swoose

Nice to get more casting news, but what will really tell me about this movie is when the press tour starts. It’s a bad sign if we hear more “longtime fans will find sooo many Easter eggs on the screen!” Please just tell a good story.

Back when Nintendo wanted their new partners to actually make new games, instead of putting them in remake daycare.

For my money Game Freak's best non-Pokemon game was Pocket Card Jockey. No coincidence it had simple visuals and put gameplay first.

Splatoon 3 is the best and it's ho-hum reputation in the West always bamboozles me. In Japan it's an ongoing phenomenon, and they know their Splatoon over there. From English-speaking gamers I saw outright envy that Splatoon was even getting a 2nd game on Switch, instead of their preferred series like Mario. And then there was a lot of simplistic coverage like it was "more Splatoon 2."

Squid roll alone is transformational as a movement option. New weapon classes, subs and specials, also transformational. There were subtler improvements to the camera and aiming as well, such that it's genuinely jarring going back to Splatoon 2 after S3 and Raiders. The single player took its cues from Octo Expansion. Salmon Run was given a great rework and full availability. The Table Turf card game has its own little campaign. It's some of the best value I've gotten out of a game for $60.

PSA that the info on these characters is much richer on the Japanese FE twitter account, which you can machine translate or find elsewhere on fan sites. They also include scenes of their voice acting and longer battle clips.

Nintendo Today’s promotion is an afterthought in comparison. They don’t even mention Mikaela is a mother (a playable mother in an anime game!) fighting to support her daughter, or that Mu is disguising herself as a boy to search for her own mother (who is possibly Mikaela). It’s like anything that makes these characters interesting is getting scrubbed, and heaven forbid you hear them speak.

NoA either thinks extremely little of their audience, or is so afraid of anti-spoiler militancy that they’re sacrificing their own hype cycle.

S2 has GameCube NSO and a Kirby Air Ride sequel, so we all know what console really drove its success.

I haven't seen all the bosses or endgame yet so I'm withholding judgment, but I've got a sense of the gameplay loop and it has that addicting "one more raid" quality. And I like the hideout ship, it's comfy to putz around on.

I will say though it seems like a game I'll be finished with once I'm done the campaign + some hoard objectives. As opposed to Splatoon 3 which I play regularly. I've seen comments like "this is the Splatoon game we've been waiting for" and I'm like, huh?? I think S3 got slept on as being "more Splatoon 2", but it would be tough to unseat it as the best value in the series.

I poked around some review videos and the Gamespot reviewer was saying “Salmonoids” and the Game Informer one was aiming at smallfry with stick controls, and they both still rated it 8 or higher, so that bodes well for actual Splatoon fans.

I don’t agree the Guardian review should be converted to a 4/10. This is part of what’s stupid about Metacritic. They use a 5pt scale for a reason, and people giving ratings out of 5 (such as movies) tend to actually use all 5 potential scores. 10pt scales seem to never even touch the first 5 numbers, so you might as well say a 2/5 is more like a 7/10.

Good to hear they nailed the multiplayer and I really think they should have marketed the game’s co-op more heavily. Calling it single player focused may not do it favors in this era where “friend slop” is all the rage, and the mode it builds on (Salmon Run) was always co-op. I’ve heard so many more casual players worry about going it solo in this game.

@HammerGalladeBro Actually, the High-Five Fever minigame in Rhythm Heaven has some ultra-realistic graphics.

Struggling to think of a time I’ve skipped new dialogue in a video game. I’ve probably thought “wow this is getting wordy,” but I still read it all.

“You can skip dialogue sequences” does nothing for me and is almost an insult to the reader.

I'm astonished the nice blue Speed team with Shiver placed 3rd in votes. That 2nd place in popularity for Power made the difference, along with winning Tricolor and the Sneak Peak and their other 2nd place categories. In this latest scoring system those add up and it helped make such a close result.

I picked Power because for horde modes like salmons I prefer high DPS and AOE, though all the tanks in Raiders have some powerful looking gadgets. I also like Frye and picking the underdog team, which it looked like we were at halftime. This means Team Power is undefeated after Zelda splatfest when Shiver was captain. GGs to all!

Someday, Pokemon Conquest 2 will have its day in the sun.

Top 4 are all Switch 1 games. I’m not so sure this should be Nintendo’s swan song on Switch.

Zero new stages in this season pass and zero new single player content to replace World Tour, for which they’ve ended support. Still the same price of course.

That is what prompts speculation that a big new version update should be coming, moreso than looking at past titles. Because otherwise, they appear to be slowing down development for a game that’s growing in popularity.

Delvil is localized as Houndour in English and the team name is Vissel Kobe.

I recognize the need for pro-consumer regulations like these. However, Nintendo was already extremely pro-consumer in its battery quality. I have never had a rechargeable Nintendo battery die in 20+ years of owning them, going back to my Game Boy Advance SP which is still kicking.

