Category: Nintendo

(Geru)Do better.

Soapbox features enable our individual writers and contributors to voice their opinions on hot topics and random stuff they’ve been chewing over. Today, Jim pleads the case for just a little more Ganondorf action…

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The reveal of Tears of the Kingdom‘s Ganondorf has to be one of my favourite all-time moments as a Zelda fan. We all collectively lost our minds over a 0.2-second clip of him shouting and then lost them in a different way altogether when we saw the accompanying key art minutes later — nothing forgives decades of tyranny and bloodshed quite like some killer pecs, after all. I was chuffed to have the gorgeous Gerudo back in my mainline Zelda games and thoroughly grinned throughout Link’s final battle with him.

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It’s the only returning game in the top ten.

It’s time to check out the latest physical charts from Japan, and this time, there are a whole bunch of new releases making up the top ten (well, technically just four split across various platforms, but you get it). Nevertheless, Pikmin 4 is still holding its own at number 5, selling a further 18,307 copies, pushing it ever closer to that 1 million unit milestone.

Otherwise, Koei Tecmo’s Fate/Samurai Remnant comes in at number 1 on the Switch with 34,728 units sold, while its PS5 and PS4 siblings enter the top ten at numbers 3 and 9 respectively. We’ve also got Infinity Strash: Dragon Quest The Adventure of Dai at number 2, while the Switch version of EA Sports FC 24 managed to snatch position number 6, coming in ahead of the PS5 and PS4 variants.

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NES and Game Boy titles included.

A retro collection containing the original NES title A Boy and His Blob: Trouble on Blobolonia and its Game Boy sequel, The Rescue of Princess Blobette, is launching on the Nintendo Switch eShop on October 17th, 2023.

While maintaining the essence of the original games, the new collection will introduce modern quality-of-life enhancements, including filters to change the display’s appearance, a music player, and save states (very much like Nintendo’s own Switch Online collection, then). Each game will also contain the US and Japanese releases.

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Wonder and Superstars arrive later this month.

Mario and Sonic both have new side-scrolling games arriving in the same week later this month and it has been generating some discussion online.

If you’ve been wondering how the developers of Super Mario Bros. Wonder feel about this, according to the game’s producer Takashi Tezuka, the Nintendo team doesn’t mind and is generally looking forward to the return of “2D side-scroller action games”. He did admit though that it was an “interesting coincidence”.

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Bank’s online service may end “at some point in the future”.

Yesterday, Nintendo announced it would be ending “online play and other functionality” for the 3DS and Wii U in “early April” next year.

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The online service is ending.

In case you missed it, Bandai Namco’s battle royale PAC-MAN 99 will be ending its online service later this week on 8th October.

“The online service for Nintendo Switch Online subscriber-only software “PAC-MAN 99″ will end on Sunday, October 8, 2023. You can continue to enjoy the offline mode of paid additional content even after the online service ends.”

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“The natural evolution of Switch Player and Ninty Fresh”.

Ninty Media — formerly known as Switch Player — has announced a crowdfunding campaign for a brand new premium print publication, called ‘Ninsight’.

Both of the publication’s magazines – Switch Player and Ninty Fresh — ceased publication earlier this year, but hope wasn’t lost as they teased their eventual return in a more premium fashion, which is exactly what this new book is.

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The jump hasn’t been smooth.

The Dragon Quest series is no stranger to spin-off titles, but few are as confusing as Infinity Strash: Dragon Quest The Adventure of Dai. This action RPG is based on an anime adaptation of a manga based on the world of Dragon Quest, but it is never clear who the game is designed to appeal to. The few things it does well are buried under an avalanche of unengaging cutscenes that go on too long and simply don’t do the story they’re telling justice.

That isn’t to say that there aren’t some glimmers of hope hidden in this game’s runtime. The combat, for example, is competently designed if unimaginative in its implementation; characters have a basic attack, plus a selection of powers that they can unleash to deal more damage or to heal their allies. It is a system that has been used countless times before because it works well, letting you feel powerful as you wade through waves of enemies on the battlefield.

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Sherlock Ho-Oholmes.

It’s been over seven years since we got our first helping of the wise-cracking, coffee-addicted Detective Pikachu on 3DS and, in the time since, the gruff private investigator has gone on to star in his very own big-screen adaptation voiced by the one and only Ryan Reynolds. Well, excuse us, Mr Hollywood!

The first Detective Pikachu introduced us to a consistently amusing take on the classic Pikachu character alongside his likeable human pal Tim Goodman, wherein the pair used their investigative skills to unravel a mystery surrounding a drug which was causing Pokémon to fly into violent rages. There was also an overarching plot — one that forms the basis of the hit movie — which saw the sleuths attempting to find Tim’s missing dad, Harry Goodman.

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He roams around, around, around.

First announced in the Japanese version of the September 2023 Nintendo Direct, Spike Chunsoft has confirmed that Shiren the Wanderer: The Mystery Dungeon of Serpentcoil Island is coming to the West, with a physical release set for 27th February 2024.

The trailer above touches on the history of this roguelike Mystery Dungeon side series, which began in 1995 with Mystery Dungeon 2. Shiren the Warrior. As you’d expect, it appears that STWTMGOSI (yep, everyone’s going to be calling it that) will deliver the series’ traditional dungeon-crawling while introducing some new quality-of-life features such as “two types of live search displays that can be used for different purposes or the ability to track your own steps on the mini-map.”

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