Dcubed

Agreed. The smaller maps were actually a benefit to Kingdom Battle's gameplay; bigger isn't always better. That being said, I would be willing to give Davide Soliani and the team at Ubisoft Milan the benefit of the doubt here. They certainly proved themselves with Kingdom Battle, and I'd trust them to make a good game. I just don't think that they've changed enough with the core gameplay for me to want to jump in immediately though, especially when I've got so many other games to play (including Bayonetta 3 next week!!!). Also... Nintendo... Please headhunt Davide Soliani and Ubisoft Milan and set them up as a first Party Nintendo studio. Don't let them get dragged down and rot at Ubisoft, they're too good for that company.

I liked the first game, but I've definitely had my fill of it. I'm not gagging for more of the same. I don't think this game really does enough new to get me truly excited; certainly not enough to jump in at full price (and especially considering the state of modern Ubisoft in general; I do not want to support that company).

Surprisingly enough, it actually seems to be a general downgrade in terms of visuals/tech compared to the first game (same resolution but worse graphical quality and lower framerate); but the environmental scope is bigger.

If it is indeed the case where Hellena Taylor asked for residuals? I can totally understand why Platinum turned her down. Almost nobody actually earns residuals within the VG industry, and I'm talking about the developers themselves; forget VA! Yes, VAs should earn residuals in an ideal world, but so should the developers themselves (much moreso in fact). And if even the developers aren't getting any? There is no way that they're gonna be willing to give them to VAs. And that's on top of what appears to be a pretty outrageous flat payment as well that is well above the norm for the industry? Yeah, I can totally understand the decision to go with someone else.

That's really unfortunate... but I'd also be very surprised if Jennifer Hale was earning less than that; considering that she's much better known and generally commands a higher profile within the VA industry. So I can't imagine that money was the sole deciding factor here (though it's very well known that non-celebrity VAs get paid absolutely shit money for non-Japanese language video game and anime voice work in general). The whole situation really sucks all around though. Nobody wins here.

Nope. OOE actually had the longest dev cycle of any of the Igavania games. I suspect that the main reason for this choice was that Iga's team were probably getting a bit burnt out on the Metroidvania format (can't blame them after doing 6 of them beforehand!) and that they wanted to do something different with a more traditional Stage Clear style Castlevania game. Makes sense when you consider that they also did the Rondo of Blood remake the year prior and ended up following up OOE with Castlevania The Adventure Rebirth (A brand new, traditional Stage Clear Castlevania title... and the very last of its kind!). But you're right overall. I don't think that the mixture of the two styles works very well in OOE. The individual stages all have very simplistic level design (with a LOT of copy/pasted elements), and the core gameplay just doesn't offer the depth needed to make it all work; meanwhile, the Metroidvania portion suffers from having a reletively simplistic and small castle layout. OOE is still good mind you (and the bosses in particular are great!), but it's definitely my least favourite DS Castlevania title (though I'd still rate it above Harmony of Dissonance personally).

HIGHLIGHTS!!!!! Great stuff as always

Hey hey hey High Rollers! For those of you with a couple dozen grand lying around and burning a hole in your pocket, we have an unreleased NES game... for the Power Glove... FROM RARE!!! https://www.ebay.com/itm/134272604161?ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT&fromMakeTrack=true

Wow. Premium subscribers are getting robbed. Literally the worst value in gaming.

That's where the concern comes from. Not from the use of Ed Sheeran himself, but from the use of real-life cameos and celebrity endorsement in an obstenably fantasy game. It's all just so very tacky. Pokemon doesn't need this stuff to sell the mainline games, it just feels oh so very skeevy.

Tacky AF. Very disappointing to see them stoop this low.

