It's a thread! (Games discussion, etc.)

[JG]

Yeah the original melded replay at higher difficulty quite well. If you played at a harder level or with a certain character you could get a reward (heart piece for that character or another Gold Skulltula)  There seems to be absolutely no reward for playing a different difficulty level in AoC, and your choice of characters only matters for increasing the weapon drops for the character played when the chests appear.

I guess the Korok hunt is one reason to replay, but you are right that its antithetic to the game mechanics. Some treasure chests hidden off to the sides as well.  These distract from the goal of the game, and while the chests are fairly easy to spot at distance and there's no serious penalty for missing them, there does seem to be a strong preference developing for locating all the Korok seeds. (Last night I got a map upgrade that shows me how many seeds found and still missing in each story battle, indicating completeness.) Some of the Koroks just seem too well hidden. I spent over a half an hour last night and only found two of the four missing Koroks in the first stage and I literally searched everywhere. Those last two are either exceptionally well hidden such that you have to be in exactly the right location to trigger the ??? prompt, or they are in areas of absolutely no interest that most players simply won't visit (like the middle of the grassy fields.) I don't like playing a half hour, solely to find four Koroks and only able to come up with two of them, gaining hardly any worthwhile experience or weapon drops as reward. Mundane tasks of dubious completability are a sign of very poor game design.

I don't mind the battle sidequests - these remind me of original Hyrule Warriors. But the collect items and give to recipient are a too basic in my opinion. They add some richness to the story, but that's about it. They don't even provide a photo of the requestor. Other than the story text and exchanging your current items for others, there's no point in having them.  The ideal solution would have been to embed the requestor characters in the maps for story battles you had completed.  This would solve the replay boredom and give something more to do in order to complete the sidequests.

And regarding sidequests, I'm getting tired of Little Knight beeping all the time prompting me to visit the Blacksmith Guild or Military Camp after every dang sidequest. It's cute in the story videos, but a terrible annoyance on the quest screen.

[Moge]

The filesize of Mario 3D World on Switch is apparently over 5 GB, and the Wii U original clocks in at 1.7 GB.  Just how much new content are they packing?!

Short review of the Xbox Series Controller -- Phenomenal dpad. Absolutely perfect for fighters. It's clicky and very loud though, so it'll probably annoy you if you can't stand that stuff. Everything else about the controller has been improved, from the ergonomics to better shoulder buttons. The grip on the back handles is uncomfortable.

[JG]

The Bowser's Fury addon might have a lot of video cutscenes. Only explanation I can give.

Everything else about the controller has been improved, from the ergonomics ... The grip on the back handles is uncomfortable.

This seems contradictive.  The 360/One controller handles are just fine. Not as good as a Switch Pro Controller in my huge hands, but far superior to the Playstation 1-4 series. The preview videos did say they were making the Series X controllers 10% smaller than One's which I said before was a terrible idea given the huge majority of their playerbase is late teenagers and adults so Microsoft needed a corresponding larger size controller than their competitors. If the placement of buttons, triggers and dpads is the same but the handles shrunk by 10%, then the ergonomics clearly can't be better for larger hands.

Frankly, instead of game companies selling different colors, I'd rather they sold different sizes. Take gloves for example, not counting stretchy cotton or latex, they come in different sizes because glove making companies realized ages ago that people have different sized hands.  Why game companies (or even third party accessory makers) haven't caught on is a mystery. Fine if the pack-in model was medium sized, but the individual on-shelf models need size variety.

[Moge]

This seems contradictive.  The 360/One controller handles are just fine. Not as good as a Switch Pro Controller in my huge hands, but far superior to the Playstation 1-4 series.

I should clarify i meant the texture of the back grips being uncomfortable and prickly on my skin. Probably will end up buying something to cover 'em up.

[JG]

That BioShock Collection for Switch is just $16.99 at Best Buy today. That's $3 cheaper than Black Friday. And you still get free shipping.
https://www.bestbuy.com/site/bioshock-the-collection-standard-edition-nintendo-switch-nintendo-switch-lite/6408084.p?skuId=6408084

If you never played the trilogy trust me on this and get it now. They aren't just solid shooters (which is high praise from me since I'm not that big of a fan of FPSs) but are regarded as some of the best written video games ever with exceptionally intriguing stories and shocking conclusions. (I still think BioShock Infinite has the most mind-bending ending of all time.)

[JG]

Last day of the year, so of course its time for the Gaming Year in Review.

I don't have ten games to share this year simply because I didn't play that many games. I focused more on one game from 2019 (Dragon Quest Builders 2) and replayed a few older games (like the first Hyrule Warriors.) I undoubtedly put more hours into DQB2 than any of these five this year, but having ranked it last year I'll leave it off the list this year.

