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@erdem I’ve never heard anyone else on here mention reading for work. I’m a bookseller so it piqued my interest. If you don’t mind my asking, what novel and what kind of work?

I am LOVING Trine 2. The visuals are stunning, the voice-over narration is charming, and the puzzles and platforming are mellow enough to not be stressful but challenging enough to stay interesting. I can’t believe I just bought it for 11 bucks. I can’t recommend this game enough.

Happy weekend and happy gaming!

If they're going for an undockable, handheld-only cheaper model to replace the entire 3DS line, I think it's possible that the higher end "Super" version will be docked ONLY, or will simply replace the switch dock with an external graphics processor and more computing power. That's my sincere hope, as I REALLY don't want to buy all new equipment a mere two years into this system's life.

@617Sqn
Can it, bro.

@Fake-E-Lee
Totally agree on Yooka Laylee. It’s clearly made with a lot of love, humor, and know-how. What else would you expect from that team? And I’m one of the many Banjo Kazooie fans hoping we see a new entry in that wonderful, long-dormant franchise.

I picked up Iconoclasts on sale and so far I’m having a blast with it. Charming storytelling, visuals, music and sound design, with an interesting new platforming mechanic (couldn’t resist).

I also grabbed Blaster Master Zero 2, which I can’t wait to start.

I can’t get enough of these new 2D games. I’m so glad Nintendo has welcomed the Indie scene with open arms and that Indie developers have embraced the Switch.

Happy gaming and happy weekend to all!

I love this cross-over trend and I see no reason why it can't evolve into something a little more elaborate. Achievements as a character in one game are reflected when that character appears in another, and vice-versa. Power-ups in Dead Cells show up in Brawlout. Think of the possibilities in New Super Smash Bros. U Deluxe LOL. Let's have fun with it!

@beazlen1 Room enough for two on that throne!

@DockEllisD
Overcooked is a blast, especially couch co-op. Intense!

My wife and I have been piling up moons in Mario Odyssey every evening to unwind. Just passed the 500 mark.

I’m maybe 60% through Valley, a fun little diversion and decent sci-fi action platformer.

Hitting my stride in Hyper Light Drifter.

Will probably continue my best run yet in Dead Cells.

And perhaps some Yooka Laylee to lighten the mood.

Have a great weekend all and happy gaming!

I really want to play gmail in VR!

Why is it that 2D graphics are charming and retro, while 3D graphics do not age well at all? Is it because they attempt to emulate reality? I say this as a day one purchaser of the N64, and someone who played tons of Turok back in the day. These visuals feel downright oppressive to me now.

@jwfurness The music is one of my favorite aspects of Hyper Light Drifter. Really evokes the best of sci fi from the 60s, 70s and 80s.

@gloom
I think that naming formula worked for Hyper Light Drifter, which just oozes cyberpunk cool. But Solar Ash Kingdom sounds kinda like anime nonsense, and nothing about that bright palette suggests "ash" to me.

hyper light rollerblader

Spot on review. Bought it day one on sale and have been really enjoying it. It creates its own mood that you crave getting back to, something sadly missing from a lot of bigger budget experiences. Well worth the price IMO and a welcome addition to my library of indie gems. Kinda like Myst meets Zelda, albeit with pretty narrow and limited gameplay. But what you can do is gorgeously rendered and a lot of fun.

@Valdney
Agree... more dungeons!

I love this game so much I will always jump at the opportunity to see something like this. Fan-made variations and passion projects just activate my own enthusiasm for the game.

@KingdomHeartsFan Thanks for mentioning International Women’s Day. When pretty much every brand uses it to market themselves, some rather tastelessly, it does speak volumes when a company lets it pass without comment. They have people dedicated to PR and social media. No excuse really.

@RadioHedgeFund
Once we fix this problem, everything will be perfect here!
🤪

Valley (pretty and fun!), Guacamelee, Starlink, and Smash, methinks.

Anyone out there own an arcade stick? I play a good amount of Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection and have been considering picking one up.

Happy gaming!

Mysteriously remove game from eshop. Mysteriously reinstate it. Have news outlets cover and remind people that the game came out, hopefully softening the blow of a lackluster launch. DEEP STATE. Sorry, I’m an American. That being said, I bought it day one and really enjoy it.

These games deserve a true next-gen sequel, IMHO. I spent countless hours playing the originals but unless they receive a serious graphics upgrade I have no desire to endure that fog and gloom today.

Now give me Blast Corps, Tetrisphere and Mystical Ninja, and I will have my dollars ready in neat little piles.

@Dakotastomp
Yet another anti-intellectual shriek of "It's not real get over it." The message is real, that's what I'm talking about, the representation is real, that's what I'm talking about, and I literally had friends in my childhood who went around roughhousing with people yelling out in their Mortal Kombat voices "FINISH HIM" and watch any NFL game and tell me once again that people don't act out what happens in video games, that the worlds don't share any common ground, as if we unplug from the matrix just for a moment to enjoy some good old-fashioned misogyny before returning to the real world untainted by it. Every worthier cause you list is on the same spectrum as this, just further along.

