What are you playing on your Switch 2: Play Harder

The big building outside features in Digimon Adventure: Last Evolution Kizuna, and in the original series when they come back to Tokyo and discover they're far from home, Nakano is the station they're in. Someone over at Digimon likes Nakano for sure

I had Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble delivered on its launch day last week, and I’ve finished the main hundred level Adventure Mode. It’s pretty good so far, and I’d say it’s the best in the series since the 2001 original. 

The newly-added Spin Dash action is interestingly strategic – it doesn’t need to be used often but timed well it can create shortcuts and cut down the length of most stages. I can see speedrunners having a great time with it, and I’ve really enjoyed tinkering about with it as well. The level design can be really clever too. Whereas the overrated Super Monkey Ball 2 was stuffed with levels that looked great but weren’t much fun to play, Banana Rumble does a very decent job of presenting you with memorable courses that balance good skill with good fortune. I like that they’ve added ‘helper’ features too, specifically optional checkpoints, a rewind button, and a guide that shows you the route to take through the course. I really like that it gives me options for how I want to play and ultimately complete the game.

It’s not without fault though. The performance is oddly iffy, and quite a bit worse than the other Super Monkey Ball games on Switch. I’m not sure what’s going on with the framerate, but it’s never solid and it takes a battering during online multiplayer. There’s a whole other half of the game that I’ve unlocked but not started but I think I’ll hold fire for an update patch before I tackle that – I think I’ll enjoy Banana Rumble even more once they smooth it out. And while I don’t think I’ll get the same opportunities to play in multiplayer like I did with those GameCube originals, what’s on offer here seems pretty rubbish. There’s no Monkey Billards, Monkey Golf, not even Monkey Target.

Oh, that's a shame about the frame rate, given it's Switch only - just delete more triangles until it runs OK guys. But I've heard a lot of very positive things about the game in general, so I hope you do get the patch that solves the main negative thing.

So far, I'm getting the impression that I should play the HD remakes of one and two rather than this new one?

I have just come out of the other side of having had chicken pox as an adult. It was rough! Wouldn't recommend. However, in amongst the fever and the headaches and the rash and the nausea, I did manage to chip my way through Nobody Saves the World. It was very fun! Will maybe write up a review in the other thread one day.

I also played the demo of Legends of Cold Steel: Trails Through Daybreak. Everything I read about the series made me think "wow, sounds like my kind of thing, but I absolutely cannot be arsed with coming into the middle of it all" - but Trails Through Daybreak is meant to be the beginning of a new arc, so I thought it was worth a bash. It was fun! Feels very Ys-y but a bit more JRPG-lore-wankery. But not necessarily in a bad way.

Oh blimey! I got my chicken pox in the last year of primary school, during the week when all my classmates visited the secondary school, and I was considered quite old to be getting it I think! I've heard its rough as an adult, so I hope you're doing okay.

Sorry to hear about that Rum, and interested to hear about Daybreak which I'm thinking about picking up but a few games next week I'm interested in.

I'm not playing Beyond Good & Evil 20th Anniversary on Switch, but I kinda associate with Nintendo as I played it on GameCube and it being a Zelda-like.

I'm playing on Series S via Ubi+ (might continue my AC Mirage save or start Prince of Persia) and as it's a favourite of mine, might get the LRG physical on PS5.

I'm not that far in but as you may have seen a new speedrun mode and I have seen videos of people getting the platinum in like 4.5hrs, that BG&E might be a short game as the open-world part umm doesn't seem as big as it did 21 years ago.

Yet what I have done so far I'm really enjoying, though camera (not jades) is a bit wonky. Hopefully play some more tomorrow.

Ah another Nobody Saves the World fan! I thought I was the only person who properly liked that game. I am a big fan of 'combine classes to make something hideously broken' though. Sorry about the shingles Rum, I've always heard that's dire. Glad they're behind you now!

Calling Trails Through Daybreak "Ys-like" is a big point in its favour. I thought the same thing as you, that I might hop into a new arc, but it's probably something I'll save for a present request for now.

Screw UbiSoft. Screwbisoft.

I maintain, and have always maintained, that giving any money to Ubisoft makes you a rat little coward. Also, their games are shite and theres so much else to play.

I really liked Nobody Saves the World on my first playthrough, but I've weirdly bounced off it on return visits. It's definitely a little clunky feeling, but it must've hit the right spot for me at the time originally.

Ubis modern games can be shite but back in 2003 they did put out great games and BG&E is one of them. That if you've not played, and I do think it holds up then you could play on PS2, Cube or Xbox to experience it.

I do hope Andy does for November games a round on Assassin's Creed, and you're on it Luke think it be hilarious (I'd also wouldn't be shocked to see AC on Andys GOTY list GGS episode).

If I have a chance to play an actual second-hand BGaE disk, I will as that isn't supporting the company.

You never played it? I know who did as cult classic, as I've got pretty high in my Top 100 games and above some actual Zelda games, though the gap between it and Wind Waker is huge mind.

Crumpy Andy wrote:

I really liked Nobody Saves the World on my first playthrough, but I've weirdly bounced off it on return visits. It's definitely a little clunky feeling, but it must've hit the right spot for me at the time originally.

I can well imagine it doesn't stack up on repeated playthroughs. I thought the best part of it was discovering all the new classes, then there's a honeymoon period after each one as you level them up to unlock all the skills and learn how to combine them with other classes. But so much of the appeal is shock of the new. Which is fine! That's a valid way to create a good or great game! But it means it won't be a good game to replay, which is fine since I barely ever replay anything.