They could have designed this generation with removable batteries from the start of course. But more importantly, they don’t put cheap, planned obsolete batteries in their products to begin with, like most companies that are targeted by this regulation. Now we have these compromises and discontinuations, all over batteries that won’t need to be replaced in most people’s device lifespans. The sticks, fans and screens could all give out before the batteries do.

I think there could have been a carve out in the law for batteries that test above a certain lifespan, as Nintendo thoroughly tests theirs to do.

I don't think the Switch 2 will be Nintendo's last physical media platform. They have 100+ years of being a toy company, and an audience that will still have a fondness for physical games a generation from now. Parents will remember getting physical games and want to give their kids that experience. When most parents remember getting Roblox gift cards instead, maybe then the jig will be up.

Music went through a period of digital-only but the vinyl market is back now for collectors. Physical games don't have all the appeal of something like vinyl (different sound, big artful covers), but they're not as expensive to produce and ship. It's just a question of consoles including a little card reader or not.

I recommend the Switch 1 pro controller you already own and a monitor you found in the garbage. As for games, your whole Switch 1 library is good but now the games will actually run properly.

I was alive for the PS1/N64 era but I hadn't really thought about how games could market pre-rendered footage as a way to "cheat" or misrepresent game performance. Nintendo games from that time almost never had rendered cutscenes.

Granted, 3D rendering itself was so new that such cutscenes still didn't look all that impressive, lol. I vividly remember cinematics in games like Starcraft (1998) and Darkened Skye (2002) that looked laughably bad.

@Tibob The purpose of this Nintendolife embed is to let us read the Velour Studios post without an external account, which it fulfills. It seems you’re not concerned with accommodation, and are running PR for one media platform over another.

I’m curious to see how the maybe-Byleth character figures into this game. I don’t hate their design. We’ve seen the player run around as Cai, so I haven’t given up hope on a more grounded Fire Emblem where the protagonist isn’t a literal god.

@LastFootnote In my experience, the Switch FE games are harder to finish because they include more RPG style unit management. The games on 3DS and GBA were a bit more streamlined and faster to play. I also finished a playthrough of Path of Radiance on Switch online recently and had a grand old time, but that game had very slow battle animations so it’s better to play with battle scenes off.

Another trap people fall into is trying to train all or most of their characters. It’s kind of like Pokemon where it’s efficient to settle on a team of 6, except in FE it’s usually 12-14 for endgame.

@Tibob The Bluesky embed looks pretty accommodating to me, and I don’t have an account there. I can even follow the direct link and see all replies without being asked to sign in.

Not really Lies of P’s fault but it was the 3rd game in the direct to be 3rd person action with the exact same art style. Lords of the Fallen II led into it and you could have told me they were the same game.

@InfamousOrange Nintendo confirmed co-op after the last trailer.

https://x.com/SplatoonNA/status/2046583481434583309

You’d think the graded collectible market would have faced more skepticism after a prominent retro game grader was caught bidding on his own supply through a shell company to inflate the market. So much of this is just money going on round trips.

It’s fair to ask, “who is actually spending $1,400 for that Gengar card?” Someone who is selling them, probably.

Given how they’ve rushed out revisions to both the Switch 1 and 2 consoles - first for the nvidea security flaw and battery, next for the EU removable battery law - I wonder why they refused to revise the joycon.

I guess the calculation was development costs and bad press would be more harming, even worse than the bad press from drift when you account for the free repair offer. A lot of faulty joycon were already sold by 2018. They went on to sell mountains more Switches and joycon unchanged so I guess that calculation was fair.

Playing it regularly but mostly docked, and I’m reckoning with how much dust has gathered on its dock, cables and screen. I’d have to break out the microfiber cloths and screen cleaner to make it look brand new.

@LastFootnote There is another way to get your spark back, and that’s Boning Up. When you spend to upgrade it also restores Mina’s health and spark. So when I get in that situation I sometimes just play more pacifist and focus on finding bones, until I can afford my cheapest upgrade (usually sidearm power).

I've been hooked. It's a game I keep thinking about after I've turned it off, which is always a good sign.

I've become a big stickler about over-scaling and emptiness in games, so it's refreshing to play one that crams its points of interest so close together. Makes it difficult to put down, because there's always something to investigate.

Probably should have stabilized the camera for barrel rolls and pulled it out of the cockpit to somersault. This is just asking for motion sickness.

It's sobering that for as much as the gaming market has grown, it has this little influence on the world economy. Maybe it was never going to be the darling of venture capital - too much labour involved, and can't be pitched for every possible company and application.

We had all better take good care of our current devices. I hope to make mine last for as long as I'm playing games.

It'll be interesting to see what amount the console sales fall after the price hike is in effect. I think about Iwata's comment that Nintendo games are recession-proof compared to other entertainment. But this time, their game device is $500 USD and RAM is the thing getting priced the hardest.

