The Nintendo Switch

ok i just experienced total sensory overload watching a Hades stream so maybe not that one

i just finished playing hades for several hours in a row. it is a great game, i think. it's another refinement of the roguelite action genre (dead cells, rogue legacy, spelunky, enter the gungeon, etc). i'm admittedly a sucker for these kinds of games. but hades has quickly eclipsed dead cells (which i loved) for me.

josh, i think you kind of liked dead cells? imagine a similar kind of combat, but in overhead 3D instead of 2D, and with lots of story development that manages to be frequently witty or at least interesting, while also relatively brief each time. the "visit the home base" part of the gameplay loop is quick and interesting enough that it literally becomes difficult to stop playing the game. it is dangerous.

Dead Cells was a lot of fun!

I grabbed Hades and barely touched it yet but was immediately impressed by the feel of it, nice crispy friction

I think I'd be more cool with constant ports and re-releases if those ports and re-releases were not substitutes for new releases

i don't like rereleases for a number of reasons but they aren't "substitutes" for new releases and generally they barely affect the development time of new releases. new releases just take a really long time to make now. and nintendo doesn't like to shell out cash for big budget third party exclusives so you get what you get.

I suspect if Nintendo had a big, new release to anchor the 2020 holiday season - and maybe they still do! - that's what they would be pushing. These re-releases aren't substitutes in the sense that they are being worked on *instead* of new releases, they're substitutes from a marketing standpoint because they don't *have* any new releases to sell.

all I know is Switch is going to kill my wallet next year, got plenty of other games to play this holiday

they do have a new game with the botw hyrule warriors. it's just not on the same interest level as mario odyssey / smash bros / pokemon. that game this year was animal crossing and it came out 6 months ago

That's just it, that new Zelda seems like a minor stop gap as people wait for the big one. PS4 is literally end of console life, and they still released two huge AAA exclusives just a couple months ago. Even assuming someone is a fan of the Animal Crossing series, that game came out, yeah, 6 months ago. Has it always been a thing that Nintendo only releases one, maybe two top-tier games, max, a year? I guess I expected more, and I concede that's on me. But the prices they are asking for these re-releases and b-list games, that's on them.

Josh in Chicago is Josh in Chicago-ing again

It me.

And actually, come to think of it, wasn't Animal Crossing delayed several months? I guess even pre-pandemic something is askew with their release schedule, because had that game been released last September they would have gone a whole year with no flagship.

in that magical world where delays don't happen other games that didn't make it this year would also not have been delayed though

all like 20 major nintendo series have gotten a solid switch entry in just 3 years of switch, hard to complain about anything thats not specifically metroid or f-zero or i guess warioware. are there diehard warioware fans out there?

my daughter!

baffling Nintendo decisions #23472: Rhythm Paradise Megamix and Warioware Gold not being crossgen with Switch

some nintendo exec must have legitimately thought the switch wouldn't immediately kick the 3ds to the curb

Traded my Switch with my ex for the Wii U

Decided to actually play, like, Twilight Princess, 3D World, Metroid Prime 3, replay Galaxy 2

Winter is coming etc.

Heh, when some of the best Switch games were released for the Wii-U, and for that matter when people are swapping the current console for the previous one, something is definitely askew.

Josh you should definitely trade in your Switch.

Look, I get it. I'm just annoyed and disappointed that there is not more I want for the system. But I'm still happy to have it around.

Boy I'd kill for a good Switch Warioware game

Josh, just go buy like a dozen back catalog titles on PSN to tide you over for the cost of two Switch games. Nobody can be a sole-Nintendo owner since the Wii days. Especially not that the Switch has replaced the DS line

It's just that we already owned those Wii/Wii U games but I never played them! Or: finished them. I think I passed on 3D World given how dire I found the revamped 2D Marios, but I've Been Told it's amazing so here goes...

