Julius

Coming to iOS and Android tomorrow! ...in Japan.

This is exactly why you're one of my favourite Smash characters, Ike

Seems to have reviewed really well, at least by Musou standards – currently at an 82 on OC and 79 on MC. Anyone have any interest in this? I've still not played a Musou game...this isn't the one I decide to check out, right?

133 tracks from Wind Waker have been added to the service (now hurry up and give me my damn HD port on Switch already, Nintendo...) As an aside, totally forgot I had access to this now that I've resubscribed to NSO, so I've just downloaded the app...any particular soundtracks people would recommend checking out? Bonus points if it's chill enough to have on in the background while I work

Sony will be contributing $5 million towards relief for the Southern California wildfires: I know it's not *strictly* pertaining to PlayStation, but still, feels like it's worth sharing just because it's feel-good in what is very much a feels-awful situation for many.

Bit of a round-up of everything Nate shared today (predictions and things he's heard)...including a couple of new things we've yet to talk about in this thread, such as a potential Direct for the original Switch in Feb? Round-up shamelessly stolen from Famiboards: Posting the part about the potential Direct for the original Switch more to ask how everyone thinks that'll be received by everyone waiting on Switch 2 news – I can't imagine it'll be a universally well-received Direct to see announced, right?

Completely agree – Tropical Freeze was ported, when, back in 2018 right? It's wild that they've waited this long to bring it over. And yeah, definitely limited excitement, but what a way to almost ensure no-one is paying him much mind on his big day This was actually my first DKC game that I played, but I never saw it all the way through and rolled (heh) credits on it – one of those rare Nintendo first-party titles to actually make it's way into my life before getting more into gaming, pretty sure it was my little brother who pushed for it so hard (interestingly he also pushed for the Mario Galaxy games, which he never got, and Sonic & SEGA All-Stars Racing...man, my brother had great taste when he was, what, 4?!). I think a good while back I played it again on Wii and, yeah, I absolutely hated the Wiimote waggle then too, and while I was aware of the 3DS version, neither seemed like a complete edition – ya wanna waggle, or ya wanna squint? Actually, I swear I wrote something in one of the gaming diary threads or somewhere about my time revisiting it. Hell, I think I might've even scored it, back when I was doing that – was it a 6.5? A 7.0? Can't remember, but it felt harsh, down to the waggle and the stupid mine cart levels....let me see if I can find it! UPDATE: I found it! From the 2018 Gaming Diary thread, very relevant to what you were saying Helmsly; Totally stand by my criticisms, but holy balls, 6.5/10 is harsh! I mean reading through the rest of the post my scores were all over the place...Pokémon Ranger: Shadows of Almia only an 8.0? SoulSilver a 7.7?! What is this nonsense?!?! 2018 Me, my guy, what were you thinking?! I mean, Pokémon Ranger at a 7.5, Final Fantasy VII at a 9.3, Pokémon White at a 9.5...I'd probably tweak some of those scores a bit but they're at least within the ballpark of what I would score them now. But what were these other scores all about?! Man, I'm going to need to revisit some of these games now, aren't I..?

Tom Phillips of Eurogamer also backing this up: Well, if nothing else, the potential reveal for a look at the Switch 2 is about as exciting as seeing those "in the know" very publicly get egg on their face, so there's that at least. Poor DK if we do get news of it this Thursday, though. He's waited all this time to Re-Re-Return just for this?

Meanwhile, over in the US, Alarmo will be available (seemingly in limited stocks) in select retailers come March, no NSO membership required:

