swoose

My question is if Pokemon devs look at a game like Metroid Prime 4 and think "are we in the same profession? Why does this look 2 generations ahead of us?"

I’ve never used anything like those hole buttons and I’d love to give this a spin. Not by paying for it though.

A single grand city has potential for a setting, but this looks like an incremental improvement over SV at most, with cookie cutter mountain geometry replaced by building geometry. And with trademark clunky GameFreak animation & traversal. A generic teleporter to warp you to the rooftops is an unbelievably lazy solution. They couldn’t find a better way to move vertically in the entire Pokemon universe?

The one thing that got a pop from me, fully real time battles, was immediately followed up by showing the 30ft long rock snake Onix, standing only about twice the height of the player. Just incredible how stubbornly they refuse to scale gameplay space to allow for the size extremes of their IP, Pokemon. This entire generation and they still haven’t been scaled right.

I’m guessing this will lack the charm, minigames, and single playability of Stadium 1 and 2. And I’m wary of concessions to make it feature compatible with the mobile market - will it be F2P?

But if it’s like a streamlined TCG Pocket take on VGC doubles, that could be something. We’ll see when they show us more.

The main point here is it shouldn't take a stray youtube comment to the original dev to discover these copycats - they shouldn't be approved in the first place.

I really don't understand how these games can be offered for sale seemingly without anyone at Nintendo even looking at them. How do they know the games even run?

In a sense, Game Freak hasn't produced a classic remake since ORAS in 2014, and they've only made 3 sets of remakes in their entire history. BDSP was ILCA and Let's Go was basically a sequel, centering Pokemon GO's catching mechanics and happening to be in Kanto, with a new protag and rival.

Game Freak seems to favor new gameplay directions with their 2nd projects now, and more power to them. But as for the core series, I wouldn't say there's been an innovation that really makes me want to see a 2D game updated. At least Hoenn was being seen in 3D for the first time, plus Mega evolutions. That novelty is gone, and they've been churning through 1-off gameplay hooks since. It's not impressive to see a bunch of Unova Pokemon gigantamaxing or terastallizing.

As a 3DS fan I always see this topic and have such little interest in playing 3DS games on a worse handheld than the original. I’ll be getting Switch 2 to play Switch games. But it’ll be heavier, larger, not a clamshell, screen of a different aspect ratio, no resistive touchscreen and no stylus. I’ll stick to my 3DSes thanks, they’re perfect at playing their own games.

I thought it was notable that Furukawa, in addressing Nintendo shareholders, mentioned affordability being important but made no mention of margins or profitability wrt console pricing. Like he was prepping shareholders for a lower margin console, where Nintendo will try to make up the difference with more sales and more presence for their software, IP and services.

Can't quibble too much with the top 10, but I will go to bat for Mario Superstar Baseball. It's not only great for a Mario sports title, but some would say the most mechanically pleasing baseball game ever made. It still has a competitive community to this day, which prefers it over the less precise Wii title.

Meanwhile in Canada VIA rail will weigh your bags and charge you extra for bringing a lunchbox.

I have no nostalgia for the physical TCG, but I do love the Pokémon TCG games for GameBoy, which were proper RPGs. Pocket replicates some of the charm of those, in that you’re building up semi-consistent decks from nothing. I just wish the single player gave any character to your opponents - they could even incorporate characters from the games for you to face, instead of blank slates.

But the pvp is also surprisingly snappy and low stakes, and the changes made to battle are mostly smart ones. Trading may as well not exist, and I don’t think this game needs it particularly.

A core appeal of this game to me is making do with a limited set of cards. Like one long term draft format. Can't say I'm too fussed about being able to trade for exact cards at all.

AI opens up all kinds of empowering new avenues for artists. Like doing scams, and… well, mostly scams.

The good news is you get points for 2nd place in each category now, so White Chocolate can't completely shut out the other teams again.

@Dazman It is often literally a scam, a grading/auction company last year got caught selling to their owner's own shell company to set a high market price.

I don't envy anyone who feels compelled to collect vintage games or trading cards. All kinds of scammers and opportunists are hopping on that train.

I started this game last week and I'm pleasantly surprised how much there is to do on a new account. I'm up to 400 total cards and several fun decks without spending a cent, with hourglasses saved for this expansion.

Only complaint is it devours my phone's battery.

Metroid fans "slagged off" Other M and Federation Force to no end, and then had nothing but praise for Metroid Dread. Fans want to be pleased. The "no matter how good it was" is clearly off base, but I can understand cynicism at Microsoft producing a good dev team for Banjo.

It all depends on things like track design, items, and online performance. If it takes longer to fill 20-24 player rooms than MK8D took to fill its rooms, and if the tracks are even wider with the least relevant collisions yet, then it's a downgrade.

