With Paper Jam hot off the presses, will it sell copies, or is the series out of ink?
Today the Crew kicks off Mario RPG week by reviewing the latest installment: Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
This game just sounds like all kinds of creepy.
Are you in trouble? Have a Poke-sized problem in need of solving? Look no further than Detective Pikachu! Could this idea really work?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
I think I got a little axe-happy…
Now that Smash Bros. for 3DS and Wii U has been out for a year, we’re doing the most natural thing: Compiling a list of characters for the next Smash Bros. Game! Who makes your cut?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
That’s some serious wind…
Ryan has been playing Fire Emblem: Fates for 3DS. Was his choice of fate wise, or foolish?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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*Enemy pops in right next to you* O hai thar.
The crew rides into battle once more! Is the new Legend of Zelda: Hyrule Warriors Legends worth you hard-earned Rupees?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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That dance IS really cute.
Nintendo’s given fans a free game to use their amiibos in… but is it worth your time? Tune in today to find out!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Scott got it and now he’s addicted, too!
With the launch of My Nintendo, we got two games to choose from as downloadable platinum points rewards. The first is the exclusive My Nintendo Picross: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess! Is it worth cashing your rewards points in?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Not QUITE as novel these days, but still very solid.
Nintendo brought back an old DS Classic as a My Nintendo reward! Is this worth your 1,000 platinum coins?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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Poor Simeon. I don’t think Kickstarter issues refunds in instances like these…
It’s finally here… Inafune’s pet project, Mega Man’s spiritual successor: Mighty No. 9. How is the game? Take it from a Mega Man expert!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
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The clever ways that people name their sequels will never cease to amaze me.
The sequel we’ve been waiting for is here! What does Ryan think of BoxBoxBoy?
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
BoxBoxBoy! is the sequel to the hit downloadable puzzle game BoxBoy! for the 3DS that expands on the original, quite literally, as this time around you use two sets of boxes instead of one. While no prior experience with the original is needed, it really helps as the mechanics you learn over the course of an entire game you learn in a few levels. You’ll still be hopping on and throwing boxes, along with hooking onto ledges and snaking your way through narrow paths, and it’s all still a lot of fun.
The only new idea is creating two sets of boxes, but that’s okay as it completely changes the way you have to solve the puzzles and sometimes significantly ramps up the difficulty. There’s still plenty of switches, spikes, and lazers to deal with and it definitely had me stumped for a while on more than one occasion. There are usually a few levels in a row where you use the same mechanic in increasingly difficult puzzles, only to ditch it for a long while and come back to it when you’ve forgotten about it. Absolutely fantastic level design and it made feel dumb for not realizing the solution much soon than I had. There are bonus levels in which you replay chunks of levels you previously completed except this time with either the ninja or the bunny costume from the first game, but you have a lot less boxes at your disposal.
Two sets of boxes, twice the challenge.
The collectible crowns are back once again. If you’re not familiar, think hidden coins from Mario, except you have a limit of boxes you can create until it disappears. Being the OCD gamer I am, I had to get all of them, and a few were extremely difficult. It adds a lot to the way you approach levels and to the overall replay-ability.
The more crowns you get, the more coins you get at the end of every level, which can be spent in the games shop. There you are able to purchase new costumes, short a quirky comics, and music from the game. All of the costumes you unlock from the original BoxBoy! transfer over too, which is a neat little addition.
There’s quite a lot of content for the price and is a great buy for the puzzle and platformer fan alike. While I recommend playing the original game first, this is a sequel that lives up to the original and shouldn’t be missed.
Check out our video review of BoxBoxBoy! or the original BoxBoy!
Seriously, though, Countershade’s stage is absolute genius.
A while back Simeon reviewed Mighty No. 9 and gave it a 6. Now he’s had a change of heart!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Note From the Author: The game discussed in this article, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney – Duel Destinies, has been rated M for Mature (ages 17+) by the ESRB for the following: violence, blood, suggestive themes, and language. That said, this article focuses only on the game’s mechanics and should be appropriate for all audiences. Please use care and caution when deciding what games are right for you and your family.
