RedShell

I was just thinking there's no way that you would need a year to play through those games why not just resubscribe for 1 month? Then I remembered that isn't actually an option for the Expansion Pack. So yeah, that does indeed suck. Anyway, if you do plan to subscribe again, ShopTo have it at a much better price than the eShop: https://www.shopto.net/en/ndo10009344-nintendo-switch-on-line-expansion-pack-365-p1179195/

GOG taking a dig at Ubisoft: DRM-free is indeed a big plus for GOG. Which reminds me about some of the shenanigans that Capcom have been pulling recently on Steam, patching in new and (by the sounds of things) pretty sketchy DRM to their games, even much older titles.

Wasn't aware there was a demo up for this, will check it out later.

Interesting. I've not thought about it like that before, but makes a lot of sense. Also, I miss the arcade scene.

Hey N-E, here's to another year of great gaming! Just realised that I didn't actually finish updating my 2023 gaming diary oh well, here's my first games of 2024... Bramble: The Mountain King: Wow, what a messed up game. Really cool though, if you can stomach the content. It starts out like a nice fairy tale and then all of a sudden transforms into a absolute nightmare! Awesome way to enhance the horror though. It also has that kind of weird/creepy old European film vibe going for it, you know, the kind of stuff that'd be on late night TV back in the 80s. So yeah, the concept is spot-on. Unfortunately aspects of the presentation (and more importantly, the gameplay) are a little bit rough around the edges, it's mostly fine, but there are several moments (mainly insta-death stealth based sections ) where it felt like it could've done with a bit more polish. But I did enjoy the game, it's not that long (only around 5 hours) so the bits I wasn't that keen on didn't detract too much from the overall experience. Next up, a game that I should've played a long time ago, but inexplicably have waited until now to play. Yep I finally got around to playing... Stray: Mind-blowing! OK, I'm one of those crazy cat people, so obviously I was always going to adore that aspect of the game no matter what, but I wasn't prepared for just how much I would love it. I cannot believe how accurately the developers have managed to portray the movement and more amazingly the behaviours of a cat! That is no mean feat but they've done such an amazing job, it's crazy how good it all is. I was completely enthralled by the main character from the very second it first appeared on screen, all the way through until the credits rolled. I've heard comments about how if you were to remove the cat from this game it wouldn't be anything particularly special, and honestly there's some truth to that, but doing so would also require the entire game to be drastically different. I mean, everything has been so meticulously designed around the limitations and advantages of being a cat... the need to often move vertically, or to squeeze through small gaps, even the way the cat jumps. I recall being disappointed when I first discovered that jumping was context sensitive in this game, but it makes perfect sense for animation purposes and also maintaining that illusion of authenticity around the cat's behaviour. The game is very linear as a result of the level design and constrained jumping mechanics, but the atmosphere and visuals are so stunning that you just get sucked right into the world and it feels like a much bigger adventure than it actually is. I was especially amazed by the quality of the lighting in this game, absolutely phenomenal considering it's not utilising ray tracing. Soundtrack is awesome as well, fits the setting perfectly, but what I probably loved the most concerning audio in this (apart from being able to make the cat meow at any time, even during cut-scenes ) were the little ditties that play on the radios! If there was anything I found disappointing about Stray, it would be that outside of going through the story there isn't more to do. With such a cool playable cat to control it would've been great if they added some extra modes or something to be able to mess about with after completing the game. Anyway, glad I eventually played it. And finally, a game that I started playing in 2023, but continue to play every night. In fact I've clocked almost 800 hours now and I'm still nowhere close to completing it! This might just be the most epic and hardcore game I've ever attempted, I am of course referring to the one and only...

Yes. But also, (increasingly) no. My opinion on this tends to vary quite a bit to be honest. While I do enjoy owning a collection of games, in reality it's become incredibly rare that I replay them. I'd rather be playing something new, so in that sense, keeping physical copies is pretty much pointless as they're just packed away and taking up space. I guess the possibility that I might want to revisit some in the future is always there in the back of my mind though and that's why I hold on to them, but it's pretty unlikely, even more so for the really retro stuff where condition of the games themselves or console lifespan becomes an issue over time as well. I think shifting over to mainly PC gaming a few years ago had a big impact on the way I see this too. As far as I can tell, digital is the only option on PC these days, even if you buy a physical copy of a game (the last one for me was Cyberpunk 2077) it's just a download code inside the box. Hell, my current desktop doesn't even have any kind of optical drive. Another contributing factor is Game Pass, which just like PS+ before it has given me the opportunity to experience many different games, some of which in genres that I would not usually play. It's a fantastic option for expanding your gaming horizons and making new discoveries. I don't stay permanently subscribed to the service, usually just a couple of months a year or whenever a game I particularly like the look of gets added. The fact that I then don't actually own any of those games just isn't a problem in my eyes, I simply enjoy whatever stuff I play through on there and then move on to something else. I own the memories, man! Anyway, that's my take on it, I can definitely see it from both sides. Hopefully things will remain similar to how they are at the moment, with the option to purchase and own games alongside the option of streaming/renting them. I mean you can still buy physical copies of films or music, despite the existence of Netflix, Spotify, etc. so gaming should theoretically follow the same path, right?

Thought the clip of this had been lost for a second there but fortunately I managed to find and preserve it (albeit without sound): Yep, nothing can top that.

