Hero-of-Time

Yeah, the boxes with Mario on the inside are awesome.

Yeah, these guys are probably the best bet. They also may introduce some kind of screening process like they've done in the past for limited items in order to stop scalpers.

Yeah, that's just absolutely ridiculous and I have zero sympathy for the situation they've got themselves into. Shawn Layden warned them about doing this and it was no doubt why he got kicked out the door. Just the other day you also had Shu saying that he wouldn't have gone all in with live service games if he was in charge. Makes you wonder if his opposition to this model was why he was essentially side lined for the last couple of years. The thing that bothers me the most about this push is that they have used studios that are known for single player games. Just leave these developers alone and use ones that are known for multiplayer games.

I don't think there's a particular title I'm really looking forward to out of their main IP. The ones I enjoyed the most from Nintendo have now changed to the point where I wouldn't buy I console just for them. I think a big draw will be the 3rd party games but having been a PS owner all these years, I've probably either played them already or they are in my PS4 backlog. I certainly wouldn't mind but I can't see me splashing a potential £400 on remakes of games I love but have played to death. Honestly, I think it's just that I'm getting old. New consoles and game announcements just don't excite me like they used to. I kinda feel like I've been gaming long enough to have seen it all before.

Probably £379-£400. Unless there's some stellar 1st party software ready for launch, I can't see me being that eager to jump in on day 1. I'm not a huge Metroid guy and so Prime 4 does nothing for me. Outside of MH, gone are the days of me playing online multiplayer games and so Mario Kart doesn't have a lasting appeal. If they do launch with a new 3D Mario game I imagine they will continue with the open world stuff like in Bowser's Fury, which I wasn't a fan of. Finally, any hopes of a traditional Zelda game are now long gone.

I was. I always watch anime in Japanese. Same when I play most JRPGs.

Probably Ring Fit. Looks like the Mario movie version of DK is gonna be the norm now.

All of the design leaks were real.

A remastered version of this.

My journey through Grandia continues. Apparently I'm now on what would have been disc 2. I ran into a spot of trouble with this boss. The thing was doing stupid damage to both Justin and Feena. Also, Justin's attacks were pretty pitiful against it. I decided to reload my save and do some levelling up. I switched the automated battle system from doing regular attacks to doing magical attacks. I think I had neglected this for too long and as such some of my stats weren't the best. I also changed the weapon on Justin to one that was just pure raw damage. After doing all of this I ended up annihilating the boss. I've lost yet another party member but gained another two in Rapp and Milda. This is the only aspect of the game that I'm not a fan of. I'm not too keen on when JPRGs chop and change party members. I prefer to have my main party and leave it at that. I don't mind having some in reserve but having them there and then having them disappear from the game/story doesn't sit right with me. Plus, I'm not huge on both Rapp or Milda. I took on one of the bonus dungeons yesterday evening. You get a shockingly low amount of exp for fighting battles in there, especially for how much of a fight the enemies put up. I decided it was probably best to just avoid what battles I could and run my way through the dungeon and fight the boss. This worked out pretty well. It was still a trek to get to him but at least I had plenty of SP/MP left for the actual battle. I love that between all the battles and hectic dungeon crawling the game allows for quiet moments between the characters. The conversations on the boat between Feena and Justin were lovely and the visuals once again helped enhance these scenes. I also continued to make progress with Neo Geo Pocket Selection Vol.1. There's not a lot to say about this that I didn't say back when I played the original game. It's more of the same really, which isn't a bad thing. It's just a standard run and gun game that allows for multiple path choices and has 2 characters to play as. It was fine. Another fighting game is in this collection. This one probably sits in the middle of the two that I have previous played. Once again, I aimed at beating the game with each of the characters and unlocking any secret ones. The unlocking mechanism is pretty bad in this though. It's all completely random. When playing trough the story mode you will get challenged by a fighter and if you're lucky it will be one of the ones you need. I didn't have an issue with this until it came to unlocking the final one I needed. The dude just wouldn't show up. I actually finished this on Tuesday evening but it took another evening of essentially grinding play throughs in order for him to finally show up. Here they are. I was pretty disappointed with them. They are essentially just colour swaps for some of the main fighters. Still, it was a decent enough game and yet another title from the collection that is off the list. Character Endings

Seems to be an average port. The game is somehow worse than the Wii version. Summary from Era. Given who they hired to work on this, it actually isn't that surprising.

I hope so. I wanna see the meltdowns.

Decent line up, especially for those who've yet to play God of War or Like a Dragon Gaiden. Interested to see whether or not the Indiana Jones game has trophy support.

Nah. It slipped me by. I started it years ago on the Vita but never stuck with it. I then bought it last year for the PS1 but the HD collection got released soon after I purchased it. There are lots of JRPGs I've not played yet. The Breath of Fire games, Shadow Hearts and certain entries in the Shining Force series are ones that come to mind. I only played my first Star Ocean and Ys games last year.

Nope.

Nothing for me on this list at all, which is no surprise when it comes to 3rd party games on Nintendo consoles. Lots for Nintendo only owners though. It would be crazy if Elden Ring didn't get a port. I can see that doing silly numbers.

Like clockwork.

Put some more time into Grandia. Man, I love some of the scenes in this game. It's a real looker and takes me back to simpler and happier times in my life. I've picked up a fourth party member in Gadwin and he's quite the powerhouse. Dude can take a beating and dish out some major damage. Also, his running animation is absolutely hilarious. I've not needed to do any grinding in a while and so I've progressed the story some more. Story Spoilers

Or a Saturn. Worked well for Sega.

Standard practice for all these lot. Eurogamer used to do it all the time. Nobody wants to go first.

From Nate, who is usually pretty decent with info.

Let's say they don't and they do start charging £60+ for each of their games. Would you still be willing to cough up the money for day 1 releases?

Aye. That's the fella.

Probably a factor. A lot of their game sales are front loaded and then fall off a cliff.