charliecarrot

Super happy that these are available on Nintendo consoles now. Yakuza 0 got me into the series. Definitely recommend everyone giving it a go.

Yep, I used vouchers on Z-A and a Prime 4 preorder.

Mario Golf: World Tour on 3DS is a quality game. Personally I'd place it right behind Toadstool Tour on GCN.

I know it's only because the 3DS peaked during a portion of my life where time moved fast and I had little time for gaming, but I wish the 3DS lasted longer than it did. I've revisited the console and its library this year and it's been a joy to play many of these games for the first time, but I regret not being around for the hype and excitement of the handheld's heyday.

This is the one game of all the Animal Crossing releases that I played the most and remember the fondest. I don't really have a strong desire to play it again - if anything, I'd go back to New Leaf - but I'm glad this game existed.

Silly to see people arguing over review scores. It's just a contextless number thrown on the end of a subjective review so your publication is included on aggregation sites. Numbers don't matter and no experience is for everyone.

I absolutely love Picross. I've been spoiled by the releases on Switch because I think the control scheme is perfect (better than touch imo) and now I can't play any other versions.

I have a 1TB SD card in my Switch 1 and it's mostly used up.

My PS5 has a 2TB m.2 SSD, and I regularly have to delete games to make space.

If Switch 2 is gonna have huge AAA 4K games, we're gonna need a lot more storage available.

Shout out to these two IPs for both being represented in Balatro

I always spent all my platinum points on avatars because I didn't realize you could get physical products with them... Sad

Gyro aiming seems like a more natural fit for controllers when it comes to the sorts of minute adjustments you get from a mouse, so I'm not mad.

I can see the joycon mouse being great for certain genres like strategy and city builders that are annoying with controllers. Not sold on it as a control scheme for more action-packed games, but willing to be shown a good example!

I'm surprised they ported this to Switch. Seems like the wrong choice.

I can't tell much from still images. They look fine, but I'm more interested in characterization!

I thought the Japan cover was an obvious winner, and I was shocked to see the results.

Interesting question about the verb release. I tend to go to Wiktionary as they have entries that reflect actual usage, and it gives this as the TENTH definition for "release" as a verb:

> (intransitive) To launch; to come out; to become available.
> when the game releases
> the new model will release on

This usage has never even crossed my radar as something strange or abnormal, but maybe that's because I've been hanging out in gaming news communities for decades now.

I understand why people rate Phantom Hourglass lower, but I think it's one of the top 10 entries. The puzzles are some of the best in the series, and the various tools take great advantage of the touch screen controls.

I think it was so cool to have a massive seafaring adventure on a handheld like that, and I personally enjoy it more than any of the top-down Zeldas that released on 3DS and Switch.

This is that Digital Foundry does - they discuss the technical aspects of performance and graphics. It says nothing about how much YOU should value these things as an individual.

Pointing out technical flaws and shortcomings doesn't make the game any less fun. If you put a lot of weight on those aspects, you might enjoy the game less. I personally really enjoyed the game on Switch 1 (there were only one or two instances of pop in that were really egregious for me). But some people might be turned off by flat balconies and static NPCs, and that's fine.

Yeah I see no reason why Nintendo wouldn't be up front if they specifically didn't want people using 3rd party docs. They could just come out and say it - not like they're shy about that sort of thing.

Still, I wouldn't get one myself.

I didn't contribute to those numbers because I bought it digitally... (the box art is beautiful though)

I'm surprised people have been getting 3rd party docks this early into the Switch 2's lifetime, considering what happened the first time around.

I don't really see GameCube... Without the iconic lunchbox handle on the back, it just reads as a box.

If anything, it evokes a short xbox.

Reggie ❤️ Cool to see him promoting that

Bring us our bandicoot!

Now can we get one of male Byleth in the same outfit/pose? For uhh, equality and all that

So happy to see y'all's growth over the years. Keep up the good work!

This seems like an incredibly bad idea. In fact, QA is probably one area you want to have large, robust human teams.

Maybe LLMs should replace the CEO and upper management instead.

Personally, the new years countdown in Animal Crossing New Horizons is very special to me. The music, the preparations, everyone counting down. That's the most memorable of all.

This remake looks so good. Can we please remake all PS1 RPGs in this style next? Thanks.

@Dang_69 Fair enough! I'm not taking a side here, and I think the attempted patent is far too broad to be allowed. I was more responding to the article title which suggests Nintendo has just lost the whole fight - I expect Nintendo to keep trying is all.

Nintendo not getting the patent doesn't mean they lose the overall battle against palworld.

Expedition 33 has the most hearts and minds. I wouldn't be upset if it lost to DK Bananza, but I'd be pretty sad if it lost to Ghost of Yotei or something

It just makes me miss this game's soundtrack.

Though without a doubt, I'll never forgive them for getting rid of the OG town hall theme from Wild World/City Folk. What happened to Pelly and Phyllis?? (not that we don't love Isabelle)

@Thomystic Sometimes the expanded version is significantly different from the original. On 3DS, SMTIV: Apocalypse is a full on different game with a different protagonist and story from the original SMTIV, but it takes place in the same world and reuses as much as possible from the original (kinda like Majora's Mask was to OoT)

@Vyacheslav333 did they? The dancing games, and I suppose the fighting game for P4? I wouldn't refer to any of those as being in a "Persona 3 series" or "Persona 4 series" personally, but I don't mind if you do

I'm happy for the success of Persona 5. But I cringed a little bit at "Persona 5 series". It's not wrong, but it's funny that they milked P5 so much that you could consider it a series in its own right (kinda like FFVII I suppose).