5. Trials of Mana, Switch (available most platforms)
C-. I've only been playing a few days but I'm rather disappointed. The character designs seem overly extracted from 1990s video game sprites and manual artwork (for example, Reisz's shoulderpads don't attach to anything, they just float in air over her shoulders.) The voice acting is generally pretty bad; for the main characters its okay but the side characters is awful, as if they read from a script with no idea of context. Moving around in combat doesn't seem as fluid as I think it should be. And too much nitpicky configuration to customize your characters, the item wheel, and so on. I'm not sure yet whether its a bad game or not, but a handful of hours into it I'm yet to be impressed enough to put it into good game category.

4. Final Fantasy VII Remake, Playstation 4
C-. I'm not so fond of it. Its graphics are really amazing, and the extra side stories really build up the 5-6 hour segment of Midgard in the original to a full-length RPG, but I don't care for the new battle system at all. Too much of the newer, worse Final Fantasies and not enough of the old, better turn-based strategies. Its biggest drawback is that its isn't a remake of Final Fantasy VII at all. Its just a remake of the first fifth or sixth of it. The best part of FF7 yes, but what happens next? FF7 Remake Part 2 can't possibly be as good. And when would it come out, 2025 or so based on how long it took to get part 1 out the door?

3. Super Mario 3D All-Stars, Switch
C. Super Mario 64 is a cheap emulation with some ok-in-1996 camera work but bad-for-2020. Super Mario Sunshine is uninspiring and still really way too difficult for a Mario game. Only Super Mario Galaxy shines. Its the only one of the three that still looks good and plays well in 2020. The lack of a Galaxy 2 DLC pack or inclusion of the better Super Mario 3D Land game kept this title from being excellent. It is merely good on the basis that Super Mario Galaxy is amazing, and that the other two games are simply included in the same cart.

2. Paper Mario: The Origami King, Switch
B. Nintendo did what I wasn't sure was possible, rescue the Paper Mario franchise from back-to-back stinkers. I still think the Mario+Luigi series is the Mario RPG series that should have continued, but Origami King is quite interesting in its own right. It makes a little bit more use of paper mechanics, though still not nearly as much as the first two games. The ring battle system is certainly something new we've not seen in an RPG.  The story is pretty good, though too linear. Not as good as the original (which was also too linear) nor as much as the excellent Thousand Year Door (which badly deserves a remake), but not bad. Unfortunately, your travelling companions don't do very much to help in fights in this game and you can't do combo moves with them like in the first two games or the Mario+Luigi series. Boss ring battles could have been better if you had to plan not one but two paths.

1. Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity, Switch
A-. It's debatable whether original Hyrule Warriors or Age of Calamity is the better game. The original is longer, with a larger cast, and much more to do, but also suffers from some really rediculous farming requirements and experience grinding. Age of Calamity has an amazing story, well tied to the Breath of the Wild events, it has the same graphics style of BotW so it pretty much looks like a prequel should, and doesn't invent as much artificial stuff that wasn't present in BotW as the original Hyrule Warriors did from its source games (Ocarina of Time, Twilight Princess, and Skyword Sword.) However it is for the most part quite easy and you can 100% the game in about 90 hours, which is about the tenth the time it would take on Hyrule Warriors: Definitive edition. It also has some bad framerate issues, the camera gets stuck behind objects obstructing the view, and has noticeable graphics pop-in which are things games produced in 2020 should not have (see also, Cyberpunk 2077.) The game has been out six weeks and these issues haven't been addressed, which knocks it from A grade to A-. But if you've played Breath of the Wild and want to know more about the events of 100 years prior, Age of Calamity delivers in a huge way. The main campaign is satisfyingly long and its full of cutscenes similar to the flashbacks of Breath of the Wild. Sure its got bugs but overall its a winner.


Missing in Action:
* Halo Infinite. In light of the Cyberpunk 2077 backlash, it was probably the right thing to delay it if it simply wasn't ready yet. It crippled their hardware launch but at least they aren't under class action lawsuit.
* Paranoia: Happiness is Mandatory. This never came out in 2020 and I'm still mildly interested, but as time goes on it becomes worrisome that it'll be less game than just silly skits stitched together.
* Beyond Good and Evil 2. I'm no longer interested in this at all, but I find it interesting that sometime in June or July it will officially pass Duke Nukem Forever as having the longest confirmed development timeframe of any AAA video game ever at 14 years, 2 months, and change since first announcement to eventual release. Unacceptable that a major studio like Ubisoft has let this happen.


Things I wanted to play but didn't for various reasons:
* Assassin's Creed III - got it last Black Friday but just never have found the time to start it
* The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance Tactics - I was interested in this very early in the year, but it got some lousy reviews and reviewers said it depended too much on knowing the plot of the TV show, which is on a steaming platform I don't have, so I've passed on it.
* Yoshi's Crafted World - was gifted this (you know you are, thanks) but also didn't find time for this
* Witcher III: Complete Edition - I got this just days before Origami King so it kind of sat on the shelf. About the time I finished Origami King, Age of Calamity was announced and I wanted to revisit Hyrule Warriors.
* Donut County - Saw this on Player Select and it looks like my kind of game, but I haven't jumped on it.
* Untitled Goose Game - Also seen on Player Select, and just looks funny. As I said last year about Assassin's Creed IV, sometimes its fun to play the role of the bad guy and ruin things for everyone else.