Nintendo entered mass production on the console before revealing it, for money (marketing considerations and Switch 1 sales). Thousands of supply chain employees became capable of leaking it, for money. And the most buzzworthy leaker this cycle was another manufacturer in Genki, who did it not for clout but for money.

Everyone's motivations in this are straightforward. Maybe you don't "blame" Nintendo for the leaks, but they have no right to be surprised by them.

Strongly doubt this is cross-gen, this is their golden goose to sell Switch 2s. It’s scaled down footage (not fullscreen) that’s in development still. The scale of the track and background details would not have been in MK8D.

That said I question the choice of using a desert track for our first look at the game, much like Splatoon 3 - like the western audience must all love deserts or something? And I agree they didn’t show any eye-catching new mechanic or scenery in this clip to really differentiate it.

Given all the copy & paste slop on the Switch eshop already, I assume there won’t be any issue with this!

Great nostalgia, now if only they would take a break from Pokemon ex. I'm a curmudgeon and can't really get into the Gym Heroes vibe when the power creep remains so high.

But I understand why they can't do that and fit it into the broader game.

I’ve been banging this drum for a while as for me, the Switch was already too big and consoles like the DS Lite and GBA were the ideal size/weight for handhelds. I revisit them regularly. But that ship has sailed as the whole market is trending towards bigger and heavier units.

I’ll take the good with the bad - bigger size, reportedly without much added weight will make it a little more comfortable to hold, and the magnet attachments will hopefully make the controls less shaky. I’ll never understand the refusal to add ergonomics to the flat joy-con however. And here’s hoping for a Lite revision that isn’t pointlessly prevented from docking again.

@Skoffo There’s no agreements between Nintendo and most accessory companies. These leaks are only possible because Nintendo chose to enter mass production on a console months before they reveal it or even announce its name. This made factory leaks to interested parties basically inevitable.

Nintendo’s strategy here is that only fandom weirdos like us will follow leaks from CES, while most of their audience will only hear about Switch 2 when ads for it are plastered on their TVs and phones. Leaks might not really matter, so they chose to focus on squeezing every last sale out of Switch 1.

Good gravy, there were TEN Nitro Blazes before this? I've been out of the loop.

I've been happily consuming every Switch 2 leak to this point but I gotta say, I didn't get a high from this one. Just no dopamine at all. I think I've developed a tolerance

Very cool and creative if this is true, but I find it funny everyone is hype for FPS games with such a narrow, makeshift mouse. For a shooting game, the Switch already has the best control scheme possible: gyroscope. Aiming in Splatoon is faster and more natural than any FPS I've ever played, and I grew up with classics like Quake and Unreal Tournament on mouse & keyboard.

Where mice ARE superior is being anywhere on screen and holding still there without any exertion, useful for games with lots of menuing like Mario Paint or Civilization.

Notably there’s a legible serial number on this unit which can be input to Nintendo’s support page, and it shows a valid warranty already. This is a final retail Switch 2 joycon.

And shocker: it perfectly matches the 100 other leaks and renders we’ve seen of it already, which users here were calling lies and frauds. I’ll wait patiently for the posts admitting they were mistaken, which surely are forthcoming.

The poor sales compared to other Next Level Games projects was probably the actual nail in the coffin. It’s the kind of series that will always be a legacy title but that doesn’t necessarily justify a brand new entry. And the 80s-90s stereotypes are part of the legacy.

The NES original holds up great as a lightning-fast single player arcade/puzzle experience, on CRT with zero input lag. To make it more accessible and multiplayer, the ARMS format makes way more sense.

I don’t care about 4k resolution. I DO care about input latency and ghosting effects from motion.

Hopefully the DLSS is conditional and not actually required to run the games.

As a lover of hilariously long game titles, thank you for putting that category in the lead where it belongs. I got more out of this listicle than out of The Game Awards.

Companies stay rent-seeking. The delisting of collections makes this extra gross.

Of course it's not much different from Nintendo closing the Wii/WiiU eshops full of Virtual Console games and then launching Switch Online. At least they waited until a generation changed over...

I don't really get the almost dogmatic hatred against leaks shown by some in these comments. Burned too much in the past? Some leaks are wrong, some are spot-on. The Switch 2 has had a notably consistent stream of leaks, shipping logs and the like, all corroborating each other, so fair to think it's a poorly kept secret at this point.

Whether or not the dock ends up having its own fan, I'd say feet on the back of the dock are a good idea. Some people have shelved setups where it's easier to fit things laid flat rather than standing up.

There's not really a good justification for it, so I wouldn't expect one from the developers. Wada may as well say something like "creative license" or "development reasons" and leave it at that.