I typically don’t play story-heavy games during the school year: they take a long time to beat and all of that pesky suspense and intrigue makes them hard to pull myself away from. So when summer rolled around earlier this year, I decided it was high time I got around to playing a game I’ve been meaning to tackle ever since it came out way back in 2013, Ace Attorney: Dual Destinies.
After slogging through other plot-driven games in the past solely out of pride (I beat games, not the other way around), I figured that I—a busy adult with things to do—simply had grown out of those types of games. As such, I went in to Dual Destinies with fairly low expectations.
It didn’t take me long to remember one crucial piece of information: I like the Ace Attorney series…a lot. This game is no different. While not the strongest entry in the franchise (clumsy writing in places, too much hand-holding, and not nearly enough Trucy Wright), Dual Destinies still managed to impress me, especially where I least expected it: the game mechanics.
The Ace Attorney series is no stranger to introducing new gameplay mechanics and gimmicks, but until Dual Destinies, I honestly can’t think of a game in the franchise that took existing elements and trimmed the fat. Overall, the game has the best pacing and flow of the entire series, which is why I think it’s the perfect candidate for a case study on how to streamline gameplay mechanics. Court is now in session!
Dual Destinies managed to impress me, especially where I least expected it: the game mechanics.
Cases in the Ace Attorney franchise are generally split into two distinct parts: investigations and court sessions. For anyone not familiar with the franchise, defense attorneys in the Ace Attorney universe are two parts lawyer and one part private investigator. They question witnesses, search for clues, and sneak evidence out of crime scenes when the cops aren’t looking, all to prove their client’s innocence. This portion of the job is represented in gameplay with what’s known as the investigation phase and plays much like a traditional adventure game in the vein of the Monkey Island series or Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom. These segments of the game are often the longest, and fittingly, most of the trimming the game does is in these portions.
Defense attorneys in the Ace Attorney universe are two parts lawyer and one part private investigator.
Like many adventure games, players in Ace Attorney games must search the environment to find items they can use, in this case evidence to prove their client’s innocence. The examine command brings up a cursor that the player can then use to click on objects in the environment to investigate them. Now, not everything the player sees in an area is going to be evidence (Phoenix’s office plant, Mr. Charlie, for instance), and when clicked these objects, instead of advancing the plot, will just trigger some flavor text wherein the protagonist and his plucky sidekick humorously palaver on about the object in question (#TeamStepLadder).
Now, in games prior to Dual Destinies, every location was searchable, even if there wasn’t any evidence there (I’m looking at you Wright & CO. Law Offices). This meant players were expected to search every area. Just because a murder occurred in, say, a public park doesn’t mean the player won’t end up searching an abandoned doctors office for clues on the whereabouts of the true killer’s lost shoes.
In games prior to Dual Destinies, every location was searchable, even if there wasn’t any evidence there.
Dual Destinies improves on this feature in several ways. First, the game limits use of the examine command strictly to crime scenes. This means that there’s only ever one searchable location for the player to worry about at a time, unlike previous games that let the player switch between searching multiple areas, each of which could change depending on event flags. More over, the game now has the courtesy to inform players when they’ve found everything they need, which too often wasn’t clear in previous titles. Lastly, Dual Destinies introduced the ever so subtle—but oh-so-useful—addition of having the cursor take the shape of a check mark if the object being highlighted by the player has already been investigated. Considering that many of the conversations triggered when clicking on something could be quite long, even with fast forwarding, this U.I. feature is something longtime fans can appreciate.
And to top it all of, despite the newly imposed restrictions there’s still plenty of that sweet, sweet flavor text.
Locations in the Ace Attorney series are normally static, disconnected, one-screen “rooms” that the player travels between via selection from a menu. It’s about as utilitarian as it gets, and yet Dual Destinies still managed to smooth out the rough edges. See, for whatever reason, previous games in the franchise had a four option limit on the travel menu, meaning the player could only travel to four other locations from any given area. The way the developers got around this—quite frankly arbitrary—limit was to have each area have its own list of destinations. So, for example, if the player wanted to go from the detention center to the crime scene, they may have to travel to back to Wright’s Office, then to the front door of the building the body was found in, and then to the actual crime scene.