Most Anticipated Titles of 2021:
* Super Mario 3D World + Bowsers Fury, Switch (February 12) - I'm not sure I'll get it or not, but 3D World is every bit as good as Galaxy and the Bowsers Fury subplot has me mildly interested. The expectation is a Direct Mini in January to shed some more light on it.
* Bravely Default II, Switch (February 26) - Clubhouse leader of interest going into the new year that has a date set
* Halo Infinite, Xbox (unknown) - Unknown when in the year but presumably first half. Fair chance I stick with the Xbox One version because I haven't seen anything else come up to warrant a Series X purchase.
* Spider-Man: Miles Morales, PS5 (out now) - On the other hand, Playstation 5 does have such a title and I'll probably buy one at some point next year, with this game in tow.
* Alex Kidd in Miracle World DX, all platforms (Q1) - This tugs at my childhood heartstrings. This and Ghostbusters on the Sega Master System were the first two home video games I ever played (at a friends house because we had a PC, not video game consoles), and of the two I liked this one more. It was the Super Mario platforming, Metroidvania sidescrolling adventure that I fell in love with years before experiencing the more well-known NES counterparts.
* Breath of the Wild 2 - I anticipate a fall release. And if its not ready for 2021 then they better be bringing a Skyward Sword or Minish Cap remake during the Zelda 35th Anniversary.

And while I have zero interest in playing it myself, Romancelvania: BATchelor's Curse, is maybe the best named game of 2021. A Castlevania/dating sim crossover is a wild concept.


Something I won't miss from 2021 (non-virus edition):
The tremendously poor response to Cyberpunk 2077 on PS4 and Xbox One has hopefully scared developers into not jerking around gamers (or capital investors) or releasing crap that hasn't been fully playtested with the expectation that players won't care and will just simply upgrade hardware to play it. Game studios have got to stop gigabyte-sized Day One and post-release updates as the way to make the game right after the fact and focus more on getting it right before launch. Its ok if they launch with some minor bugs, but huge, glaring holes that just aren't fixable have landed CD Projekt SA in court, in a case they are likely to lose. They also made some fools out of a few reviewing organizations and supposedly neutral gaming awards, such as Gamescom which awarded it Best Sony Playstation Game despite never playing the Playstation version.


Moments of the Year:
1. Winning the non-Asian zone's photo contest for my Factory photo submission in Dragon Quest Builders 2. Less than 100 people worldwide have won a Gold Trophy and I'm one of the few that has. Unquestionably my greatest personal accomplishment in gaming.
2. From a non-personal achievement standpoint, my favorite video game moment occurs in Age of Calamity, during the scene in which the Zora princess Mipha is fighting against Waterblight Ganon inside Divine Beast Vah Ruta. I've tagged this with spoiler so those of you playing the game can enjoy it themselves.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Suddenly a new time portal opens and Prince Sidon comes rushing in, deflecting Waterblight's spear. Sidon turns, crosses fist over chest and gives his customary sharp-toothed smile. He has saved his dear sister from her fate.

It's the "Oh hell yes!" moment of the year (since no BOTW2 release announcement was made.)

[JG]

So I'll put Trials of Mana into the good category based on 19 hours and some odd minutes into it. The voice acting is still suspect in a lot of parts, while great in others, the character designs have unexplainable problems, and flying enemies are a real pain. It's biggest problem is that its got too many scenes where the heroes run up to a bad guy and say "who are you!?' or 'what are you doing!?" when you were just told 10 minutes earlier who they were or what they're planning. Either something is being lost is translation or, like most of the rest of the game, its sticking way too close to the source SNES material. But looking past its storytelling and design problems its a pretty good game if you've got mages to help take out flying monsters easier. The story advances pretty quickly since the fields and dungeons are pretty short - just like Secret of Mana was. Though like Secret of Mana the weenies aren't meant to be hard, and then you run into a boss that might whip you up.  The wall monster boss (every Square game seems to have one) was especially brutal and cost me nearly all of my healing items.  Pretty short game though, I'm just shy of 20 hours and feel like I'm well past the halfway point. (As a measurement stick, I've found 35 of the 50 Lil Cactus hiding spots.)

Also, after my last post I got a notice that some Google Play credit was about to expire so I spent it on Donut County for my tablet. I didn't even know it had a tablet touch mode rather than PC mouse or console d-pad. Its a really short game at under 10 hours, but fun if you like simple stuff: perfect for tablets. I wish the writing was better: real people don't use terms like LOL in regular speech. Maybe its just meant to be a joke though, as basically the (w)hole game is. I enjoyed it and at only $5 I thought it was priced well for an indie game, but it doesn't have much replay value.

[JG]

In case you've not seen the newest leak, which is either a really great hoax with a lot of detail or a stunning preview, there's going to be a full sized Nintendo Direct coming Monday, January 11. And it's a whopper if the leak information is to be believed.