I've been getting into the Rune Factory series and even a smaller team like Hakama have managed dual protagonists as of RF4 on the 3DS, and even that was long in coming... I can't imagine Atlus isn't capable.

The main things I still want confirmed:

• Hall Effect sticks. This feels very un-Nintendo in that it's like admitting something was wrong with the Switch's sticks in the first place, which they have never done, and adopting a solution that many other controller brands marketed first. I almost expect the Switch 2 to have some proprietary Nintendo stickbox that leaves it ambiguous whether or not drift is solved, since they won't acknowledge it existed.
• Joycon ergonomics. This one is less likely, and the CAD renders have been inconsistent about the back of the console, but they all showed the joycon still being flat on the back. Now all the peripheral leakers incorporate a grip on the back of the joycon more like a Wiimote or WiiU gamepad. That could just be part of their case designs though. They correctly identify that nobody wants to hold up a slate-thin console for hours in 2025. Ergonomics are a solved problem. I really hope Nintendo fixed it themselves and aren't just leaving the issue to 3rd parties.

There will always be a place for 2D characters on 3D backgrounds, but this "HD-2D" brand has gotten too formulaic. I prefer other looks featured in this article like Sea of Stars, or fully pixeled games like Tengo Project is making.

For me, there's too much shadow in all the games up to Dragon Quest III, the text sizes are always way too small, and the UIs are never integrated in the pixel style.

They found a way to make cats ugly.

Instead of tasting bitter, the new cartridges will taste like honey.

I was coming here to insult this shoddy de-make of a port and say nobody should support full-priced shovelware from Nintendo, but I see there's still enthusiasm for it in the comments. It's certainly a way to play it on Switch. So to each their own!

The pinhole video of the joycon being pulled off the unit is far more convincing than this. With how isolated and shadowed they kept it this could easily be a render.

That said, safe bet the Switch successor will look pretty much like that.

I also think the “Wii hardware was creatively stifling” quote is slept on here for how stupid it is. Imagine environmental artists at Monolith Soft thinking that way.

It’s one thing to think that in the moment in 2006, but with hindsight that’s admitting your own incompetence at the time.

What’s annnoying about this is Sakurai’s joke was at the expense of CERO, along the lines of “CERO has decided that Smash Bros is for good boys and girls” which makes it way funnier. But the localization left that out because they think we’re stupid and don’t know what a rating board is.

And so now english social media is full of “take THAT Sakurai!!” when he never passed that judgment on Mai in the first place.

Transparently they wanted to withhold these tracks forever so the app doesn’t obsolete the physical release.

They should’ve just left it as-is for this one OST. Drawing attention to their removal like this makes it look 100x worse.

Remember they shut down WiiU and 3DS service, but have the server traffic for all this junk.

There HAS to be a happy medium between blocking Binding of Isaac, and having no curation at all. All these copycat unity asset flips are not hard to identify.

I don’t think even Nintendo can outdo the Switch’s success. I think we’re facing an economic downturn, and some market saturation for handhelds (people satisfied with their Switches). The Switch was a runaway freight train in gaming and I think the Switch 2 can be a modest success, but lightning won’t strike twice. So I don’t expect a competitor handheld to take off either.

I hope that leads to more innovation in handhelds 2 gens from now, and especially to smaller form factors. People are buying pillow attachments to hold up their “handheld” pcs and consoles this gen, so their hands don’t fall asleep since the tech is so stupidly heavy. You can barely call them portable.

It may have been tricky to make an article out of the blurry joycon & console footage from yesterday, since Nintendo was getting videos of it taken down. It's very obviously real. And not surprising, given how deep into production we are.

Nintendo waiting until 2025 to reveal this may as well have been saying "We're OK with you seeing our console from leakers first."

Well, four free Switch games is pretty generous. That’s sure better than we got for the WiiU/3DS shutdown

If only there was a Nintendo-made peripheral that weighed only 8 ounces, supported all DS games natively, had a nice resistive touchscreen, and was so popular that Nintendo shipped like 130 million of them, so they’re easy to find everywhere. Oh yeah, that’s the Nintendo DS.

Play your DS games on DS, people. It’s a comfier and more portable handheld than the Switch anyway. A new “Nintendo Classics” DS mini product would be preferable to all the compromises listed here, but even that I think is wasteful and too soon.

I remember liking the grid-based battle system in this. Can't for the life of me remember why I fell off playing it, other than it being a full-length RPG.

I think I was playing the 3DS version, which has voice acting and some extra dungeons in exchange for new anime portrait art that got mixed reviews. The DS original had a more distinctive look for sure.

Funny enough, I don't think text even needs to be scalable - it should always be huge by default. Back in MY day text had to be legible on CRTs so it was like 10 characters per line, and we LIKED it that way!

The downside is devs will actually have to think about UI design and how much text they're putting in their games. The horror