I know it's hypotheticals and you're not necessarily saying that you think this will be the case - and I agree that the timeline actually seems somewhat reasonable - but I think the main reason we can expect things to be different this time around and just a bit more condensed - other than the potential for the console to be much more, but ultimately more of the same - is simply because of the time of the financial year these events will be happening this time around vs in 2016/2017 for the Switch. There kind of had to be a gap of nearly 3 months for the Switch from it's unveiling in October 2016 to the Presentation in January 2017 simply because of the Christmas period, as even with the Wii U dead and buried at that point, the 3DS was going strong and Q4 is packed in terms of major releases (it was for them, too, what with Pokémon Sun and Moon that year), whereas that's not the case here. In fact, I'd argue a gap of three months which would take them into April and just past the FY cut-off would be plain weird, and releasing potentially a month after in June when in the first week of May they gave their end-of-year finances come out, when they could get bombarded by questions would be...odd, to say the least. Tears of the Kingdom released 12th May 2023, and Furukawa "announced" the Switch 2 on 7th May 2024. Just coming off Golden Week, and releasing it virtually a year later after it was "announced" on Friday 9th May 2025 just kind of fits right in my head. Guess we'll need to wait and see. Oh, and unrelated to that but related to the initial reveal video and just the timing of things – it's worth noting that the January Presentation was announced on October 26th, within a week of the Switch unveiling video dropping – so if they're playing by the same rules, we're probably getting an announcement of the Presentation by the end of next week, if it's not rounding off the video itself as a "More coming in our Presentation [ON THIS DATE]". ...they're totally going to be cute about it and air the Presentation in the first week of March to commemorate the Switch's 8th anniversary aren't they?

I think what's also worth mentioning alongside this is that press around the world got hands-on time with the consoles the day of/following the presentation too (depending on time zones) – it was a proper one-two punch and I'm going to argue that having the Presentation and worldwide hands-on back-to-back was the strongest part of the Switch marketing campaign (yes, beyond the initial reveal), and is something I think they'll be keen to replicate this time around. There was also the Super Bowl ad which was a huge statement of intent I feel: Crazy that this was also when they turned up with Super Mario Run, right? Miyamoto played the Mario theme with The Roots iirc. Oh and of course the obvious highlight was this beaut: I won't lie, the Switch being the first console marketing campaign I followed along with has fully ingrained it in my bloodstream. I've watched the January Presentation more than I'd like to admit, even since getting a Switch myself. Yeah, I fully agree. I think they'll condense the Switch 2 marketing campaign down to a 3-4 month science, I remember the Switch campaign being a massive success and a surprise to pretty much everyone with just how short it actually was, and hell, I don't think PlayStation or Xbox learned enough from it with how they decided to handle their respective PS5 and Series X|S marketing campaigns in the end. I mean rather than comparing it to a Direct announcement, I think the tweet they dropped to announce that the NX "preview" trailer was coming is probably a more suitable point of comparison. They dropped that announcement in the middle of the night over here, the monsters. Just 13½ hours ahead of the trailer dropping.

I mean, of course you're right hell, they've probably forgotten all about Legendary Z-A and will pull out ports of Gen I (again) on a Switch knowing what they're like, with no sign of any other gens being celebrated Believe it or not – the 8 year (what the hell?!) anniversary of the Switch's January presentation is today! It aired at silly o'clock over here of course (04:00 was it?). Crazy how quickly time has gone... But yeah, I'm inclined to agree. I'm personally feeling April or May myself at this point, I just can't see it being in June as even without an E3 I think everyone's Not-E3 plans would end up being dwarfed by the Switch 2 launching. I think April would be super interesting just because it means they'd be kicking off a new financial quarter with a next generation console launch, which doesn't really happen. Oh, and because that means it'd be closer, of course

Kind of buried amongst all of this is both Nate and VGC speculating that this will release in May or June; Nate saying that he thinks there will be a software showcase in late Feb or early March. The existence of a Pokémon Day presentation for 27th Feb was leaked a few days ago (I mean, no surprise there), so I wonder how Legends Z-A might factor into all of this? Assuming it's cross-gen I guess Pokémon can show it on their own terms and just talk about it being a Switch title just for Nintendo to confirm a potential next-gen performance bump on Switch 2, but it'd be odd for them to have a presentation so close to the potential Switch 2 presentation either way. Unless the Pokémon Day presentation doesn't feature Legends Z-A at all... UPDATE: Tom Warren also jumping in on this~ When it rains...