First Party coverage:
Nintendo Switch Pro - April 23
The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of the Past - April 23
Mario Kart 9 - spring
Fire Emblem Echoes: Path of Radiance - May
Splatoon 3 - summer (almost certainly post-E3, which is mid-June)
Metroid Resurgence - fall
Super Mario Odyssey 2 - holidays

3rd Party coverage:
Assassin's Creed: Valhalla - April 23 (Switch Pro required)
Grand Theft Auto V Premium Edition (Switch Pro likely required, but does not specify)
Resident Evil 2 Remake - April 23 (Switch Pro required)
Resident Evil 3 Remake - April 23 (Switch Pro required)
Watch Dogs: Legion - April 23 (Switch Pro required)
Call of Duty: Black Ops: Cold War - May 7 (Switch Pro required)
Bayonetta 3 - summer
Devil May Cry 5 Special Edition - summer (Switch Pro required)
Final Fantasy VII Remake - fall (Switch Pro required)
Shin Megami Tensei V - fall
Far Cry 6 - unknown (Switch Pro required)
Kingdom Hearts: Destiny's Embrace - unknown

Other games to be mentioned (unknown which are Switch and which are Switch Pro):
Apex Legends
Bravely Default 2
Control: Ultimate Edition
Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time
Dead or Alive 6
Dirt 5
Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout
Fallout 3: New Vegas
Hollow Knight: Silksong
Monster Hunter Rise
Monster Hunter Stories 2: Wings of Ruin
NieR Replicant
No More Heroes 3
Persona 5 Strikers
Plants vs Zombies: Battle for Neighborville
Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury (probably to be covered in a mini in February)
The Witness
Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition
Yakuza 6


All games that require Switch Pro will also run on regular Switches in cloud mode for Switch Online players, in a fashion similar to Google Stadia.

Switch Pro will be first thing covered in the Direct, Echoes of the Past will be the last as the typical "one more thing" moment.

There will be demos for Super Mario Odyssey 2, Metroid Resurgence, Bayonetta 3, and Kingdom Hearts: Destiny's Embrace prior to their releases. (The lack of a demo for Zelda tells me it may be Switch Pro-only title.)



Thoughts:

Holy crap. If this is all true its a monster year for Nintendo and they'll completely crush Sony and Microsoft. A Super Mario, a Zelda, a Metroid, and a Mario Kart all the same year? That's not even fair. Sprinkle in some more exclusives like Splatoon, Fire Emblem, Bayonetta, and Bravely Default and you might well close the book on who's going to win the Ninth Generation Console War before its barely gotten started.

The third party games indicates the Switch Pro will be quite a bit more powerful than anticipated to be able to run higher end games for the PS4 and Xbox One and be able to compete with the PS5 and Series X. Cloud mode is an excellent concept for an on-the-go system like Switch. If the Cloud Mode works well you'll stop seeing games being only for PS5 and Series X on the basis on technical requirements. The gaming world will return to being all about exclusives, for which Nintendo and Sony have a gigantic lead over Microsoft.

I'm going to take a guess and suggest that package labelling and marketing material for Switch Pro will not follow the white on red pattern of the Switch, and be more visually distinguishable. Microsoft stumbled on this with Xbox One and Xbox Series X packaging being way too similar, often with just an X on the front cover corner. Sony did better with a distinct color scheme for PS5 (black on white headings rather than the PS4's typical white on blue.) Nintendo should follow what Sony did right and Microsoft got wrong.

Pokemon Diamond and Pearl remakes were rumored in leaks a few days ago but aren't on the Direct. Doesn't mean its not happening, but maybe doesn't have anything ready to show next week. (There's enough wow factor already.)

I am very down on "Echoes of the Past" as the title for the next Zelda game. First, it's unwise to release two games with Echoes in the title within a month of each other. Second, its way too close to the better "Echoes of an Elusive Age" subtitle already carried by Dragon Quest XI. Exceptionally poor choice of title if true.

[Rai]

I saw the list earlier but didn't give it many seconds of credence. It tics off too many of the boxes of fake leak for brief amount of attention.

[JG]

Yeah, it suffered from 'too much too soon'. Too good to be true I think. Everyone seems to agree a Switch Pro is coming, but a Switch Pro and massive online service at same time, in three months seemed unlikely.

On the other hand it had the support of the recent OS update for which investigators have identified two new hardware versions: one that has neither a game cartridge slot or battery (i.e., a new model of dev kit) and another with some strange new dock that has its own GPU chip. It gave credence that the Switch Pro could conceivably be right around the corner. I found the game announcements to be the really questionable part: the rumors are Metroid Prime 4 is in no way going to be ready in 2021 and nobody anywhere had dropped a previous rumor about a Mario Kart 9. With so much effort recently put toward Mario Kart Tour and Home Circuit a new major Mario Kart seemed ill-timed. It would also put three Nintendo EPD releases within the first few months of the year, since we already knew about Super Mario 3D World and the Mario, Zelda, and Mario Kart series are all developed by that group. Splatoon as well, bringing into question four games within a six or seven month timeframe. They did all of it in 2017, but that was with a good two years of planning and no pandemic to interrupt development.