Heh, my PS4 backlog will already likely last me well into the life of the PS5, let alone whatever Nintendo does next.

if anyone wants to go to hell,

Hades (from Supergiant, maker of Pyre, Bastion, Transistor)

I'll get to it after I play Transistor and Pyre...

i've never played transistor, i need to check that one out! i loved pyre (put it in my coint and plick) but i have already put about twice as much time into Hades, it is a ridiculously addicting game

transistor has a cool combat system but it doesn't ramp up enough, once you get the hang of it all the encounters are kinda samey even for a 4-5 hour game or however long it is

A brand-new Kirby game is available NOW! Choose from a cast of Kirby’s most iconic copy abilities and duke it out to be the last Kirby standing in #KirbyFighters2!

Download now: https://t.co/4EeCbC1m2b pic.twitter.com/5NrX452WvJ

— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) September 24, 2020

i'm not in the market for a kirby game rn but this exists

As someone who’s new(ish) to modern gaming, I will never understand this weird depressive strand of fan entitlement

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/super-mario-3d-all-stars-review

― Chuck_Tatum, 2020年9月20日 星期日 上午 4:29 (four days ago) bookmarkflaglink

very late to this but i don’t agree that being annoyed by a lazy emulation of three games at full price is ‘entitlement’. the spyro three-game bumper pack was a full rebuild and cost less. 3d all stars is as cynical as it gets.

We'll never know if 3D all stars would have been different if it was not created in a remote working forced pandemic, or if they had had more time and not had to tie it to the 35th Anniversary.

I like to think that mario64 is such a swiss watch, that adding things like adding luigi would have plain broke sections of it, unless Luigi was the same size/weight and mass as Mario.

they were doomed whatever they did, but given the circumstances, I'll accept it as better than nothing. (except for that limited availability s**t)

Also Super Mario Sunshine is considerably better than the first Spyro, and that's the worst against the best.

GameCube controller support on Sunshine would have been nice and easy.

i have bought the marios and can report back that n64 mario is the best mario of the 3, the most pure mario, also the spray backpack is a huge bummer its an anti mario device mario is intended to run and jump and be free instead there is the fiddly shooting thing and many of his jumps have been taken away in favor of spray controls, galaxy is cool with the variety of planets but also maybe too many planets and too small constantly cresting a planet instead of being on flat ground is perhaps also an anti mario form and the lil star bits are dumb too much busy work

i have not played super mario 3d world or super mario galaxy 2 and i would like to in order to have complete 3d mario knowledge

Also is that Kirby thing just a stripped down Smash Bros or what?

i think its just a kirby platform fighter yeah. small scope multiplayer/party game

It looks like when Capcom would just make endless SF clones with the CPS engine. Like they barely even changed Smash Bros Ultimate, and all the characters are Kirby!

https://thumbs.gfycat.com/ThreadbareFirstAnole-small.gif

I like to think that mario64 is such a swiss watch, that adding things like adding luigi would have plain broke sections of it, unless Luigi was the same size/weight and mass as Mario.

they did this 16 years ago, which had updated graphics and even a playable luigi.

or if they had had more time and not had to tie it to the 35th Anniversary.

yeah, i do wonder if they saw people saying ‘mario’s 35th this year! they’re going to update mario 64!’ and shat themselves and dumped this emulation collection at the last minute. it would also explain why galaxy 2 got left off.

I suspect that has at least some truth to it. Also possible, they would've split it into two collections for more money

i would have paid 60 bucks for galaxy 1&2 but not just one

lagoon's reviews pretty much line up with my own, down to the planets on galaxy 1 being too small (often, at least. i think. it's been a while)

galaxy 2 ruled

the small planet physics of galaxy 1 seemed like a sub-level from another recent 3D mario, but blown up into every stage

Oh shit, the second Ori is now out on Switch?! When did that happen?!

it was in the same direct as the monster hunter announcements a couple weeks ago

Looks lovely

First game was an absolute joy and totally gorgeous. The new one I understand to be more of the same, and then some. I'm considering pulling the full-price trigger (which is of course half that of your typical Nintendo title).

I have trouble keeping up with this stuff, and tbh Digital Foundry often gets stuck in the weeds, but I thought this was fascinating, how they were able to get this painterly Xbox game running on the Switch at all:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kH6wTpIObxE

Sounds like the Switch needs a few patches, from what I've read, but the developers are on it. Seems like an example of how well a port can be done if the original devs (with all their understanding of every last detail) do it.