Category General Gaming

How did Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze fare in the eShop charts?

Nintendo Switch eShop – UK Sales Charts (06/05/2018)

Sean Alexander 1 Comment

Notable new releases show the UK eShop Charts may be very different this week. Is FMTouch still high? What about Donkey Kong?

Numbers in brackets are previous positions based on: 29/04/2018 (Unless they haven’t moved) in the UK eShop

How did Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze fare in the eShop charts?

Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze is the huge new release this week

1: Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze (NEW) – £49.99
2: Stardew Valley – £10.99
3: Football Manager Touch 2018 (Down from 1st) – £29.99
4: Rocket League (Up from 5th) – £15.04
5: Minecraft: Nintendo Switch Edition (Down from 3rd) – £19.99
6: Robonauts (80% OFF) – £2.69 (Usually £13.49)
7: Arcade Archives: Vs. Super Mario Bros. – £6.29
8: South Park: The Fractured But Whole (NEW) (Up from 14th) – £49.99
9: Sonic Mania (Down from 8th) – £15.99
10: Naruto: Ultimate Ninja Storm Trilogy (NEW) – £44.99
11: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Up from 13th) – £49.99
12: Timer Man Vs. (NEW) (10% OFF) – £1.61 (Usually £1.79)
13: Celeste (Down from 12th) – £17.99
14: Kirby Star Allies (Up from not charting!) – £49.99
15: Naruto Shippuden Ultimate Ninja Storm 3: Full Burst (New) – £16.99

 

This week the charts are pretty strange, so let’s break it down.

 

Analysis

 

The notable big entries this week are Bandai Namco’s Naruto titles, with the Trilogy placing respectably at 10th, and the third entry as a standalone purchase in 15th. South Park continues to steadily climb post-launch and Donkey Kong of course stormed to the top.

The usual chart topping suspects remain the same, with Minecraft, Rocket League, Stardew Valley and now FM Touch. Robonauts remains high due to a discount, Vs. Super Mario Bros due to nostalgia.

The critical darlings Sonic Mania and Celeste remain in the charts, as is expected now. Kirby returns after vanishing yet again, showing new purchases continuing long after launch. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is at least no longer the only first party release here!

Timber Man Vs is the final new entry, its low price and lower discount no doubt contributing.

 

That’s all for this week! A good showing both by indies and third parties with of course DK ruling the roost! See you next week where things may be very different! Happy Gaming!

Nintendo Labo allows users to learn about engineering and programming at their own pace in interactive ways

Nintendo Labo – Does It Matter If It Fails?

Sean Alexander

Nintendo Labo released in late April to what many call middling sales. But does it really matter?

Nintendo Labo allows users to learn about engineering and programming at their own pace in interactive ways

Nintendo Labo released late April to somewhat warm reception

Consumers and armchair analysts can argue all they want about the merits of Nintendo selling cardboard. Included with each Labo kit is the ability to produce Toy-Con and even make your own custom creations. However, in terms of sales it would seem Labo hasn’t hit home.

Around the internet on message boards you can see examples of “I told you so” and “Well who thought $80 cardboard would sell?” and this attitude is both unfairly dismissive and forgets the history of the game industry.

 

We Have Been Here Before!

The PlayStation EyeToy was a weird add-on used in few games

The EyeToy, one of the earlier examples of a weird peripheral gadget

Cast your minds back to the PlayStation 2, a system on top of the world. What do you do when you have success like that? Find new ways to use to device you have already sold to people. Sony did just that with the EyeToy! This is an odd little peripheral that projected your body into the game for what was at the time the height of motion control in gaming.

Of course people don’t remember it now. It existed though. The EyeToy had games exclusive to it, but it required the PS2 to function. It was a platform on top of an already successful platform. A “Sub-Platform”. A peripheral.

Jump ahead to the PS3. Despite early struggles it ultimately became a respected and well selling console. What would a company do with a device already in homes? Introduce a peripheral, with exclusive games, but still tied to the core hardware. Introduce both PS Move and Wonderbook.

PS Wonderbook was a great example of a failed peripheral for a platform.

Who remembers Wonderbook? Anyone? No?

 

Some of these peripherals did fail…

You won’t remember Wonderbook. It would be a challenge to find one these days, but the PS Move lived on and still is available as a peripheral. Of course the thing to remember is sometimes these peripherals will fail.

But why will they fail? Well they simply don’t catch on. A peripheral has a maximum base to sell to that is equal to that of the platform it needs to even function. So for something like Kinect, it could only sell to, at most, the total amount of Xbox 360 users.

Price and purpose: If a peripheral is too expensive it obviously won’t catch on especially if the perceived value is low.

Some Peripherals Do Succeed

PSVR is a peripheral designed for PS4

PSVR has shown how a “Sub-Platform” can mostly flourish

Sometimes one has to take a look back to see the failures before judging the present successes. PlayStation VR is a new way to experience video games and has numerous exclusive titles. It also has a very hefty price point to enter. On top of that, it needs the PS4 to even work! PlayStation VR, for all it is its own platform, remains a sub-platform wholly dependant on PS4.

How did it succeed? It was periphery to a system already in homes. It gave a new way to play games. A new experience. But one thing it doesn’t do is detract from the system it is attached to.

