antonvaltaz

Just heard Nate the Hate claim a new Switch 2 Star Fox game is on the way for this summer... in which case they're clearly trying to hype up the IP in advance... makes sense.

The thing that physical-only advocates never seem to mention is that buying a physical copy is no more “owning” a game than buying a download. Even a DRM-free download. In both cases, you are buying a license from the platform-holder to play that game on their platform. In both cases it can, legally, be revoked - the only difference is that revocation (incredibly rare - not sure if it’s ever happened on a Nintendo console?) can be enforced more easily with digital downloads. But it could still be enforced on physical copies with a system update.

And in both cases, there will be situations where data, whether stored on a cartridge or the internal memory or a micro SD card, can be lost or damaged. In fact, a digital game downloaded to a micro SD card can be backed up much easier and without specialist equipment compared to a physical cartridge.

It’s not like the difference between a physical book and a DRM’d ebook at all - in that sense you do physically own a copy without any reference to a platform holder at all.

Is the second step fixing all the crashing bugs in the 30th anniversary edition?

@Not_Soos Someone more technical than me can probably answer this better, but I certainly remember software which could do ray-tracing back on the Amiga back in the early 1990s. The difference is that then we were talking about static, quite simple images - which would take hours or even days to render, depending on your setup.

And so I imagine that the graphics in something like Donkey Kong Country on the SNES were ray-traced one-by-one, before being converted to bitmap/raster graphics. Maybe there was something similar with Rayman - although the graphics don't give that impression to me?

I assume that what's new about ray-tracing in video games in the 2020s is the idea that it can be done in real-time 3D graphics at 60 or 120fps.

Keza Macdonald is great, I love reading her stuff in The Guardian. Definitely going on my wishlist!

@ArthurFan1998 It looked like there were sliders for each attraction, no? So presumably if you set them all to “no”, the mii character would be asexual by default?

@Polvasti FIVE apps, if you’re a parent and want to use Switch Parental Controls….

Have only just clocked that she was the young Jean Grey in the later X-Men films... oh... a bit less excited now. Not the most charismatic actor.

Does Japan recognise Taiwan as a state?

@PapaMurphy I had never heard of kabaddi before now, and now I am in danger of becoming obsessed...

@Rentaro @World I just wishlisted it on Deku Deals, where there are more screenshots - and it does indeed look like there are retro mode options.

@dartmonkey The bit about NSO at the end needs updating with the addition of those four Koei strategy games for the SNES a little while back.

@progx True, but readership of a dedicated fan site like this is hardly representative of the wider Nintendo audience. Judging by other discussions, I get the impression that there are proportionately far more Steam Deck (& other handheld PC) owners among the NL audience than the wider population.

No real comment on the article itself as I've never had / used a Steam Deck (different strokes indeed) but it's great to see @CasuallyDressed back on the Nintendo Life team - I remember when he was the videos man, before even Alex!

@Olliemar28 Just to be the pedant… in the last paragraph you wrote “Square Enix committed to a plan in 2014…”. That should presumably be 2024?

Blimey... I just had my 3DS XL (not 'New' repaired by Nintendo UK because of a broken hinge... although as far as I can see they just replaced it with a (presumably refurbished) model! Cost me £80 including delivery costs, but independent repairers were around the same or more.

@Coffeemonstah I should hope so... the PC Engine version is the definitive version, which others are conversions of (it was never released in the arcades).

Just saw that Arcade1Up are releasing a machine with Capcom's '90s X-Men and Marvel games, to mark the launch of X-Men '97 on Disney+ this month.

Too much to hope that it will also be available as a collection for consoles? That would be a killer "And finally..."

My theory is that, given they’ll have to go through a Christmas season with everyone aware that a new console is coming early 2025, they’ll slash the price of the original Switch models and probably launch a new ‘Nintendo Selects’ style budget priced range of game re-releases ahead of Christmas.

Where's the Amiga/DOS version?!

I doubt anyone will be reading this now, but there’s a lot of misinformation regarding this series and the earlier Lotus series on the Amiga.

They weren’t made by the same people - the Lotus trilogy was developed by Magnetic Fields (Shaun Southern and Andrew Morris) and published by Gremlin.

This series may have been inspired by the Lotus trilogy, but it was developed by Gremlin, in-house, and published by Kemco.

The only connecting thread was the Barry Leitch soundtrack, which of course also links Horizon Chase Turbo.

Yeah... just hoping it doesn't follow in the footsteps of the 2013 Flashback "reimagining". (shudder...)

Aren't pretty much all the arcade versions available on the Switch via various Capcom collections? Wouldn't they be the definitive versions?

What about the Game Boy games?

@Axelay71 Perhaps because the graphics are by Henk Nieborg, who worked on Lionheart, Ambermoon/Amberstar, Flink etc

Looking at the screenshots, Managing to do a whole review of this game without mentioning Flashback once seems quite an achievement!

