swoose

Nice to see it crushing GO in particular.

I'm a daily Sleep player and between this, Splatoon, trains, and tiny handhelds, I think I'm just cursed to like things that are far more popular in Japan than where I live.

@SillyG My gen 2 example was only that it was a small generation. Yes, they were also poorly distributed in Johto. But the following 3 generations all introduced more pokemon than Gen 2, and the last 4 generations have now introduced even fewer. That points to an already downwards trend.

Johto was directly attached to Kanto so it made some sense to heavily feature Kanto mons. It still had its own identity due to innovating the series forward in a number of huge ways (day/night cycle, held items, gender, eggs, special atk/def split, weather conditions)

Excluding regional and paradox forms, no 3D pokemon game has introduced even 100 new pokemon. That’s how many Gen 2 introduced, and Gen 2 was tiny!!

They’ve clearly already put the brakes on new designs in favor of servicing old ones, and it’s for the worse. Each game used to have its own identity because you saw so many new faces filling up niches in the dex and the game world. Maybe not every game can be Black & White, but I’d settle for a Ruby & Sapphire again! At least the Hoenn dex was over half new.

I play a new Pokemon game to see NEW pokemon. The 3D era has blended together into grey goo because each region is just a staging ground to see old designs over and over.

Re: Stamp Man, obviously Miiverse is returning on the Switch successor and they're letting you start your stamp collection early.

I was worried the game would suffer for lacking the simple press A, swing sword gameplay that is so polished and satisfying in 2D Zeldas. I'm glad it's in there even if it's a limited capacity.

Between that and all your summons I'm guessing battles will get quite chaotic. Hopefully Grezzo has this game running smoothly, not something they're known for.

Something cursed about slapping GameCube colours on the now industry standardized, tiny ABXY buttons. Give me my giant A button back

Advance Wars with all the charm removed from the commander designs.

Wait your objective is assassinating the leader of the United States? Now I’m really on board!

Very interesting that they can still tweak things about the connection speed. I remember much was made about Splatoon 2 and 3 having a lower ping than the WiiU game. I assume to give more leeway to the handheld console that most users would be playing on wifi.

Most users will still be playing on wifi. The state of internet infrastructure in the west isn’t getting any better, and wifi isn’t getting any better at stable connections. That’s the single biggest obstacle to a Splatoon where opponents aren’t jumping around the screen or DCing.

These were the best animations Marvel characters ever got. A cool extra feature would be a simple animation player with adjustable speeds and whatnot.

Used to work at a game store and we would get the irregular customer trying to weigh our packs with a milligram scale. It wasn't allowed. Sometimes they would turn it around and accuse us of weighing the packs first, and taking out the good ones.

To me, there is no replacement for a good brick and mortar store. If you become a regular, you get to know the people behind the counter, and more importantly others in the community who have gotten good pulls there, if everyone is accountable. And at the end of the day, the point of a TCG is having others with whom you can play and trade. There's not much reason to buy blind packs online - at that point, just order the specific cards you want.

In a perfect world the original anime VAs would have kept on voicing those characters across all media for as long as they were able, like Kevin Conroy as Batman. They really gave the franchise its personality at a time when it was most critical to get it right.

It’s awful that we’ve lost both Rachael and Maddie now.

@kkslider5552000 Everything about the story, premise, art, and music of PMD looks fantastic. I think the main turnoff for people is the snail’s pace, repetitive gameplay. It makes the GameBoy Pokemon RPGs look like speedrunning games.

50 floors of procedurally generated dungeon with the same encounters and tile-by-tile turns is pretty much the opposite of a game to me. I’m envious of people who can find fun in that part because they get rewarded with all the other good stuff.

I'm on board with every Tengo Project game after seeing Pocky & Rocky Reshrined.

They do peak original pixel art, I much prefer this to the "HD-2D" remakes everywhere.

Bind and Reverse Bond are the headline here to me, another ability with as many applications as the echoes. I love the simplicity of it compared to something like Ultrahand, and I laughed out loud at a couple applications in this trailer.

I feel like enemies and their abilities are playing a bigger role here than ever, you can recruit them for yourself in a number of ways.

The market speaking on a $70 Nintendo game.

Name recognition for Game Informer extends further for me than GameStop even. I had no idea they owned the publication.

I'm shocked they lasted this long, given that ownership.

I voted GBA for being the most modern of the plasticky, toy-like era, but at a size where it’s easy to store them together.

I definitely think something was lost in the move to disks, and now what are basically memory cards. An advanced game coming out of something so chunky and plastic, that you don’t have to handle delicately, has a sense of magic to it.

The multi-billion dollar company funded by Google and Nvidea part of this is a pretty good indication this isn’t AI being applied to empower artists. It’s a cash grab, and one taking shortcuts at that.