I do love the idea of a Switch Pro cloud service for regular Switch though. It bridges the technology gap and provides another buy-in to the Switch Online service. Its not something you can hide though: you need a vast array of servers around the world, something Nintendo does not have. Google and Microsoft do and are already utilizing it for gaming. But if Nintendo can work out a deal with Amazon, it just might happen. Seems like a total win for both sides if they could make it work.

[Moge]

Biggest Dissapointment in 2020 -- Deadly premonition 2, Switch
The sequel cuts back so on many elements that made the original a bonafide cult hit, and the game's fps is absolutely abysmal, reaching into the single digits at times. Despite its very big flaws, the story manages to be endearing and wraps up York's story nicely.

Most Anticipated
------------------------
Cotton Reboot
Perfect Dark
Breath of the Wild 2
Nier Replicant
KiKi KaiKai
Mario 3D World Deluxe
Clockwork Aquario
Wonder Boy - Asha in Monster World
Resident Evil 8

Top 10 for 2020
--------------------

10. Crackdown, Mega Drive
9. Tuned Heart , PC98
8. Ganbare Goemon 2, SNES
7. Moon: Remix RPG Adventure, Switch

6. King of Fighters 2002 Ultimate Match, PC
5. Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow, NDS
4. Guardian Heroes HD, Xbox 360
3. House of Velez, PC

2. Jet Set Radio, Dreamcast
Very janky platformer, and yet i was deeply engrossed in the game's absolutely bangin' soundtrack and fresh visual style.

1. Resident Evil 2 Remake, PC
An unbelievably well-done remake that's both faithful and reverent to its source material but also contemporary in modernizing the clunky original into a slick 3rd-person shooter.

[JG]

So Microsoft doubles the price of Xbox Live, gets tremendous negative feedback over the move, and then walks it back under the realization that its currently the only thing keeping the Series X at least marginally competitive with PS5 and Switch. (Though exactly how competitive you are being outsold 2-to-1 by Sony and 8-to-1 by Nintendo is debatable.)

If Microsoft senior leadership hasn't yet realized that the gaming division is floating in the breeze with no coherent direction, this should open some eyes.

[Moge]

Xbox Series systems are selling out, so i can't imagine they're doing badly. Saw a survey from MS asking if ppl would like to have the same controller features as the Dualsense. Kinda late to be asking considering the other two implemented gyro into their controllers decades ago, but i would absolutely be down with it.

It's becoming increasingly worrisome that so many notable game publishers and developers are getting swallowed up. I don't mind some of them, but any developer getting devoured by EA or Amazon isn't good in my book.

[JG]

Its a way for them to sell a Series X Elite controller, since they rolled all the features of the Xbox One Elite into the basic Series X controller.  Microsoft has always been big on earning extra cash from the advanced controller market since compared to Sony and Nintendo they make ridiculously far less on first and second party software sales. All three do it but Microsoft spends more of their advertising on hardware, since they have fewer exclusive games to promote. I've never quite understood this pattern of advertising though, as accessories account for only about 6% of the physical gaming spend ($546 million out of $9.6 billion in December) while main hardware is 14% and games are the remaining 80%.

The system is selling out, but we're still in the period of early adopters. I suspect limited inventory will go on until at least March, meaning Switch will still outsell PS5 and Series X until then. Once shelves are full then it will be interesting to see how quickly they can be moved.  If it gets to summer or fall and Switch is still outpacing them then they'll need to rethink their price point or add value such as a pack-in game, which gives Sony a huge advantage as they'll have Miles Morales ready to suit up for round two while Microsoft will still be waiting for Master Chief to even fire his first shot. If its a PS5 with Miles Morales or a Series X with Minecraft at Christmas, its clear which one is going to outsell the other. A Switch Pro that undercuts the price point of them will likely doom them both to another second and third place finish at Christmas.

In short, I've no doubt the Series X will sell 20 to 30 million. Maybe 40. It's whether it can approach the 100 million the PS5 is aiming for or the 90+ million the Switch is targeting. Microsoft isn't going to reach these numbers unless they can drastically cut hardware costs, or start churning out high quality exclusive games, or prove better value through things like Xbox Live and Game Pass. Announcing the value of Xbox Live is being cut in half directly undermines this plan.

[JG]

Either the funniest or most disturbing thing you'll see all day:

[JG]

If you need to watch the Direct again: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVHbzcr1-D8

Or, the summary version:

Pyra/Mythra from Xenoblade Chronicles 2 joins Smash Bros Ultimate as next character (March) - She/they should be a competent fighter.

Fall Guys: Ultimate Knockout (summer) - Behind every else who already has it.

Outer Wilds (summer) - Another reset the clock to try again game. I liked it the first time when it was called Majora's Mask. Or that shooter game from last year.

Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir (May 14)
Famicom Detective Club: The Girl Who Stands Behind (May 14) - These two are old Famicom mystery games that were never ported to English, but are being remade (and ported) for Switch - low interest

Samurai Warriors 5 (summer) - Another Warriors musou.

Legend of Mana (June 24) - I'm rather disappointed that this is 16-bit style, not 3d. I thought they were redoing all the Mana series in 3d.

Monster Hunter Rise (March 26) - If it floats your boat. A huge amount of water/mud/liquid ground effects in the preview. I don't know how you defeat these things while drowning.

Monster Hunter Rise edition Switch and Pro Controller (March 26) - I'm surprised they didn't mention a thing on the new Super Mario red and blue themed set.

Mario Golf: Super Rush - June 25 - Multiplayer speed mode and Mii compatibility added to the series. Still, its Mario Golf so its a bit of a bore.  The Speed mode looks like it would be good for multiplayer, but as a primarily solo gamer I can't say the game appeals much to me.

Tales from the Borderlands (March 24) - Another game that's been on other platforms for a while now.

Capcom Arcade Stadium (today) - I'm confused by the way this is behind sold. Did I get it right that you think you're buying 32 games but only get 1 (1943), and have to pay more to get the game(s) you want out of it? If so, that's a pretty underhanded move unless 1943 is a free offering to entice you to buy the others.

Stubbs the Zombie in Rebel without a Pulse (March 16) - Well, its a bit of an different take on 3d shooters. Shoot other zombies to collect their parts to keep going. Got to give them credit for trying something new.

No More Heroes 3 (August 27) - I feel like this one is way overdue, like iy was previewed two years ago at E3 or something (Maybe it was and I've forgotten.)  Still, it won't arrive until after this year's E3?

Neon White (winter) - The clear dud of the Direct. Don't waste time on this garbage Nintendo. You play an assassin in heaven (of all places) hunting other assassins, and you use magic cards to perform all your abilities like jumping, dashing, and attacking? Its like a 3d shooter based on Paper Mario Sticker Star mechanics with a really bizarre backdrop.

DC Super Hero Girls: Teen Power (June 4) - A game for pre-teen girls. I suppose DC can have this market since Marvel's taken everything else.

Plants vs Zombies: Battle for Neighborville: Complete Edition (March 19) - Yet another that's been on other platforms for several years, and since it wasn't any good there (compared to the excellent first two games in the PvZ series) there's no reason to give this a look either.

Miitopia (May 21) - This... has promise. I heard really good things about the 3DS version. Though I think it depends on a lot of social contact in games, setting up a lot of Miis of friends and family or exchanging friend codes (meaning heavy use of Switch Online which the 3DS didn't need.) Since the pandemic seems to be hanging around until at least summer time, this possibly fills the social gaming niche Animal Crossing took last year.

Super Mario themed items coming to Animal Crossing: New Horizons (February 25 form some, March 1 and later for others) - Looked like a lot of new costumes, brick and question blocks, gold coins, and a pair of warp pipes.

Project Triangle Strategy (2022, demo today) - Looks like the spiritual successor to the Final Fantasy Tactics series. However its operating under another goofy working title from SquareEnix that probably sticks around (as Octopath Traveler did) SquareEnix has got to get someone to name these things before they make preview trailers and put out demos. (I'll take the job if someone from SquareEnix is reading this.) Like Bravely Default II, its getting a demo way in advance of its eventual release.

Star Wars: Hunters (sometime in 2021) - The only trailer to not show anything, except a vague Stormtrooper shooting a gun and Chewy raising his arms and howling. Apparently its a cross-platform MMO of some kind set in the Star Wars universe, with a lot of in-game real money purchases to boost your success rate.

Knockout City (May 21) - Look like a neat, cartoony team combat game like Splatoon or Ninjala.

World's End Club (May 28) - Some kind of adventure game where you have 12 characters and have to experience the story from each of their points of views and split them into teams ot accomplish tasks as they try to get back home to Tokyo. I got the feel that this was a game not intended to be published outside of Japan, and now is, so its going to come off as odd to the western world.

Hades (March 19) - Physical version with a soundtrack and artbook. Given the high marks it got as a digital game last year, this is something I may have to consider.

Ninja Gaiden Master Collection (June 10) - Ninja Gaiden Sigma, Ninja Gaiden Sigma 2, and Ninja Gaiden 3 Razor's Edge. Yawn. A great game from the late 80s that really never translated well to 3d.

Hyrule Warriors: Age of Calamity: Expansion Pass (May 28, $19.99) - Its pissed a lot of people off that this isn't coming until May as part 1, June as the first wave, and then November for the remainder in wave 2. The game is already 3 months old and now its a four month wait for the DLC to even start? Had this been announced earlier and released by now they probably would have sold twice as much as they will come May and June when the game is over half a year old and most people have long stopped playing it.  The only explanation to extend this out to November is that wave 2 must tie into the Breath of the Wild sequel in some way. So without actually saying so, Nintendo has pretty much hinted that the sequel isn't arriving before November.