Of course, a sleek, afigimatiko-dynamic game like Dual Destinies isn’t about to put the player through all that for something as simple as getting from point A to point B! Enter the magic that is “scrolling”! With this space-aged technique, players now have the uncanny ability to pick any location from anywhere in the game simply by “scrolling” between options! (Restrictions may apply in accordance to plot demands.)
Anyone who’s played an old-school adventure game can tell you that the worst thing that’s guaranteed to happen to the player at some point is getting stuck without any clear directions. This is why many modern games of all genres keep an objectives list or provide a character who the player can ask for advice at any time. Unfortunately, until Dual Destinies the Ace Attorney games fell into the old adventure game trap of not always giving the player clear directions on what to do next. To make matters worse, N.P.C.s had an annoying tendency to just up and disappear until the player triggered the right event flag. This led to the player constantly going back and forth after every event to see which N.P.C.s had returned to their post and who had new dialog options.
Dual Destinies introduced an extra section to the court record (basically the player’s inventory screen) for notes—which in this case is more of a checklist than a place for the player to jot down information. Any time the player isn’t sure what to do next, they can just open the court record, hit the notes tab, and be on their way. Admittedly, Dual Destinies’ plot is structured in such a way that the player rarely needs extra input, especially once you factor in the previously listed enhancements, but the handful of times I did need it, I greatly appreciated the fact that I could just hit a few buttons and continue the game instead of wandering around in circles for ten minutes.
Any time the player isn’t sure what to do next, they can just open the court record, hit the notebook tab, and be on their way.
What I hope to get across is how seemingly small changes eventually add up. Small U.I. improvements can help better communicate information to the player, which leads to less time spent on tasks that slow progression. Moreover, limiting when a player can perform certain actions—like investigating their environment—can keep them from getting side-tracked or lost. In Dual Destinies’ case, the end result is the first Ace Attorney game that didn’t have me at a complete loss for what to do next at any point. As I mentioned in the beginning of this article, it’s not necessarily the best game in the series (my personal favorite is Apollo Justice), but I will say right here and now that it’s the best structured and paced, all because the developers weren’t afraid to make some compromises regarding many of the accepted, long-standing conventions of the series. I’ll miss you, dear glut of humorous flavor text, but I can’t deny the game’s pacing is better off without you.
Glen is a lifelong Nintendo fan and has been an Ace Attorney enthusiast ever since he first played Apollo Justice: Ace Attorney back in 2008. His love of video games has inspired him to pursue a career in computer programming and is currently studying to get a masters in computer science. Despite his name and choice of professions, he is in no way related to Glen Elg.
As someone who has been a Nintendo fan since I was old enough to hold a controller, I have never seen the company attempting to juggle so many different projects at the same time.
With Nintendo dabbling in so many areas, is it only a matter of time until they start dropping the ball?
Let’s take a moment and examine everything that Nintendo has on their plate, so we can determine if they’ve bitten off more than they can chew:
It makes me anxious just thinking about all of the things that Nintendo management must deal with on a regular basis, and each and every one of those projects comes with their own set of challenges: public relations, marketing, quality assurance, customer service, and more.
Wisely, Nintendo is not embarking on all of these endeavors alone. With the help of other established companies like DeNA, VANS, and Universal Studios, Nintendo is only shouldering a partial load for some of these projects. Still…
The load adds up quickly.
How many different ways can Nintendo’s attention be split before their products begin to suffer?
We’ve already begun to see the affects of an unfocused Nintendo, I’m afraid. The publisher was banking on a hit success with the Wii U, but the console performed below expectations, causing Nintendo to focus on attaining cash flow through additional means. The key to this extra revenue? Intellectual Property (or IP). Nintendo has invested in their character for decades, and finally decided that the time to cash in… is now.