I play Splatoon 3 almost daily so as a docked console, I’m pretty content with it. I could play games that look like this with a Switch pro controller for the rest of my life for all I care, and graphically devs have enough power to tackle nearly any art style. All I’d really want improved is framerate and cooling that doesn’t involve creaky fans.

As a handheld, I’ve been ready to move on for years - ever since I revisited my DS and 3DS and remembered how much more comfortable they were to play. I really wish Nintendo was going for a smaller form factor next with incrementally more power, but rumored screen size suggests otherwise.

These personality tournaments have been getting a lot of viewers for fighting games like Tekken and Street Fighter, normally a more niche audience than Nintendo games. It's smart because the collaborative element brings the audiences for all the separate streamers together for one thing.

In medias res is a technique in writing and film as well, so it makes sense to also be applicable in games. Nobody should take it as a requirement though.

Not only is it case by case based on what a game is trying to achieve, but even my tolerance for a fast/slow opening will vary a lot by the day, what time it is, how I’m feeling etc.

I would like some kind of stand that melts my joycon down to scrap and then mails it back to Nintendo, so they can use it to manufacture good controllers next time.

@sunspotty I'm guessing some X rank players abuse the block function to take good opponents out of their matchmaking pool and climb the ranks faster. People get THAT caught up in their X power. This prevents that kind of thing, and the downsides you mention only affect the minority of players in X, a mode that already struggles to make matches quickly.

For what it's worth, I don't see offensive names or poor sportsmanship in X all that often. The barrier of entry to the mode might help weed that out, but that's just my experience.

The Switch Lite form factor was woefully under-served this whole generation, with only the original model released. It was an HDMI out and hall-effect sticks away from being the definitive Switch model, and sure a nicer screen wouldn't hurt. I have zero interest in the OLED model being even bigger and heavier than the launch Switch.

I'll keep an eye on the Switch Lite modding scene going forward, because they'll come the closest to fulfilling this console's potential.

So many comments here ignoring who has all the leverage in a contractor-contractee dynamic.

The point of stories like this is to highlight standard industry practices that ought to be improved. It's stupid to blame workers for their own contracts being bad.

Any surprise that this game made so much money means we haven’t been shouting enough from the rooftops that it’s the most well crafted Pokémon mobile game to date. From the creators of the other real mobile gem, Magikarp Jump. And yes I’m including Go in that calculation.

It’s a slight surprise only given that the monetization in the game is so subdued, and it’s easy to play totally free. Still, the FTP model is always worth critique. Most of that $100 million no doubt comes from a small group of Sleep “whales” who may face addiction, which is sad to think about.

For major releases, sure I understand longer dev cycles. But like many here I'd like to see a return of smaller Nintendo games. During the home console / handheld split they used to have a 2nd rail of games that were more experimental, shorter, more casual, or expansive of their audience in some way. Thinking of Rhythm Heaven, Tomodachi Life, much of the "Touch Generation" series, all which have fallen by the wayside.

Nintendo now seems content to let indies fill that price point on their platform, which is a shame because we miss out on that "weird Nintendo" charm. And a lot of their developers might miss out on a cool creative outlet as well.

Oh, it looks much better with the textures turned off as shown briefly in the video. Less nightmare fuel, more like it could have actually been an ambitious GBA game à la X (1992) for the GameBoy.

A leaked game may eventually be good, a game where time and resources were spent on "information security management" and "continuous education for employees" will be bad forever.

Talk about something that has no impact in the grand scheme of things and should be at the bottom of Nintendo's priorities. It does not matter if people hear about a game a few weeks early.

How dare fans expand on Nintendo games completely free of charge! Just shameful!!

@SillyG Yeah, imagine they made Zelda disguise herself as a masculine-looking ninja. Or some kind of tomboyish pirate girl. Or a ghost who possesses big suits of armor. That would be so out of character!

“Zelda can use the rod to attack enemies, but that's not the only thing she can use it for.”

Was it confirmed the rod can be used for attacking? The trailer sure implied you would have to summon or throw things to defeat enemies.

Important distinction because melee attacking is a big appeal of 2D Zeldas and this game may be doing away with it entirely. But I’m open to see how it turns out with more puzzle-oriented combat.

@rainbowtick For sure, it would have been unthinkable for the biggest new Playstation release to only be top 10 in software sales for a few weeks, before it returns to being entirely Nintendo games. And many of those games are several years old!

Nintendo really read the market perfectly by going all handheld, at least for Japan. Hopefully if Sony starts prioritizing handhelds more, the broader industry can finally move away from hyper realism and tech arms race junk.

While GRIS was very pretty, I didn't think there was much there with the gameplay. This game looks like it has more of an identity. A game where you don't directly control the central character is an interesting hook.

It doesn't hurt that I'm a huge Princess Monoke fan and I will take the shameless Ghibli influences.