Hehehe. Yeah, that was a stage that I made quite early on (before I'd figured out all the little quirks of stage builder) so I go back to those sometimes in order to optimise them more than anything, but often end up also adding stuff with the additional memory that becomes available. As for the Pilotwings stage, that's the first time I've really made decent use of the path feature. The light plane performs multiple manoeuvres as a result, including a hilarious looking loop-the-loop! I didn't actually get the chance to test it before last night's games either, so I'm glad it appears to work as intended. At one point I thought you must've changed the launch rate or something. But yeah, great stuff. Oh man, that is classic! I think I was expecting a completely different move to the one I got, a consequence of having multiple Mii Fighters all with slightly different movesets. I suppose the smart thing to do would be have them all set-up in exactly the same way, but where's the fun in that?

Great games, cheers everyone! @Glen-i, that last stock on the very first match... was a bit of a nail-biter, ey? Also, my ridiculous SD when playing as "Bomberman"... Can't wait to see that one again on @S.C.G's replay vid.

Oh yeah, I added some dynamic terrain that ended up being a bit too shaky and also a stupid amount of falling objects that then get randomly chucked all over the stage. It's still a WIP and I wasn't going to choose it yesterday because it can really tank performance, but seeing as it was just us two playing at that point I figured it wouldn't be too bad.

Those 1v1 matches we had during custom stage Smash were hilarious, especially the one with the baseball on the Mii swimming pool stage! I actually have no idea how a lot of my custom stage gimmicks effect the majority of items, but it sure is fun finding out over time. This double Home-Run Bat KO by @Dcubed was great: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2025006642?t=0h28m11s Although I still don't get how my Isabelle suffered a shield break.

Cheers. Just something I threw together very quickly for tonight's theme. It'll probably be quite different the next time you see it. Whoops. Yeah, that may have been me. Sorry about that. BTW, was anyone else hearing the Shantae music on that stage (and the Ice Climber one)? Bit of a weird combination. Anyway, thanks for the games everyone, see you next year!

Cheers for the games everyone! I never knew Snake had such difficulty going up ladders. Yeah, I might to have to modify that stage a bit.

Sorting out Christmas stuff has gone a lot smoother than anticipated so I should be able to join tonight after all!

Yep, once I get started with stage builder I do find it quite difficult to stop, be it making new stages or just tweaking old ones. My Star Fox stage is on its 3rd iteration now, it was a bit too chaotic originally when you could only stand on the arwing(s) so I chucked some more terrain in there which seems to have done the trick. And the way Andross can now eat players/items but not always spit them out again ended up well too. The Shantae stage came about when I recently purchased the Mii costume/track. I wanted to have falling cannon balls as the stage hazard but making stuff fall into a stage from directly above is so tricky without any off-screen space to play with there, so had to settle with the lava idea instead. Cheers. The lava is just a couple of terrain pieces placed extremely close to the ground, and then both set on a super slow speed path to gradually make the stage get smaller over time. Yeah, great matches. That last stock between you and Glen on the Mario Wonder stage was particularly fantastic! You almost managed a great comeback as Pac-Man. Looked like it should've been a double KO to me, but Wario was too heavy to get properly launched! Speaking of almost managing a great comeback... that game when I was Little Mac. 2 SDs in the first 30 seconds yet somehow I was a whisker away from the win: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/2006107384?t=0h3m10s Anyway, don't think I'll be available for the next couple of Saturdays (if this is still going down) so I'll just say Merry Smashmas to you lot now, and hopefully catch you all again in the new year for more battles!

But normal and custom stages each have their own completely separate random choice setting, so surely a custom stage wouldn't be selected unless someone in the lobby were to specifically choose one or the random custom stage button? You always have the option to choose either normal random or custom random when both types are enabled.

I love how both of us just mess around when Exeggutor appears, knowing full well about the underground route on that stage.

No worries. You didn't actually need to turn them off though, I always switch to selecting standard stages from 8pm so it doesn't matter if custom is still enabled or not. Anyway, great games as usual. Enjoyed those 1v1 battles too. I thought I did something really cool here and scored a triple KO! But in watching it back, it turns out I was also one of the KOs: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1999838770?t=0h59m22s Also, fun with the Home-Run Bat: https://www.twitch.tv/videos/1999838770?t=0h50m16s That's the first time missing a Final Smash has been worthwhile. OK, see you all next week. Hopefully @Glen-i will be back too.

Cheers for the games! And for not stitching me up with characters that I can't use... for the most part. Seriously, I tip my hat to anyone who can use Rosalina & Luma proficiently, I simply cannot get my head around how they control. @Glen-i & @BowserBasher, hope you guys enjoyed the festive custom stage. I just threw that together in about 30 minutes earlier on today, but it turned out pretty well I reckon.

Had a go at a few classic races. It's a nice addition, I like how the game reverts to a 4:3 aspect ratio for it too. Just a shame that it's single races and not GP format, although you can just keep jumping back into it for the duration of the event anyway so it's not that bad. It does seem like the amount of active players in this has already taken quite a hit though. Here's hoping Nintendo has even more updates planned for the future to try and keep it going. I reckon if they added content from BS F-Zero Grand Prix/2 or even the GBA games, that would get player numbers up again.

A few more vids from my time with the game that I finally got around to uploading: Interview with the actress for Akame: I'm glad she ended up in that role rather than just being a hostess, it made Akame a great character.

And all with a development cycle of only six months! Remarkable. I was slightly concerned about the fate of this series following the departure of Toshihiro Nagoshi and several others from RGG Studio, but if Gaiden is any indication, then Yakuza/Like a Dragon is going to continue being great. Anyway, glad to hear you enjoyed it.

The credits have rolled... But yeah, what a game. Bring on Infinite Wealth!

I managed to get myself stuck doing coliseum and substory stuff all over again. But yeah, have completed every battle in the coliseum now, so at least that shouldn't distract me from the main story any more. Well, unless I find myself in need of more cash (it's crazy how much money you can earn there!).