Topic: Nintendo Switch --OT--

@KALofKRYPTON It doesn't have anything to do with the amiibo, but with the fact that they couldn't use the official Pokemon sounds in Mario Maker for some weird reason. And I'm sure there are plenty of other examples. They do own a good chunk of the franchise, indirectly. But it seems that without GameFreak, Pokemon wouldn't exist either. So it's a very complicated situation.

@Knuckles-Fajita As I said, it's very likely that Ninty's actual stake is more than 33% as they have an undisclosed share of Creatures Inc.

Also, with Pokemon Go, Nintendo dealt both directly with drafting (and later acquisition of) Niantic; as well as dealing with them through TPC.

Ninty fires plenty of content strikes on YouTube, they're rather bad for it actually.

Seems more like some just don't want Nintendo to shoulder any 'blame' or at least suffer any heat for perceived miss-steps relating to Pokemon when it's actually pretty obvious that their fingers are pretty deep in that pie.

@Octane I don't think it's all that complex really. Pokemon is big business and it's owners are responsible for it in various ways. Without Ninty, it's possible GameFreak would never have gotten the franchise off the ground in the first place.

@KALofKRYPTON Except the copyright claims were explicitly from "The Pokemon Company" which has always been run independently.

Nintendo is recent months went completely lax like most companies on copyright strikes, issuing a public statement and holding themselves to it. So they DID fire copyright but now? Not at all.

But you're missing the key thing. TPCi is run independently.

1. Bayonetta 2
2. Super Mario Odyssey
3. Xenoblade Chronicles 2

I’ve still got Let’s Go Pikachu & Tropical Freeze in my backlog.

@Knuckles-Fajita

"TPCi is run independently" - in reality that is all but meaningless. So the copyright strikes come from TPCi and not Nintendo... as if Nintendo has nothing to do with the company.

You don't own a third (and probably more) of a company that you publish for and not take any decisions in it.

At the most generous, TPCi could be considered akin to a first party studio.

@KALofKRYPTON I'd probably disagree - with a third stake and an independent company, Nintendo would have very little operational say in marketing, licensing etc. Indeed, in theory, if they wanted to make TCPi change an operational policy, they would need to get a majority across shareholders. While the reality is probably a little more closer, I am not sure they would have that much say in it.

Given Nintendo's history with copyright strikes - which is ridiculous and archaic, btw, exactly as one would expect from Nintendo - it doesn't matter whether it was them who was responsible for the Pokemon ones or not, really. They would have if they could have, most likely.

Anyway - it's not really important.

My daughter managed to overcome her Pokemon snobbery (ha!) and got herself Let's GO Eviee and is enjoying (but blasting through) it; and is pretty jazzed for Sword & Shield.

I got Let's Go Pikachu for Christmas and I haven't opened it yet because I've been holding off hoping that they'll patch in Pro Controller support but I'm not holding my breath. I might start it soon because I do like catching a Pokemon but I'm already rolling my eyes at the thought of having to wave me arms about to do so so who knows maybe I'll wait a bit more.

@Fight_Sora_Fight You should fast-track Tropical Freeze if you haven't played it before and have any love for platformers. It's easily the best game in the franchise,

@johncalmc Honestly, what I hate more is controlling the game on the TV with only half a controller. Thankfully, that's not the case in handheld mode, and you don't need to use motion gestures undocked either, so I'm sticking purely to portable play with that game.

@Kidfried

1) The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (one of my favorite games of all time)
2) Valkyria Chronicles 4
3) Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle / Donkey Kong Adventure DLC

If I'm going pure exclusives, though...

1) Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle / Donkey Kong Adventure DLC
2) Xenoblade Chronicles 2 / Torna: The Golden Country DLC
3) Super Mario Odyssey

I'd have put Splatoon 2 if I was more into multiplayer or if the single-player campaign was as good as the Octo Expansion. Still a lot of fun, though, and a very easy "honorable mention."

One of these days I'm going to get around to Octopath Traveler.

@johncalmc What @Ralizah said.

My daughter was lamenting the pokeball controller the other day (she doesn't have one), I'd assumed that she'd be doing the motion stuff with the joycons but she's only been playing in handheld mode and didn't even realise that the motion controls without the pokeball were a thing.

@Ralizah @KALofKRYPTON Yeah, that's my issue with it. I hate how the half controller thing looks. In my head, when I imagine playing it, it actually annoys me. Motion controls are garbage town, but even if it was chuck pokeballs with the right one and control stuff with the left one it would make more sense in my brain. This control scheme seems like it was designed entirely so they could charge people an arm and a leg for a stupid pokeball controller, common sense be damned.

I like the look of the handheld controls a lot more with one caveat - I do not want to play the game in handheld mode at all. It's mind boggling to me there's not a halfway option.

@johncalmc Put the dock on your lap...

@KALofKRYPTON Considering Pokemon will always be a primarily portable series to me, I'm not too broken up about it, but there's no excuse for them not including different control options for TV mode.

In handheld mode, if you box the starter (Eevee/Pikachu hang around regardless of their actual presence in your party), it gets a decent boost in terms of the challenge involved, and functions as a cute but somewhat shallow take on the first generation games. I don't personally care for seeing the enormous Pokemon models crowding up the narrow, Game Boy-era environments, though, and the lack of battling with wild Pokemon will never not bother me. I probably wouldn't have bothered getting it if we hadn't bought it for my young nephew as a present, although, amusingly enough, I've taken more of an interest in it than he has. Any time he spends on the console lately either goes to Fortnite or the youtube app. Sigh

The music is fantastic, though. They did a great job bringing Game Boy chiptunes back to life with modern symphonic compositions.

Sword/Shield look like a return to form for the series. Really excited to play the next gen.

@Ralizah It's just another thing that fed in to the 'Pokemon lite' nature of the game.

My daughter was surprised at how quickly she picked up the badges and ended up fighting MewTwo since she's played the orginals via my Revo.

@Ralizah Yeah planning to get to Tropical Freeze soon-ish. Just not had the time recently.
Would like to get it out of the backlog before the new Fire Emblem.

Just cleared NSMBU Deluxe. Not the most ambitious game, but I thought it was good fun. I'll probably try collecting all the Star Coins (to take a crack at some of the Superstar Road levels), but as I'm not an expert player I'll probably move on before doing it all (same for Luigi U as a whole. I'll probably give it a whirl, but don't expect to clear it).

I impulse bought Hyrule Warriors and Diablo 3 as they had a slim bit off cash off at my local Argos and I had vouchers. Never played either before.

@Rudy_Manchego You just bought two huuuuge timesinks!

@RR529 Superstar Road is deceptively tough...

@Knuckles-Fajita Ha ha.. Good thing I have loads of time and a tiny backlog and..... oh I’ve made a terrible mistake!!!!