Bravely Default II (February 26) - Yep. The next big thing on Nintendo's horizon now that Super Mario 3D World is behind us. (I'd have liked to seen something about that Bowser's Fury mode. Only seen a few videos and I'm still not sure what warrants me rebuying the game.) My preorder at Best Buy has been in place for a few weeks now.

Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection (February 25) - Given how absurdly difficult and unforgiving the original NES games are, I'm not too keen on this. For you younguns, when you hear people use the term "Nintendo hard" - Ghosts and Goblins is exhibit A.

SaGa Frontier Remastered (April 15) - Yet another Square RPG getting the refresh treatment. This one seems to be completely drowned out in the noise of Bravely Default II, Legend of Mana, and Project Triangle Strategy news.

Apex Legends (March 9) - And another battle royale game coming to the Switch much later than everyone else.

Aonuma appears spiking interest. But then he bums everyone out by saying there's nothing new to show for Breath of the Wild sequel, and news will come later this year. Given the previous AoC DLC news, its pretty clear the sequel isn't arriving before November, if it even arrives in 2021 at all. (An early 2022 release is not out of the question.)

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword HD (July 16) - Uses Joycons to copy the Wiimote and Nunchuk motion control, but also playable with buttons and the right joystick. I think some people were expecting a three game anniversary set of some sort, but Skyward Sword alone isn't bad as its one of the best in the series.

The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword Edition Joycons (July 16) - Left has a shield design and right has a sword design. (Note that Skyward Sword is one of the few that has a right-handed Link.)

Splatoon 3 (2022) - The "one last thing" preview of this Direct. A nice ending, even if I don't care for Splatoon. I couldn't tell if the gameplay was showing off Splatoon 3, or just a souped up Splatoon 2 though so I'm not sure what to make of it. I saw an article a few weeks back that said Nintendo needed a Splatoon 3 for Christmas 2021 though. I'm rather surprised they'd tease something that's both a year off and doesn't help them with 2021's outlook. They've been tight lipped about not showing things off until a few months before release of late, so this seemed completely out of character for Nintendo. They could have easily just said "coming soon" and not put a 2022 label on it. Instead, its another a leak that the Zelda game almost has to be the Christmas marquee title. Otherwise entering the holiday season with your two most hyped games coming the following year doesn't make for a strong finish to the year (especially with Sony and Microsoft itching to get back into the fight.)

[Moge]

Was not expecting the Direct to cater so much to my interests: JRPGs and a Splatoon sequel

Even though i'm not big into Smash, the Pyra announcement renewed my interest in Xenoblade 2. Would like to play the game some time, but man, JRPGs are a massive time sink, especially the current one i'm playing. Absolutely loving it though.

The branching narrative concept of the new Octopath is very intriguing. That was a pretty huge selling point of Tactics Ogre, which this game takes a lot of its inspiration from (and FFT of course).

Past GnG games are downright evil in difficulty. The newest sequel looks a lot more manageable thanks to difficulty options and additional weapons (and companions apparently). A modernized GnG is exactly what i've been waiting for. Tried the PSP GnG not too long ago, and i couldn't stand the fully polygonal graphics. There's a sense of precision you get with 2D sprites over 3D on a side view.

New Mario Golf looks great. I'm not normally into sports games, but Wii Sports convinced back in the day that the genre is an absolute blast with the right people around.

Saga Frontier - I dismissed this game back in the day based on the account it was far too radically different from the rpgs i was used to. I'm a lot more open now to experimental games however, so i think i will give Frontier another shot.

Skyward Sword - The Zelda fanbase at large considers SS to be the worst of the big boy console Zeldas. The game certainly does have a lot obnoxious elements that really slow down the experience. I would like to see the Zelda team smooth out the experience like Wind Waker HD.

Splatoon 3 - What can i say? I was absolutely giddy once this game popped up in the Direct. Having spent over a 1000 hrs in Splatoon 2, i'm absolutely ready for a new one. The open desert landscape in the beginning of the trailer suggests the campaign could be open world, but that's a pie in the sky desire at the moment. I'm incredibly happy they're adding a bow to the arsenal. That was my one most wanted weapon concept i wanted out of Splatoon 2, so it's nice too see the idea from my head become fully realzied. Very surreal.

[JG]

Was not expecting the Direct to cater so much to my interests: JRPGs and a Splatoon sequel

Definitely a Moge-Direct^TM. I on the other hand did not like it very much at all. The Age of Calamity DLC is too far out. If it came out already I'd have bought it. By June I doubt I'll care. Legend of Mana was a disappointment after the 3D work done on Secret and Trials. Don't care about Mario Sports games. They didn't show off anything that isn't already known about Bravely Default II. The only bright spot of the Direct for me was Skyward Sword HD - but they didn't mention any new features and I really hope it has some.