Nintendo’s famous stable of characters can now be seen in places previously untouched by the company: mobile games, figurine toys, and more.
Is this a bad thing? No. But does it mean that we will get fewer software releases? Inevitably, it must. You’ve felt it on the Wii U and 3DS for the past couple of years.
Can we fault Nintendo for outsourcing some of these projects, like with DeNA and VANS?
Perhaps.
The risk with partnerships is the very integrity of your brand.
There are more companies trying to turn a profit with Nintendo’s own IP now than ever before, and Nintendo has less control over them.
Remember when 5th Cell was given permission to add Mario characters to their Scribblenauts game? It was called Scribblenauts Unlimited, because you could modify whatever nouns you wanted with any adjectives you would like.
Except for the Mario characters.
Angry sweater? Check. Loose goose? Check. Green Mario? No go.
Nintendo’s IP used to be sacred, but now it’s plastered on tie-dye, Hawaiian VANS apparel with abandon.
Nintendo can make money through video games, theme parks, apparel and frozen yogurt… but they shouldn’t have done it all at once, with plummeting hardware sales.
The NX should have been priority 1, it should have been unveiled at E3, because it should be on store shelves this Holiday.
Scott does his very best unintentional Obama impression.
We’ve played a few pranks on Nintendo Customer Service before, but today we’re branching out to see if the folks at GameStop can give us help finding some gaming-related products!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Let’s talk about the giraffe in the room.
Just when you think the Pokemon Team has ran out of creative ideas – they hit us with Gen 1 Alola forms! Is giraffe Exeggutor the craziest of the bunch? What’s up with Psychic Raichu? Gotta discuss ’em all!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
This video deserves a 7/10.
What is the difference between a 4/10 and a 2/10? Is a TEN actually a perfect game? And for the love of all that is good and holy – why don’t gamers READ the contents of reviews?!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Reformat” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
Kinda left you with the “meh” aftertase of “bleh,” didn’t it?
Simeon is holding down the fort with his reactions on Nintendo’s newest announcements for the 3DS, covering Super Mario Maker, Poochy and Yoshi, Yokai Watch, and a whole lot more!
Shot by Alex Campbell
“Escape the Premises” Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com)
Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
I want to make Nintendo games.
Let’s face it, we’ve all thought that at one point or another. Usually it doesn’t go any further than wishful thinking, though. Sure, some of us might doodle concept art or gameplay ideas in a notebook, a few might even learn to program, but even for those with all of the skills there’s another, more tangible hurdle: the tools. Game development isn’t free and procuring a software development kit (SDK or devkit for short) is often a costly proposition. For those of you not familiar with the game development process, a devkit is a collection of specialized software and hardware used to make and test games. They’re quite expensive: the Wii’s devkit cost around $5000, which at the time was rather cheap compared to the XBox 360’s and PS3’s $20,000 price tag. Now, those of you who are used to making do with free software—like me—are probably thinking, “do I really need all of those fancy tools?”
No.
Homebrew is the process of making software for a system without the original development kit or system distributor’s blessing (more commonly known as a “license”). The term originated among beer aficionados for beer brewed by an individual instead of a commercial brewing house, but now is used in many hobbies—including video games—to refer to unofficial/amateur produced content. Homebrewering shouldn’t be confused with modding or ROM hacking: homebrewing is concerned with making new content for a system, while modding and ROM hacking only intend to change or manipulate an existing game (sometimes to the point where it’s arguably a different game made from the parts of the original).
Homebrew is the process of making software for a system without the original development kit…
Homebrew provides a surprisingly diverse selection of content. There’s homebrew for almost all Nintendo systems, though the type of content varies greatly from system to system. Older systems mostly focus on games, while newer ones–from about the Wii onward–have homebrew for everything from games to system utilities. Let’s take a quick look at some examples.