@Ralizah Because the women look like women and are intended to be construed as women. Because the intent of the creators was to sell a game using the sexual exploitation of women, albeit by pixies, to make money. Because the creators of Pokemon are not hinting at real violence, even though they're using the same visual and narrative metaphorical vernacular. I'm asking you to consider what you're seeing in this game as violence, not participatory playfulness. It's so ingrained in our culture it's almost impossible to avoid using violent metaphors to describe things or the relationships between things. Watch any sport. Any competition. Let's stop accusing me of conflating the characters in the video games with real life. I'm conflating the developer's intention with the depiction on-screen. That's the story I'm interested in.

@Paraka
I love a good scifi setting and atmosphere and I really enjoy playing Warframe. In Warframe, I'm shooting at aliens (which, as I type this, also sounds problematic LOL - and not because I'm an aliens rights activist), so I feel a little protective distance from the violence, as well as an intellectual one born from my viewing most sci-fi action movies or games as wondrous kitsch. I am probably deceiving myself as to the total distance, but there you have it. I love Dark Souls and Skyrim because in the former, you're in such an immersive fantasy realm that is so far from reality, there almost isn't any gender to it, and you're wielding weapons we don't have pathological devotion or access to (guns), and the latter because it's a very nuanced and emotionally literate elaboration on running around hacking at things with a giant sword. And I love Breath of the Wild, even though the gender roles are still very rigid and uninspired, in the same vein as the Mario games.

@Ralizah
You do know that the animals in Pokemon are not real, and that they are not intended to represent real animals, right? And the only real-life animals you encounter in Mario are turtles. Even those you don't kill, you just send them spinning away. Let's instead look at the intention of the creators and artists, ask yourself what kind of story they're telling, and assess everything in that context. Which is why stomping on goombas is way less problematic to me than the princess needing rescuing YET AGAIN (and yes I know there's a modest twist to this at the end of Odyssey, but not nearly enough for my comfort). The crazy thing is, these games don't require these hackneyed characterizations and hackneyed stories to be successful, not at all. It's just lazy storytelling. But then there are games that seem to delight in it, or are comfortable depicting violence but incapable or unwilling to depict its consequences, or even hint at them.

@Andy3004
Listen man, I never said there's a direct line of causation. I think framing it in that way does a disservice to the seriousness of the topic in discussion. This isn't some intellectual or academic phenomenon we're talking about, but something women are telling us directly every single day. What model of heroism did you ever encounter in which the hero defended not those in need, but those abusing their power over others?

And why can't we condemn oppression in totality and not just instances at one extreme of it? Have you taken anything I've said to imply I'd be comfortable with it? Are you suggesting we ignore the present problems because they're not as bad as somewhere else, and they're not as bad as in the past? If they're any better today, it's because of people who stand up for themselves and for others, not because somebody was around telling people to calm down and saying "it could be worse."

Your belief that such things are harmless tells me you haven't thought critically about it. A group of 6th-graders, if tasked with deciding whether this was a negative or a positive thing, would write lovely essays about how problematic it is. Let's not overthink it. And since there's never any science or data brought to the discussion by "liberals are brain-dead" silencers, I won't be seeking guidance on how to think and behave among them.

@Paraka Well honestly I judge it based on a holistic assessment. Who are the developers or artists, what are their intentions, are they handling weighty issues responsibly or recklessly, who gets exploited, basically is there any evidence I’m being handed a meaningful experience that a true artist has thought through or am I just having a dark impulse mindlessly exploited for someone else’s bottom line.

@Andy3004 Well, be fair, I’m not commenting on most, I’m commenting on this one. And the misogyny it takes to even conceive of such a game in the midst of a global revolution in gender relations and power dynamics is mindbigglingly tone-deaf or culturally illiterate at best and a rage against the dying of the light that abusers of women and abusers of power enjoy at worst. A genuine and relatable romance, how could you argue against that? I love a love story as much as the next guy. But I place conditions on the quality of the media I consume. Think of it as standing my ground in my mind, defending it against all the toxicity. Just keeping it light here folks

@Paraka Definitely. The hipocrisy (or inconsistency) of this stance on violent media (and only some kinds, usually not the gun or gore kinds) is somehow livewithable as compared to the misogyny stuff (probably because I am not surrounded by violence or even touched by it, but I am surrounded by women, only one of whom actually touches me lol).

@Paraka Reckless driving isn’t a system of oppressing women that is reinforced by corporations to sell you stuff and control the way you think.

@Paraka because I don’t have a personal history with violence but I do know and love women who are impacted by these things, and there is some violent media I do engage with and enjoy (I love reading thrillers and watching martial arts films).

@Andy3004 That is a reasonable thing to say.

@Andy3004 I think most people who liked The Matrix only saw a white dude shooting guns in slow motion. Cuz they seem super comfortable with faceless entities controlling what they think to sap them of their money and power.

If anybody is curious, this speaks eloquently to a lot of the stuff I’ve tried to express here, in my flawed emotional way.

[removed]

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@gazamataz Having a difficult discussion. You? Apart from bringing condescending platitudes to the table.