Agree with all the comments about Master System versions (but don't expect to see them added, as they were much less familiar to audiences in Japan and North America).

But the thing that really surprises me is that they are adding all the Game Gear games but leaving out several Mega Drive/Genesis Sega related games. No MD/Gen version of Sonic Spinball or Dr Robotnik? And no Sonic 3D Blast?

Admittedly none of those are exactly classics, but if you're putting together a "definitive" 8/16-bit Sonic collection, it seems strange to leave them out, especially given how they already have emulators for all modern systems ready to go, it should be little to no effort...

I love Henk Nieborg’s stuff! Sign me up!

I love this game!

As no-one else has said it yet... medical doctors don't have PhDs!

(Well they might, but it would have nothing to do with their medical training / qualifications...)

@AmplifyMJ Hope you get it soon. I pre-ordered it too, for my son as a Christmas present, only arrived today (Tuesday 24th) even though it was sent on Thursday 19th. It came by Royal Mail which is pretty unpredictable at the moment...

My 8 year old is desperate for this. I wouldn’t usually let him play a 16 rated game, but is it worse / scarier than the films (which he’s seen)?

What about Mr Winpy? Retro game and retro fast food!

https://spectrumcomputing.co.uk/index.php?cat=96&id=3312

Can't believe you missed the obvious "Double Bubble Bobble Trouble" headline 😀

@SwitchedOn_Games I thought it was flair too...

@OorWullie Perhaps they could start with re-releasing the Rebirth trilogy by M2 on WiiWare, they'd be a great fit for the Switch eShop at the right price...

"Northern Island"? Any particular island?! 😂

This is the one I remember!

https://www.mobygames.com/images/covers/l/398750-ghosts-n-goblins-zx-spectrum-front-cover.jpg

@Ruthless4u You know all the Wing Commander games are on GOG.com, and have been for ages? Regularly discounted too...

“the pioneer of the Japanese video game industry, TAITO Corporation, will return to the western console market after around a decade.”

I’m so excited for this - after Nintendo, I think Taito were my favourite publishers back in the day. Loved the WiiWare “Plus” games they released, hoping they’ll get rereleased too...

@LavaTwilight They were officially licensed by Sega, but Sega didn't really have much to do with their production, it seems they just let AtGames get on with it, without much (if any) quality control. Whereas these ones are developed by / in close conjunction with Sega themselves, and M2 are handling the emulation, who are generally considered one of the very best companies operating in this area.

So that's why some people are really hyped for it.

@Jayenkai Never knew that! Only ever played the Spectrum and Amiga versions...

@Ooyah On the ZX Spectrum it was called Dizzy Panic on the box but Panic Dizzy on the loading screen (or vice versa, I can't remember).

But weirdly, whatever it was called, it seems a completely different game to this...

@Liam_Doolan "Sato confessed the team simply wanted to create a game console that could beat the Super Famicom"

Do you mean the Famicom? The Mega Drive was launched two years before the Super Famicom, how could it be designed to compete against something which didn't exist yet?

I WANT ALL OF THESE! Also check out Fusion Retro books, if you're a European 8-bit / 16-bit home computer fan...

@Kilroy They changed their name after Miami Chase, but it was the same creative team of Rico Holmes, Andreas Tadic, Stefan Boberg, Allister Brimble and Martyn Brown who developed all the earliest games (Full Contact, Project-X, Alien Breed, Superfrog, etc).

I guess Assassin was their first externally-developed game, right at the end of 1992.

@ryancraddock Team 17 didn't begin as a publisher, they began as a developer. In fact their first title, Miami Chase, was published by Code Masters. Then they self-published some of their own games (e.g. Alien Breed, Superfrog and Project-X) before publishing other groups' work - like, as you say, Super Stardust by Bloodhouse (as Housemarque were then known, before they'd merged with Terramarque).

"When I grew up and became a high schooler, I got really into UK music, particularly music from Manchester"

Good man!

I think my favourite would have to be Bitmap Books' 'Sinclair ZX Spectrum: A Visual Compendium'. I also have the SNES and Amiga books in that series (which are also excellent), but the Speccy one pips the post for me because:

(a) the computer has a special place in my heart, it was the only games machine I had until I got a Game Boy in 1991 at the age of 10 (and my only home system until a Master System the following year);

(b) the bright vibrant simple colours just look amazing with whatever fancy printing techniques they used.

Just exquisite.

Soooo pleased about this. I saw somewhere recently that they'd be announcing their new book soon, and I was secretly hoping it would be the Master System, but was guessing it wouldn't be as it hardly gets any retro attention, due to its lack of success in the US I guess.

Growing up I had a ZX Spectrum, then a Master System, then an Amiga. Now I'll have Bitmap Books for all three!

(The other books I have are gorgeous, also have the SNES one which I just got, as I used to play on my friends' SNESs all the time...)