Just as “all toasters toast toast [sic]” Nintendo homebrewers homebrew games…duh. Sadly, most of the homebrew games I found in my research are simple, forgettable diversions much like the flash games of the early days of the internet. It’s not that surprising, considering game development on any level is an intricate and time consumptive process. That isn’t to say that all homebrewers lack diligence and ambition. There are still many quality original titles. Notice that I said original titles; a large number of homebrew game projects are simply ports, usually of games whose creators have released the source code to the general public. In fact, the Wii alone has ports of P.C. classics such as Tyrian, Quake, and Jazz Jackrabbit.
I’m not going to try to enumerate every homebrew project released for a Nintendo system, but for the sake of being thorough, there are some that warrant mention. First up is Blade Buster, a Famicom shoot-em-up notable for its screen filling boss sprites (on an 8-bit console mind you), an insane number of sprites on the screen at a time, and unique time-attack styled gameplay. Next for the Super Nintendo is N-Warp Daisakusen, a game that allows eight—yes, eight—players to compete in a free-for-all brawl. Lastly, I want to mention a puzzle game for the DS named Negative Space which has the player drawing paths to guide two opposite colored blobs to their respective goal flags. The catch? They can only travel through the other’s color, meaning every path you draw for one is an obstacle to the other.
After games, the most common type of homebrew is emulators. I’m not exactly sure why when emulators are already so prolific on P.C. Maybe people make them because they like the challenge of getting an emulator to function on the constraints of a game console. Maybe it’s to prove that more fully featured emulation is possible on Nintendo systems. Maybe people just think it’s funny to play Playstation games on their Wii. Whatever the reason, most of Nintendo’s modern systems have a multitude of homebrewed emulators available on them.
Obviously, many of the homebrewed emulators available online for Nintendo consoles are for older Nintendo systems. As I alluded to in the previous paragraph, however, the homebrewed emulator scene isn’t exclusively concerned with Nintendo systems. On the just Wii alone there are emulators for Sega Genesis/Mega-Drive, Sega Saturn, Playstation 1, CalecoVision, Commodore 64, Atari Lynx, and many, many, many, many, many more. Also, there’s a Super Nintendo emulator that runs on the original 3DS (I knew it!).
Whatever the reason, most of Nintendo’s modern systems have a multitude of homebrewed emulators available on them.
Not all homebrew projects are game related. Some are just the sort of software you’d find on any computer: music players, web browsers, etc. One such program of note is an art program called Colors! Which was originally developed as homebrew for the DS but has since gotten an official release on multiple systems, including the 3DS eshop. Then there’s software that changes system behaviors. For example, the 3DS has an application that removes the cap on the number of play coins a player can receive in a day. More impressive is a Wii hack that let’s the user change the region of the console—y’know, to play region locked games.
Where there’s hardware, there’s Linux. Much like the speed of light or the certainty of death and taxes, it’s one of the constants of our universe. Seriously, any system that’s powerful enough to run Linux sooner or later will. There’s Linux for the GameCube, Linux on the 3DS, Linux for the Wii, a distro is in development for the N64, there’s a version for the DS; heck, even the GameBoy Advance has…Unix?
…Wait, what?
Any system that’s powerful enough to run Linux sooner or later will.
For those of you who don’t know, I happen to be a programmer, so when I write an article that gives me the opportunity to talk about programming, I’m going to talk about programming. If you think programming is some kind of voodoo (which it isn’t: it’s sorcery), you may want to skip this part.
Still here? Great! Believe it or not, if you’re already comfortable with programming it’s almost as simple as picking the system you want to develop for and a few Google searches. While homebrewing isn’t exactly the go-to past-time among bored nerds, there are several online guides and communities dedicated to the craft: forums, YouTube videos, blogs, and wikis galore! Heck, there’s an entire free book on WikiBooks about Super Nintendo programming.
Even though you’re not going to be using The Man’s toolkit, you can’t exactly make a game with just your imagination and wishful thinking (trust me, I’ve tried). You will need software to compile the code you write and, if you’re developing for one of Nintendo’s more recent systems, an API library to interface with the system (getting controller input and such). You’ll also want an emulator. Fortunately, all of these tools can be easily acquired on the internet for free.