Remember, this is a game that originally released on the PS3 (though the better version was released at the same time on PS4). Same generation as the Wii. Game development cycles are out of hand these days.

I must be one of the rare ones who basically tried to change my outfit every day! I love all the options available, and the default fit looks really silly imo

The Devil May Cry 1-3 HD remakes are on sale so I picked all of them up... I just got past the first spider boss thing in DMC1 and it was quite a journey to get there for someone who's never played it before. But I'm having a blast and it's so satisfying once you start to get a feel for the controls.

I love love love this article. Thank you for sharing

Please, everyone, try out 13 Sentinels!

I don't even play many visual novels, but this is very much not a typical visual novel. I tried 13 Sentinels on a whim and it ended up one of the best experiences I've ever had on the Switch.

Super engaging story full of new mysteries at every turn, lots of fun references to classic sci fi, and a super original story told in a unique way (though multiple different perspectives and timelines) that ultimately ends in the most satisfying way.

Definitely worth $15!!

Switch 1 sales for ZA are well outpacing the Switch 2 sales now, which is more in line with what I expected! Was interesting that they were fairly equal on release when the Switch 1 definitely has a much larger install base.

Always happy to see bugs being addressed! Didn't run into these things in my playthrough, but it sounds like it would be unfortunate for any player who does.

Dragon Quest XI is a masterpiece that everyone should play if they haven't.

But it's hard for me to sit down and play a classic JRPG these days. Glad the remake is doing well, but I don't have a strong desire to jump into a game like this at this point in my life.

Monster Hunter Rise is still great and still worth playing, even the regular Switch version.

I bought Wilds for PS5 but I haven't played it yet because no one else I know plays it and it just had a really disappointing launch period.

I really don't think ZA is a bad game at all. I think the general sentiment toward Pokemon has soured from SwSh and SV, as well as the DP remakes (that didn't live up to what we historically expected from a Pokemon remake), and that negative opinion of Pokemon has bled onto ZA. It's actually a super fun game with great side quests and an interesting locale to explore. The gameplay is probably the most fun I've had with Pokemon in over a decade, easily.

The ire at ZA is incredibly misdirected, but it's hard to blame people who have been disappointed over and over with the switch games so far.

I'm not convinced Pokemon has ever been a super polished or a graphical juggernaut on any system. They've always been a bit simplistic throughout the generations. I think their development process just never really caught up to modern standards. It takes a whole lot more effort to make a good looking and fun game in an HD, 3D world compared to a top-down 2D game (just look at how development timelines have ballooned in the past decade for most other game series).

Gen 1 was fairly on par with other Gameboy RPGs, but when you get to Gen 3 on the Gameboy Advance, it's clear they wanted to keep the same simplistic formula with minor enhancements when you compare RSE against other GBA RPG juggernauts (like say, Golden Sun). Gen 4 is basically Gen 3 but with some 3D buildings. Gen 5 really shook things up visually as much as possible within the confines of still basically being the same core, grid-based game.

Even going into Gen 6 where everything is fully 3D, the core formula is hardly touched - you have the same basic grid layouts, same towns connected by routes - it still doesn't feel totally removed from the Gameboy games.

When you have a core formula like that (towns are arranged in grids, routes connect towns, random encounters with Pokemon in tall grass on these routes), I imagine it's easier to iterate and slowly improve graphics and mechanics. I think with the switch generation, they kinda upended that core formula and now things are just a bit of a mess. There's a struggle between trying new things and staying true to the core identity, and I think the balance is really off there. I think they need someone like Monolith Soft to handle the world and help with the graphics, but their dev teams are just pretty out of touch at this point.

Like what do you do? Do they try to make a Pokemon XY-esque game and revert back to the core mechanics, abandoning free roam for a more grid based gameplay with a limited camera angle? Maybe that would be for the best if they're not gonna significant change their development process to facilitate a true 3D open world type game.

On the mainline vs spinoff thing... At least right now, there's a clear divide between the core games and Legends. Game Freak may consider Legends to be mainline, but Legends acts in every way as a side series to the main games.

From the beginning, main series games have had dual releases (Red & Blue, etc) and turn based battles, while Legends seems more experimental and willing to eschew series norms. In any other circumstance, I think most people would easily place the Legends games as a side/gaiden/spinoff series, but I guess Word of God has said otherwise...

I decided to pick this up last minute and I decided to use a voucher to get it for $50, so I got it digitally myself.

However the Switch (1) box art is so beautiful that I kinda wanna own it for my collection.

Legends Z-A might be last on your list, but it's the most fun I've had with a Pokemon game since Generation V 🤷‍♂️

Glad to see it's doing well!

@johnedwin Metacritic just aggregates critic scores, and critic scores are subjective. A great game is a game I think is great. I don't care if the majority of critics agree with me.

Nier on the PS3 has a 60-something on metacritic, but I think it's a great game.

It's so weird to say "no, you cannot say this game is great because critics in aggregate scored it 6 points lower than what can objectively be considered great!!"