@Ralizah
Good points all, but I don’t think you can divorce art from the culture, or environment, that produces it. It doesn’t show up from a neutral zone and have its fate decided in a culture unshaped by art and entertainment. There aren’t only extreme examples of harmful art, and I think it’s dangerous to judge the wrongness of something based on how normalized it is within a given culture. (Genital mutilation comes to mind). Rape culture is insidious and ubiquitous and exists in endless small and large manifestations. Just because we’re not talking Birth of a Nation level “bad art” doesn’t mean we can’t talk about what something like this contributes to a systemic problem. Both contributes and is a result of. This is a game made by men for people who find undressing women against their will titillating good fun. Is that not an accurate description? How does anybody say those words to themselves and think “harmless”? I refuse to believe this doesn’t activate anybody’s common sense.

@FrowningCoach Yours, I’m afraid.

@Paraka There’s a rich history of co-opting the oppressed to participate in their own oppression. If that seems dramatic to you it’s because it is, but what’s happening here exists on the same spectrum. And of course not every woman will agree with me here.

I think it’s very likely the women knew the context of their voice work, but that’s neither here nor there. A job is a job and we’re not talking about commiting a crime. It’s a highly normalized problem, in my opinion, which is why people get up in arms when they’ve got no skin in the game. And point to the fact that it happens elsewhere and with other types of violence across all media, as if that somehow makes it better or OK! I’m advocating against unthinking engagement with this stuff, which of course will mean less fun. And maybe I’m projecting my own “fixation”, which we will more kindly call awareness, in the hope that people will see the wisdom in rejecting this kind of toxic entertainment. Especially when the Nintendo logo pops onto the screen beforehand.

EDIT: I also find it rich that NL highlights a game like this but deletes my initial comment because I used a curse word when calling the game out for what it is, which the community guidelines forbid because people of all ages use the site.

@FrowningCoach I would totally try and police this comment for thought, but I just can’t find any.

@Paraka I meant that if one engages in any kind of entertainment or art imagining that it is not real and therefore harmless merely because it is representational and not “actually happening”, is not engaging consciously, and therefore allowing themselves to be manipulated and influenced without having a say in the matter. There is simply no such thing as neutral art or neutral engagement with art. It’s not all harmful, of course, but the potential for harm increases dramatically when both the creator and the consumer deny the work has any impact on the world.

@AlternateButtons Hasn’t been disproven at all, silly fellow. It just hasn’t been successfully litigated. For powerful reasons, some of them very good. If you think you can engage with violence (or simulation thereof) neutrally, you’re a tool, quite literally.

@Ralizah
Basic media theory would set all this to rest. Everything is political. Everything has a message. Not having a message, is indeed a message, especially when one trucks in fraught subject matters irresponsibly. Ignorance isn’t an excuse, it’s bliss bought at someone else’s expense. There’s a huge, logicless abyss between it’s not real and it’s harmless. And, of course, it IS real. And just because you can’t litigate it, doesn’t mean it bears mindless consumption.

@Paraka Absolutely. 100% agree.

@NintendoFan4Lyf
The whole damn game is problematic, regardless of who the target audience is. And let me tell you who the target audience is. People who think simulating rape and assault is entertaining and arousing. Let’s go to bat for ‘em. And before you give me a false equivalent, yes, I think games where you go around shooting people are also problematic, and I don’t play them. If you game as an adult engaging with the world, who’s taking part in these conversations with real women, who’s engaging in dialogue about representation and toxicity in the media, then you don’t shut off your conscience when you pick up your Pro controller, and you don’t shut down criticism when it’s leveled at something you’re not invested in. You’re not the target audience but you’re speaking out for them, raising your voice for them. I’m doing the same thing, but for the targets.

@Paraka @NintendoFan4Lyf
My problem isn’t with the supposed age of the girls, however, it takes a heroic act of willful ignorance if you don’t read pedophilia into the style of artwork and age-old obsession with violating youth and innocence that is implicit in a lot of Manga and very alive and well and EXPLICIT in a lot of other Manga.

This turns unclothing non-consenting girls into a game.

That’s a problem.

Period.

The graphics in the demo were shockingly retrograde. We know the Switch ain’t a visuals powerhouse but we also know it’s capable of more than Ubisoft bothered to wrangle out of it. Guess not enough ppl were into the Fog City Bikers franchise :/

@Evilworm Where are the AAA games? On other consoles, you ham sandwich. If you want a hundred and sixty “different” games where you go around shooting things, you know where to find them. I, and I think most of us here, would trade a thousand Overwatches for one Breath of the Wild, one Mario Odyssey, one Smash Bros. Ultimate... you get the idea. Join the party!

The gamer had slumbered one hundred years. The Sheikah Slate called out in the darkness... the gamer awoke and grasped the Slate... and ventured once more into the land of gaming... It’s been a stellar two years, especially for someone like me who’s skipped the last 10 or so and can discover a decade’s worth of phenomenal games, both treasures and gems, being brought to the console. Here’s to a bright future. Happy birthday Switch and happy birthday to one of the least toxic gaming communities out there!