There are several online guides and communities dedicated to the craft: forums, YouTube videos, blogs, and wikis galore!
As for the coding itself, it’s mostly the same as regular programming. For example, I—out of curiosity—browsed through a tutorial on GameBoy Advance homebrewing and was quite relieved (and just a little surprised) to find that the code was hardly distinguishable from any other program written in C. There are certainly nuances to keep in mind—like in the case of the GBA, some memory addresses are reserved for the screen’s RGB values, tracking whether buttons are pressed, and so on. You may also need to go without some modern conveniences (hope you like compiling your code from command-line!). But by-and-large, anyone who’s sufficiently experienced with C and/or C++ should be fine.
Unless you’re developing for an 8 or 16-bit system. In that case I hope you really like 65c816 Assembly!
Instead of starting on a proper summation, I’d like to cover my backside real quick and stress that despite this being the longest article I’ve written for Two Button Crew to date, I have only given the barest of overviews of the subject. I encourage you to look further into this, either as someone interested in finding new games to play or someone hoping to make such games. More over, there’s a lot I omitted for length, like how some retail games have been pulled from store shelves because of homebrewers.
Having said all that, it’s a shame homebrew isn’t more popular. I understand why, though: if someone’s going to go to all the trouble to make a game, why make it for a dead system? And if it’s for a modern system, why make a game that they can’t license and sell? But, hey, who knows? Many Nintendo fans have grown up and started making games of their own. As time goes on and more fans get old enough to take an interest in game development, maybe some of them will try to make a few for the systems they played on as kids. Wouldn’t that be something, a flood of new old games?
Glen is a lifelong Nintendo fan whose love of video games has inspired him to pursue a career in computer programming; so much so that he is now studying to get a masters in computer science. He doesn’t understand that the average person isn’t interested in programming and won’t shut up about how awesome it is.
We need to talk. I’ve been a part of the Nintendo community for a long time now, and what used to be something to be proud of has me quite ashamed from time to time. The actions I see online are absolutely ridiculous and seem to get more out of hand every Nintendo Direct. Of course, not everyone acts the ways described below, but far, FAR too many do.
Make up your minds, please.
When Nintendo releases new games in the same franchise (Mario, Zelda, etc.) a lot of what I hear is whining for new ideas and new IPs. When Nintendo releases a new game or new IP (Federation Force, Codename: S.T.E.A.M., etc.) I’m also hearing a ton of complaints and hate. If you try a game and decide you don’t like it, that’s completely justified, but when Nintendo announces a game and it’s suddenly the apocalypse… not okay. Nintendo is completely aware you want a new Metroid game, I assure you.
I’m a HUGE fan of the first two Paper Mario games, but couldn’t get into Sticker Star at all. While Color Splash looks more like Sticker Star than a traditional RPG, that doesn’t mean I’m going to attack the game. I’m going to do something revolutionary instead: I’m not going to buy the game. If reviews come out and the game happens to be incredible maybe I’ll change my mind, but there’s no reason whatsoever to throw punches at Nintendo for simply making a game I’m not interested in.
Nintendo is a business.
Why make Paper Mario: Color Splash when Sticker Star wasn’t as well received as the other games in the series? It sold well. Nintendo makes decisions that will first and foremost make them money. They try to please as many people as possible, but you’ll certainly never please everyone, and they know that. If Sticker Star hadn’t sold well either they would have taken a different approach for the next Paper Mario game or the franchise would cease to exist.
Enjoy your (extra) life!
So many people act like the decisions Nintendo makes will make or break their quality of life. Just take a deep breath and calm down. It’s completely possible to not be interested in any games Nintendo is releasing for months (possibly years) on end. Luckily they have such an amazing backlog of games that it should be easy to find something you’ll enjoy. So bust out that dusty N64 and 4 controllers, because Mario is always ready to party with you.
I wont stop being a part of the Nintendo community – it’s in my blood – but I sure hope the overall attitude changes soon.
/endrant
Check out our non-biased review of Metroid Prime: Federation Force and our rant on game review scores.