Nintendo will still have the cheapest dedicated gaming device, when you look at the bigger price hikes from all their competitors. But maybe they'll lose some people to mobile games.

Wow, I used to watch Brandon James Greer art videos. Didn’t know he was working on a game! Look at that bike turnaround!

I’ve seen a romhack called Emerald Seaglass that really clued me into there being a lot of juice left in this kind of art style if you just… choose a cuter palette. And given the no-battle, story driven design, if any game shouldn’t be compared to Pokemon except as a subversion of it, it’s this. As noted it bears as much in common with Undertale.

This game was a fun little experiment. I know it got overshadowed by the greatness of Tri Force Heroes, but it’s still worth going back to for hardcore fans. It’s like a single player Tri Force Heroes without the costume and totem mechanics.

If I’m Nintendo, I’m looking at the Tomodachi Life sales and remembering the old two-pillar approach with the WiiU/3DS, Wii/DS etc. Rhythm Heaven could also be a tidy success. Furukawa talks about convincing customers to upgrade to the Switch 2, but realistically for many people that won’t be viable at its price point.

Would any Switch 2 owner be upset if they continued to allocate resources for new Switch 1 games? I sure wouldn’t.

Pokémon Company considering taking over the government, offering a full employment program and universal basic income to eliminate the root cause of scalping forever.

Only way out of this I reckon.

Loved this short even when I couldn’t understand a word.

The sense of speed to Dragonite’s flight is like nothing else. If Pokemon will keep trending to giant, overscaled open worlds, it would be great to have a traversal option that’s actually that fast. Or in any video game, for that matter. It would be a technical feat to load everything in fast enough, a simple art style would help.

Adding to those who are pleasantly surprised with this product. The motion sensing is so much better than the sound-sensing apps I had been using, such as in Pokemon Sleep. Those would wait until after you rolled over and got comfortable to rudely blare the alarm, because it caught you moving and decides movement = almost awake. I was always getting up grumpy.

Alarmo with my settings won't go off if you're already moving, and when it does it gets silenced with just a wave or wiggle. That's just enough to let me snooze but be semi-aware that it's my wake-up window. I'm reliably out of bed feeling rested by like 10 minutes later. It acts more like a pet or family member trying to wake you up in that way.

I thought this headline would be about Switch 2 having the diminishing returns from being just a more powerful Switch, with little other innovation.

I prefer 60fps and smooth performance, so I'm not complaining, and the Switch hardware needed a power boost just to handle its own games. But we'll see how well the $500 S2 sustains with rising memory prices and multiple N64 remakes. This would have been the perfect time for Nintendo to think more laterally.

Shocking that people are trying Living the Dream despite not being able to easily copy over their 15 year old Miis from the 3DS, or spawn them from a QR code in a game about creativity.

^Actual complaints game critics used to score the game poorly.

The game I actually want to replay is Star Fox Adventures. Wish I knew if it’s imminently going to be on Switch online, like the Star Fox direct may have foreshadowed.

It gives chills listening to this and thinking about where this melody started on the Game Boy, and how far it has come. A real butterfly effect of Junichi Masuda liking classical music and programming for a small team on a little handheld console.

I wasn't aware of online communities distributing their games, and wasn't of a mind to pirate them. But now I'll consider it! Good shout, Level-5.

It's funny how much this dwarves the standard little amiibo stand that contains the NFC chip, which they've used since the beginning. Looks top-heavy.

Bit of a visual metaphor for how amiibo have "developed".

If Sega wants to pander to my nostalgia they should make Dreamcast controllers that are compatible with Switch. They had a great feel, analogue triggers and Hall effect!

Since it incurred no costs it must not have entered a design phase. This whole sequence reads like this:

Sega - We've announced a Super Game!
Devs - OK, what's it about?
Sega - A F2P title that attracts the whole gaming ecosystem!
Devs - That's not a genre, but ok... how will it do better than the F2P battle royale with Sonic, our biggest IP, that just failed?
Sega - ... we are now cancelling the Super Game.

I get why this omission happened for brevity but it's not accurate to say all Switch 1 & 2 got a price increase in Japan. The region-locked Japanese language S2 got increased, while the standard region-free model stayed the same.

The region-locked model was by far the cheapest way to get a Switch 2. All told, it's a pretty incremental price increase that according to Furukawa, doesn't fully cover the higher component costs. My read is they're still selling it at a loss.

Not a surprise, but this also confirms more titles coming for this year that haven't been announced yet.

Coming from the 3DS, I was grousing the whole Switch generation that there weren't any more 1st party Nintendo games targeting a lower price point. I'm glad someone in the higher ups remembered they can do that. It may actually help the performance of some titles - $70 Mario Tennis appears to have landed with a thud with less than a million sales. $50 is a much easier psychological barrier for these non-tentpole games.