Andy Robinson of VGC backing Nate up:

Damn you @Hero-of-Time and my want to write down my thoughts first

Nate is saying that we will see the Switch 2 revealed this Thursday in a dedicated video: Sounds almost exactly in line with the original Switch hardware reveal, then, though I imagine like he says some new software will feature but not directly (such as on a screen/TV/monitor). I mean, that's how we got our first look at Odyssey, and some major third-party commitments could be on display. I'll be honest, I find this a bit...weird. I thought it was really effective for the Switch to have that initial reveal trailer, show a few games, but above all else get the messaging of the Switch across like they did in that October 2016 video. But if the Switch 2 is mostly more of the same, but just more powerful? I don't think there's the same need for a video which focuses on hardware so prominently, even if there are a few gimmicks they might have up their sleeves still. Either way, if this happens, I don't think they wait 3 months before the blowout like they did before (October 2016 > Jan 2017), and wouldn't be surprised if they set a date at the end of the vid itself – "presentation coming XX.XX.25". Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if they announced the hardware release date, because I feel like this would be a go-ahead for third parties to start talking about their own plans, and so I don't think you can leave (or need) too much lead time. They otherwise run the risk of their software launch line-up getting leaked which I think it's very apparent they're much more focused on keeping locked up tight.

New trailer coming next Wednesday at 04:00 GMT: Wonder if we'll see a release window/date?

The NSO member timed exclusivity period for Alarmo has been extended from mid-Jan to early March, after which it will remain exclusive to the My Nintendo Store here in the UK:

You think there'll be a £10+ bump to what I assume you mean to be every AAA third-party game? Considering just how few third-party and first-party titles are £60 on Switch to begin with, I'd be shocked if that were to happen, especially seeing as pretty much anything over £60 on the eShop right now is some sort of bundle or "deluxe" edition. With how late on with the Switch this £59.99 price standard was introduced while I think we'll see more games match that, I struggle to see everyone making the jump to £69.99 on par with prices for the biggest AAA games on PlayStation, Xbox, etc.

I think so, I think we'll see them stick much harder to the £49.99/£59.99 lines and more titles will be the latter than has been the case on the Switch. This year I can imagine that being the case for Metroid Prime 4, Pokémon Legends Z-A (perhaps even just factoring in the extra year it feels like this game has had to cook, because it's not like it's kicking off a new gen of Pokémon for them), and then potential titles like a new 3D Mario, a new Mario Kart, and whatever else they're positioning as being a tentpole release. I think the RRP for Tears of the Kingdom (and maybe some other games?) has been £59.99, but very few of us have found ourselves paying that amount due to ordering from a third-party or thanks to things like the digital voucher programme or the points system. For as high as Nintendo games stay after launch, you kind of need to go out of your way to pay full price for them, I feel, at least at the moment. Similar to this gen, speaking I guess about the Switch and my time with the PS5, I think it would really vary from game to game for me, and how interested I am in the game. Unless they somehow manage to drop the ball with the launch line-up this will be the first time I look to enter a new generation with Nintendo on Day 1, and they've earned that for me with the great experiences I've had on the Switch - while I've probably played fewer games on the Switch than many here (didn't get it until 2019 and it's only my secondary console at the best of times) it's rare that there's a question of quality, and I think they've got a higher hit rate than most other developers out there. I'd likely allow myself to splurge at launch, even on games I'm not foaming at the mouth for, and so I think I'd be paying full price for a few titles then – but after? Really depends on the title, my confidence in it matching up to what they show, and I guess my familiarity with the IP. I just think with the potential increase in price, the sales of games like Zelda or Mario or Pokémon aren't up for grabs - they'll sell regardless - but rather, smaller, more experimental, or niche IP could suffer, just because people aren't as familiar with them and will be less likely to throw their cash at something they can't be confident about enjoying. I'm thinking, for example, if they were to come out at some point with a new Advance Wars given that they've reintroduced the IP – I'm not sure if be dropping £60 on that, and the fact that their prices very rarely go down means I probably wouldn't ever get around to checking it out unless it had an impossible-to-avoid word of mouth which had it as a shoe-in for being a GOTY contender. It's for that reason that I don't think they'll take a complete blanket approach still with how they price their games, and I think they're actually pretty good with how they price their games – only exception, arguably, would be the various Wii and Wii U HD remasters, but for people new to them like me, I've not really had a problem with those prices, personally. Not to mention, with Nintendo, there are some games they release of such high quality that I'd gladly pay much more for them...but don't go telling them that Great questions to ask, H-o-T; it's not really something I'd given much thought to, even with the Switch 2 being the only thing on everyone's mind these days Along similar lines, I wonder how much third-party titles are going to go for, especially those of critical claim getting re-releases? Would Switch 2 versions of Baldur's Gate III, Elden Ring, Final Fantasy VII Remake/Rebirth be at that top band of pricing alongside Nintendo's best? Or because they're older games on sale elsewhere are they going to be priced more in line with what you'd expect to see, i.e. Elden Ring – Definitive Edition for £49.99 rather than £59.99(+)? EDIT: considering this would probably include Shadow of the Erdtree, maybe Elden Ring at that price was a bad example, it kind of begs to be £59.99 for how much game you'd be getting.