Even though i'm not big into Smash, the Pyra announcement renewed my interest in Xenoblade 2. Would like to play the game some time, but man, JRPGs are a massive time sink, especially the current one i'm playing. Absolutely loving it though.

Unfortunately Xenoblade Chronicles 2 is a gigantic sink.  Its easily 250+ hours and the length varies greatly by the gacha mechanism for randomly giving out the unique Blade characters. It definitely belongs in the "way too long" category. It was enjoyable but at the same time 'ugh'. It was so long that it turned me off from trying the Torna: The Golden Country side story/prequel game.

The branching narrative concept of the new Octopath is very intriguing. That was a pretty huge selling point of Tactics Ogre, which this game takes a lot of its inspiration from (and FFT of course).

And the above length problem is probably why I've not been so keen to try out Octopath Traveler and why this new Project Triangle Strategy has me nonplussed. I like a good RPG story but don't need to play the same game multiple times to see all the different story branches. A good book has a story that develops linearly over the course of a defined chapter sequence.  These new games feel like they're taking eight different books, jumbling all the chapters together into one large book, and calling that a good story. I'm doubtful. You don't need 200+ hours of content and a thousand branches to tell a good story and make a good JPRG. The JPRG heyday on the SNES got by with games that fit into the 24-40 timeframe. Short by today's standards but often better because they didn't bog down in sidequests that accomplish little but to burn time off the clock.

Past GnG games are downright evil in difficulty. The newest sequel looks a lot more manageable thanks to difficulty options and additional weapons (and companions apparently). A modernized GnG is exactly what i've been waiting for. Tried the PSP GnG not too long ago, and i couldn't stand the fully polygonal graphics. There's a sense of precision you get with 2D sprites over 3D on a side view.

I'm ok with rebooting the GnG series, too.  There's a lot of good 80s games that could use a renaissance, especially in Capcom's portfolio. They had a treasure trove of hits on the NES and over the last 20 years or so have either let some of them (like GnG) go to waste or, worse, made so many bad games that they led the series down the path of irrelevance (Mega Man)

Skyward Sword - The Zelda fanbase at large considers SS to be the worst of the big boy console Zeldas. The game certainly does have a lot obnoxious elements that really slow down the experience. I would like to see the Zelda team smooth out the experience like Wind Waker HD.

I'd rather say its most polarizing. Either people rank it very high or very low. It doesn't sit in the mid-range on people's rankings very often. I don't understand why people don't like it though. It must be those obnoxious things but most Zelda's have something annoying about them (feeding the map fish in Wind Waker, super-annoying heart pieces in Ocarina of Time, several hundred too many Koroks in BotW, etc.) Skyword Sword had motion controls, some clever sword fighting techniques, new uses for old items (like the double grappling hooks), a challenging new game+ mode that had been missing since the first game, and arguably the best, most complete end-to-end story in the bunch with a recurring villain instead of a boss that only appears in the last five minutes. I think people that rank it low are out of their mind. I've even gone so far as to say on this very board that Skyward Sword is better than Breath of the Wild. I would still, 10 years after release, rank it as the best Zelda game, above Ocarina of Time and Wind Waker.

[Moge]

I've tried the Trials of Mana demo. I much prefer the old 2D game. My biggest complaint is that it doesn't live up to the production values of the original, which that version might as well be considered AAA for its time. The new 3D Trials is about mid-tier production values-wise. It's okay, but i wanted something more grandiose, like on the scale of DQ 11 or the FF7 Remake. That is of course an absolutely impossible request with current Square.

I'm quite happy to see Legend not be turned into a 3D game, cause it game's 2D graphics are wholly unique and still hold up. Cleaning it up and repackaging it for modern times is the best way to go. According to the Steam listing, the port is being handled by M2, so i know the port is in very capable hands. I only hope they improve the game in other ways besides remastering the backgrounds.

From my experience with strategy-RPGs, they're more longer than traditional RPGs cause the battles require so much more input, both in combat and inventory management.

The GnG reboot was Maximo on the PS2. Never did get to play it, but would like to one day.

Breath of the Wild pretty much fizzles out once you familiarize yourself with its world. Those first 10 hours or so where you're exploring the unknown really are quite fantastic.

[Moge]

More details of the next Switch are leaking out, and it's looking the next upgrade will be a lot more substantial than many were predicting. 4k resolution and the switch (ahem) to an OLED display seem to be the biggest selling points. More importantly to me however is DLSS tech built into the hardware. This will allow the Switch to pump out high fidelity visuals even with low horsepower. Side rant, but it was a huge mistake by Microsoft and Sony to launch their latest systems without DLSS. Considering that both consoles are touting raytracing as a selling point, it would have been hugely beneficial and would have made the difference in getting a 30 fps raytraced game to run at 60 fps instead (looking at you Control).

Not mentioned but other upgrades i'm expecting for the next Switch are the switch to Bluetooth 5.0 peripherals and better build quality for said peripherals. Nintendo has gotten a massive amount of flak for the subpar Joycon sticks (to the point where they're offering free repair), so i'm expecting that to be significantly improved.