(i am playing another visual novel please be surprised)

My save file says I’ve been playing it for twenty-eight hours, but it feels like I’ve been plugging away at Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door for double that length of time. I’m at the very start of Chapter 8, I’ve resorted to a using a walkthrough to speed things up, and I’m strictly focused on getting to the credits and finishing the game. It’s been enjoyable on the whole, but – bloody hell! – this is a game that needed to wrap up five hours ago. Without all the new additions like the quick-travel warp pipes and Goomba gameplay hints I think I’d have been struggling with this, I think there’s a good chance I’d have chucked it.

Up ahead, I’m going to look towards playing something totally fresh that I’ve already got in my collection, something that’s not a retro remake. That rules out Another Code: Recollection, Advance Wars: ReBoot Camp, Metal Gear Solid Master Collection Vol. 1 and many others for the time being. I’m thinking about starting Neon White, but on the other hand this feels like a good opportunity timing-wise to see what Mario & Rabbids: Sparks of Hope was all about.

Hmm . . . they play pretty differently, but that'd still be jumping from one Mario RPG to another, so i wonder how fatigued you'll feel?

Also, I thought Mario and Rabbids was pretty gash. There was always one obvious way to proceed in every battle so I felt like I didn't need to be there.

Neon White, as long as you do the smart thing and skip all the dialogue, will be a nice palette cleanser.

Buskalilly wrote:

Hmm . . . they play pretty differently, but that'd still be jumping from one Mario RPG to another, so i wonder how fatigued you'll feel?

Also, I thought Mario and Rabbids was pretty gash. There was always one obvious way to proceed in every battle so I felt like I didn't need to be there.

Neon White, as long as you do the smart thing and skip all the dialogue, will be a nice palette cleanser.

Was that the second Mario & Rabbids that you thought was gash? I wasn’t that bothered by the original. All I remember about it is that it looked and sounded really nice, and that I stupidly traded it in as part-exchange for Travis Strikes Again: No More Heroes, which is easily the worst Switch game I’ve bought at retail. Mind you, I’ve never bothered to get Kingdom Battle back again.
 
I recall a lot of folk saying that on here and elsewhere about Neon White, but thanks for reinforcing it. Unskippable dialogue can be a game-killer for me.
 
Since finishing The Thousand Year Door I’ve ultimately decided on playing neither Spark of Hope or Neon White, instead I’ve gone back to the newly-patched Super Monkey Ball: Banana Rumble. I'm open-minded about what I play after that, though on the other hand I may as well go mop up what's left of Metroid Prime Remastered.

You can fast-forward the dialogue in Neon White if I recall correctly, and I'll second Buska and third all those other folk. I like anime and anime tropes and I still thought this was awful gubbins of the highest order. Great gameplay though.

The Cappuccino Kid wrote:

Was that the second Mario & Rabbids that you thought was gash? I wasn’t that bothered by the original.

Yeah, the first. See above for why the sequel didn't even get a look-in.
It looked and sounded great, and was slickly put together, which kept me involved for a nice big play session. I turned it off and went to work or whatever, and when I came back to it I just thought . . . what's the point? Why am I even playing this? And traded it in.

Yeah I got mixed feelings about them Mario and Rabbids games as well. It was clearly very good, but I think I had a similar feeling to when you come across a level-based puzzle game. That was fun - wait, I've got to do this how many times over?!


Tangent - I'm slightly cold-afflicted so please redirect me if I'm blind: did the Nintendo World Championships game make so little of a splash?

The main thing I heard was that it doesn't have any built-in leaderboards to compare with friends which killed any minor interest I might have had.

Same as single player, player. Who's not going to play local and the lack of online leaderboards, I do go why would I play a score chasing game by myself.

It didn’t make any impression on me. Never mind owning a NES collection itself: between Virtual Console, the Switch’s NES Online app, NES Remix, Amiibo Touch & Play on the Wii U, the 3DS Ambassador Programme and Animal Crossing on the GameCube, I’ve played all of these games to bloody death. The only interesting thing about Nintendo World Championships: NES Edition is that it could lead to Nintendo World Championships: SNES Edition.

~
 
Anyhoo, I snuck in a playthrough of the very enjoyable Thank Goodness You’re Here! and I’ll sit down to finish the unexpectedly excellent Super Monkey Ball Banana Rumble tonight. For the next couple of weeks I think I’ll be focused on Tombi!: Special Edition. It’s a really unique oddity that’s a meld of platformer and RPG, and it deserves another crack at success. The design and mechanics are very much of 1997, but it’s still highly creative, aesthetically distinctive and consistently interesting. The new Rewind function isn’t much needed but the save states make it much more manageable than it ever was on PlayStation.

I also wrote my review if you like reading.

Damning, but - let's be honest - not surprising.

Mas'll like this: I've been playing Star Ocean: The Second Story R. Mas won't like this: I've found the writing awful, and there's far too much of it. I made the mistake of picking the female lead as the MC and she's pathetic trash (that is, your standard JRPG female lead for a game that originally released in 1998) with an annoying VA, and both her and her fellow villagers waffle on like it's their last chance. (Which it might be, nobody seems quite sure about that.) Thankfully it's got solid real-time combat, a good soundtrack, and it looks lush. Possibly the best of that crop of HD2D games Squeenix has put out, it's really bright and vibrant and just a treat for the eyes. I'll persevere for a while.

I also downloaded Game Of The Year Cat Quest 3 on Thursday when it released, but The Lady's been in a gloomy mood so I've been left to salivate over the thought of it for now.