Link looks so happy to be there. Thank Hylia they wiped that smile off his face

You wish Pilotwings 64 ran at 30FPS! It spent most of its time at around 15-20 FPS This is correct. Pilotwings 64 originally had an uncapped framerate that could run between 0-60FPS; meaning that logic is not tied to framerate. As such, the game just automatically runs at its highest target framerate when run under emulation. Perfect Dark and Goldeneye are the same BTW, so they will also be running at 60FPS when they hit Switch eventually.

Yeah. Pokémon Black/White and White 2/White 2 was the series peak. A soft reboot of the series that was brave enough to ditch the entire cast of previous Pokémon (until post-game), with a brand new set of 151 mons, an interesting new story driven focus that moved beyond the usual Team Evil & Pokémon Gym concept (a story that even dared to challenge the very concept of mainline Pokémon games themselves, essentially being cockfighting simulators!), excellent level design and pacing; a huge, exciting and colourful handcrafted world to explore, masses of post-game content and excellent battle mechanics. Gen 5 really had it all. Gen 6 (X/Y) attempted to recapture some of what made Gen 5 so incredibly good, but fell flat on its face while doing so. And the shift to 3D meant that much had to be sacrificed in terms of level design and such… Still, it had the best rendition of the series’ signature battle system; especially with the introduction of Mega Pokémon, as a much needed rebalancing that made previously useless Pokémon now competitively viable! If you love the battle system of Pokémon? This is the game for you. Gen 7 (Sun/Moon) went way too far with the story, with so many incessant cutscenes that just wouldn’t stop, you’d think that Hideo Kojima directed it! And the amount of linearity and handholding was utterly suffocating.. and on top of that? The new Z-Move gimmick broke the careful balance achieved during Gen 6. Thoroughly disappointing. Gen 8 (Sword/Shield) actually took things back to more of a Gen 4 kind of structure, and it was all the better for it. Some excellent new Pokémon designs, interesting gyms and cool set pieces; with some actual non- linear exploration!! A real breath of fresh air after Gen 6 and (especially!) Gen 7. Unfortunately, the game was blatantly unfinished, with a massive chunk of Pokémon cut, and huge portions of planned content cut (including Mega Evolutions, and most traditional handcrafted Route/cave/dungeon environments). Game Freak simply stretched themselves too thin during this time period, and it really really shows in the final product. It’s a real shame, because conceptually it’s a real return to form for the series; but just not in the state it was released in. And unfortunately, it seems that Game Freak have given up on the idea of making a traditional handcrafted game in HD… as they’ve switched to the Open World format with Legends Arceus and Scarlet/Violet… Damn shame. Sadly, it seems that Pokémon isn’t really for me anymore; but hopefully the battle mechanics will at least return to something closer to the heights of Gen 6 this time around.

Well that was quicker than expected

Portrait of Ruin is great!

That's a great trailer; love that they played into the smooth porn jazz motif of the Birdman music

Jack Black is gonna totally carry this movie. His Bowser is perfect. It's Jim Carrey in Sonic all over again!

Well, Jack Black as Bowser is completely fucking perfect; as expected. But holy shit! Chris Pratt as Mario is utterly fucking awful! Somehow, Kamek sounds even worse though, fuck me! Jesus Christ!

Check the bottom left corner...

Trading Pokemon not available at launch? Oh dear... This game's coming in hot...

Probably from Americans settling for a PAL copy and getting by with Freeloader/whatever other solution they use. Still, it's not the rarest GCN game. That honour goes to the US version of Cubivore; which regularily goes for around £350-450 online (and it's even a case of genuine rarity, as it had an extremely low print run. It's not even in particularily high demand outside of anyone other than collectors). Outside of a few particular high ticket games though (Skies of Arcadia, Twilight Princess Gamecube, GB Player disc, FE: POR, the Mario Parties etc), I don't think the GCN market is that expensive really. Most of the major titles can be had for between £10-35 pretty easily.

Surely this can't be right... surely FE: POR is worth way more... [checks eBay]... HOLY SHIT!! TBF, FE: Path of Radiance PAL is about on par with this.