I definitely first thought of Minit seeing this, one of the best indie titles in the Switch's early years. Its design was really built around the 60sec time limit, which likely took some inspiration from Majora's Mask but taken to a logical extreme. You almost don't have to be anxious about the time limit because it goes by and respawns you so quickly.

This game looks like it's a more classic Link's Awakening / Oracle approach. There's of course room for multiple monochrome top-down Zeldalikes!

I always thought these options were stupid because they’re offering the player an option to make animation in their animated medium look worse, in exchange for slightly more resolution. Terrible trade off, and to make matters worse some games have the “”quality”” mode as the default!!

Very un-Nintendo idea, very contrary to the ethos of craftsmanship, and it sure doesn’t speak well of their game if the developer doesn’t care what speed you experience their work at. Imagine a film director or editor not caring if every 2nd frame of their movie could be missing.

It’s to match the Mother 3 box art, of course.

TTYD fans have earned every right to dance on the grave of modern Paper Mario. An exceptionally charming and creative RPG tradition got gutted and replaced by 3 generations of sterile, brand-safe autopilot games.

I liked the recent Scott's Stash video "A Period of Boring Mario." The problem went well beyond Paper Mario, into the mainline New Super Mario Bros series (after the 1st one), and Mario's sports titles, even the Mario & Luigi remakes. He likened playing these games to looking at a Mario lunchbox, which I think is apt.

It's like Nintendo since the Wii were putting their character recognition above all else (perhaps building up to the Mario movie & theme parks), certainly above creativity in their games. Mario Odyssey and Wonder have corrected that, Paper Mario is hopefully to follow, and then maybe we can even get Mario sports games that don't suck.

It's of course stupid to make RPGs without any original characters. And maybe worse is that they've forgotten they're making RPGs!

The original Mario Story was meant to be a sequel to Mario RPG, Square Enix was approached to make it, it was developed for 4 years and positioned as THE Nintendo RPG on the N64. Of course Intelligent Systems went with a pretty unconventional turn based formula in the end, with almost no stats. But the badge system was there to offer players progression, and the original box art had a big fat "action RPG" on it. The paper aesthetic was chosen as a visual style, it wasn't the whole point of game world like recent titles.

10/10 for the original, maybe 8/10 for this de-make.

Here’s hoping Intelligent Systems find their way again, and I don’t mean returning to this formula with their modern “improvements”. Slow text speed and menuing?? Those would have been unthinkable for their classic games, they were the masters of snappy UI.

I always wonder if sales are a lagging indicator with a series like this. Fates had a pandering, mistranslated, widely panned story but rode the hype of Awakening to be the best selling entry on 3DS. There's a lot to praise about Three Houses, but it had awkward story compromises to support 4 routes, and there's the bland maps. Maybe that and FEWarriors: Three Hopes created some fatigue that sapped Engage's sales a bit. Then Engage had its own marketing issues, where it wasn't clear enough that it was a new main series game rather than a crossover/spinoff, plus the toothpaste protag being front and center.

Still, can't deny that initial Awakening success is owed to a lot of good word of mouth about the marriage mechanic. The only other thing it could be a lagging indicator of is Marth and Roy in Smash Bros.

I would have gladly taken a 1080p 60fps version more faithful to the original's art style, instead of making everything glossy and reflective. It's a sad state of affairs how they thought that was necessary to market the game.

If nothing else this keeps in the news how connection in these games was 99.9% not burdening Nintendo. And these gamers will hold a record for some time, or until the next major game matchmaking service gets shut down for no reason. They passed the people who stayed in that Halo lobby for weeks, which itself has become a sort of folklore.

They may be doing it for their own sentimental reasons, but personally I think it's doing a good turn for game preservation. It's incredibly stupid that companies are making these peer to peer games unplayable, and that it's falling on fans to find workarounds.

Well, that settles it then. Cancel the hall effect sticks in the Switch successor shipments, the joycons are just fine!

2nd titles on consoles typically sell worse, so there should be no surprise about TOTK. It's visually similar to BOTW, costs $70, and has had 6 fewer years to sell.

At least it's IN the top 10, I say thinking about my beloved Splatoon. If only that series was marketed here half as much as in Japan...

The fact that you can stay connected peer-to-peer almost indefinitely just highlights how unnecessary it was for Nintendo to shut down the service in the first place.

Loved Rainbow Curse, for a second I thought about how it would play with joycon gyro controls, using one like your "paintbrush". But of course you're not only drawing the ropes for Kirby, but also tapping on him precisely the whole game.

I think the resistive touch screen on the WiiU is too central to that game's charm.

@sleepinglion Eh, the Wii was compatible with GameCube disks and controllers but nobody mistook it for a slightly improved GameCube, even though that's pretty accurate to its internals.

Name and marketing do the heavy lifting for perceptions like that. It's a shame the Wii U got let down in those areas because it was such a jump in power over the Wii.

I was just thinking Pokémon’s ownership situation is too straightforward and they could do with more subsidiaries and ownership splits!