think it's someone more well known...
With all this excitement in the air I can't help but fear we will be let down in the end. Not because it will be a bad pick but because our expectations were completely out of proportion.

I think we will go out with a bang. In Smash 4, the last announced character was from the survey on who the community would like most in the game. And that turned out to be Bayonetta.
Now the scope has changed significantly in the last 5 years. Smash is bigger than ever with more third party representation than ever before. I think the last character will either be a highly requested one (Waluigi, Sora) or someone completely unexpected but still from a big company. I do not see this as a minor character from a minor series.
Personally, I would be ecstatic if it were Sora, even if he is extremely unlikely.

@Torakaka I think Sakurai once stated that the final decision is up to Nintendo not him. However I do agree that getting an agreement with Disney seems highly unlikely. As much as I would like to see him, I think the chances are pretty slim.