Added to the first post @BowserBasher, glad to have you aboard Nice and diverse pledge, too! Weirdly I've played only one of those games and it was a few hours of Nightfire on PS2, feel like it's one my dad picked up from a charity shop or pre-owned from GAME or Gamestation along with some others. Can't remember much about it if I'm being totally honest so I'm particularly looking forward to hearing your thoughts if/when you get around to it!

I mean, some nods are definitely less subtle than others wasn't there a blurry poster or something with Pikachu on Ash's shoulder in SM? Not sure if it was USUM too though, as I didn't get around to those. And well, at least five times with the capped Ash's Pikachu events I mentioned too, then (and that's if we bundle them all together to count as one thing) How Pokémon is managed in Smash is so interesting for this reason, just with how certain Pokémon are (or used to be) clearly based on how they were presented in the anime, like @Glen-i mentions; had no idea about that Misty trophy in Melee (having never played it myself), so that's a really cool tidbit. I'm pretty sure one of the Events in Brawl was a nod to Lucario and the Mystery of Mew as well, the one where you play as Lucario on the Spear Pillar stage.

It depends on how we're defining "acknowledging the anime" (Ash in particular? The films? Just the animated series? Actual visual representation of something/someone in the anime being seeing in a game? Just a mention?), but at a surface level, this statement just isn't true; the games acknowledge or reference the anime countless times in many different ways throughout the series. Off the top of my head: Red's Pikachu in HGSS had its moveset changed to be in line with Ash's compared with its original GSC moveset; there's an Ace Trainer called Rebecca just off Victory Road in Sinnoh, who is clearly based on/named after Rebecca from Destiny Deoxys, Metagross in tow; similarly, there are trainers named after and with the Pokémon of Butler and Diane from Jirachi: The Wish Maker are in DPPt; if we're counting event Pokémon like Ash's Greninja, there are the Pikachu-coloured and Spiky-eared Pichu from Arceus and the Jewel of Life in HGSS, as well as Zarude with its scarf from Secrets of the Jungle in SwSh, not to mention the various Pikachus we got with Ash's caps for the 20th anniversary in SM; the dialogue in ORAS's Delta Episode where Steven refers to Alain and his Mega Charizard X from the Mega Evolution specials...you get the gist, and there are what feels like countless more that I'm surely missing (these are the ones I remember from what grew up with). Also...the entire existence of Pokémon Yellow, with the myriad of changes and various characters brought in not featured in RGB to bring it more in line with the anime? But, I do agree that it's pretty strange that we never had more games actually based on/featuring Ash and his various companions. I have to imagine it's just down to how Game Freak ended up needing to start up a new gen every few years with the pressures they've always been under to consistently deliver, and I think also tying into this is how it feels like they don't milk the IP with as many spinoffs as they used to, where you'd imagine they might have leaned on the anime more.

Great to see so many joining in and making their own pledges! Added to the wall of pledges, glad to have you aboard Cube - nice diverse and interesting line-up you've got there! Looking forward to reading your thoughts on them The OUYA? I don't know how you managed to get that from his pledge list though...

Absolutely not! That would be bordering on sacrilege! ...yeah that's no problem, it's done Haven't heard of some of those new additions before - so looking forward to hearing your thoughts on them!