This is the thing with peripherals. They need to be understood and accepted as supplements to the platform they need to function. They can offer new takes on existing experiences like VR or offer new experiences all together. But generally no one should expect a sub-platform to sell like a new platform.

So How Does This Matter To Labo?

Simple! Nintendo Labo is a peripheral. The fact that it has multiple kits under one name should tell you future kits will (Probably) exist. Additionally, it is entirely dependant on Nintendo Switch.

Nintendo Labo lets people use the Switch in new ways. It is an educational tool teaching engineering, creativity and programming in an accessible way.

Nintendo Labo features a Toy-Con Garage for custom apps

The Toy-Con Garage lets users make their own experiences

Toy-Con Garage lets people learn and understand basic programming. The technology behind making the cardboard creations work is simple yet technical.

Labo as a peripheral is ideal. It does something different from the already hot core device, to bring in other people. It’s only crime is potentially price.

So What If Labo Fails?

If Labo fails then we simply move on. In the same we moved on from weird Wii accessories and Wonderbook and EyeToy and Kinect. A peripheral failing isn’t the end of the world. After all, it never hurts to try.

To loop back to the earlier dismissive comments – if that attitude prevailed we would likely see peripherals die out. The fear of trying and failing would end with not trying at all. It is better to try and then fail than not try at all. A peripheral can’t damage a platform. If the peripheral is marketed well then it can stand as its own thing and thrive as a supplement to a system.

But if it does come to fail, well the platform it is attached to didn’t fail. Only the peripheral. The platform did well enough beforehand to make this venture worthwhile.

It Is Harmless!

Following on from yesterday and a discussion about mid-tier games not needing to sell millions, Labo is in the same position. It doesn’t need to be PSVR or WiiFit. If handled sensibly, if marketed to the right people, Labo will do just fine.

There is no harm or shame in trying something new with your existing hit platform. By being dependant on something that already exists, success or failure really doesn’t matter, so long as it isn’t incredibly expensive to develop the peripheral. But the success of the base system doesn’t guarantee success for the peripheral either!

 

To conclude, it all doesn’t matter. Success or failure the Nintendo Switch will continue on its path just like the PS2 did, or the SNES with its add-ons. Labo ultimately needs Switch. Switch doesn’t need Labo.

But it is always nice to have something different there to supplement too.

 

Thanks for reading! If you liked this piece please share on social media via the buttons below, and let me know I shouldn’t play with cardboard! Happy Gaming!

Nintendo 3DS: It’s Time To Move On…Slowly.

Sean Alexander

The 3DS Family is now almost 7 years old, and I see two camps. Those who don’t want to upgrade to a Nintendo Switch for things that were on 3DS previously, and those who want it to die immediately.

 

REPUBLISHED MAY 3 2018 – Nintendo themselves have clarified the stance on the 3DS going forward:

“[The 3DS] has an ample software lineup at a price point that makes the system affordable especially for parents looking to buy for their kids. We expect that demand to continue during this fiscal year as well, so we will continue to sell the product”

“Given that Nintendo Switch is a home gaming system that can be taken on the go, this situation may change if it grows from being a one-per-household system to a one-per-person system. But the price of Nintendo Switch is not something with which most parents would buy a system for every one of their children in a short period of time. Moving forward, we will work to ascertain what kinds of play people want at which price points, and as long as there is such demand, we will continue to sell the Nintendo 3DS system. I see the product coexisting with Nintendo Switch at this point in time.”

 

Original Story – December 2017

 

So this is an interesting position we find ourselves in. Nintendo 3DS launched in March 2011, meaning very soon, it hits 7 years old. For any console that is exceptionally good, as the average tends to hover around 5 years, with exceptions being the DS, 3DS, PS2 and the entire 7th Generation of consoles. You could probably say 7 years is now the new average.

In reality, at this stage, we should be looking to the future, even with the New 3DS/2DS lines, you can only get so much out of the systems, and as shown with Pokemon, and as explained by the developers, that ceiling has been hit. You can’t push it anymore than you already have, and again, 7 years? That’s a great time to move on.

Thing is, I see two warring sides to this.

 

On one hand, we have the Pokemon fans primarily. They say the newly released New 2DS XL is a sign it’s not dead, and the move of things like Pokemon to Switch are just cash grabs, and that they should just keep making games for 3DS. Why should we have to upgrade, they say.

Okay so first off, you’ve had to do this before. Remember Pokemon Crystal? You needed a GameBoy Colour. Then a GBA, DS and 3DS. Now it’s Switch. This isn’t new and part of the industry. You can’t be held back for so long and you need to move forward, heck most consumers encourage it.

The concept that you wasted your money…well that depends on your individual perception of value. If you bought a system just for Pokemon, you would know an upgrade, like with anything technological, is inevitable. It will happen no matter what. You can’t expect the system to last and be supported forever.

With regards to the argument they just released a New 2DS XL, they also released the Wii Mini a year after the Wii U. Did that mean the Wii was still kicking? Not really, unless you count the licensed games and Just Dance. I will come back to the New 2DS XL though, it ties in to something else.

 

What about the other side of the argument?

The other side of the crowd simply wants the 3DS line dead, as soon as Switch is out, citing it takes away development resources and there is no reason the games shouldn’t be on Switch.

First off with this one, do you remember how everyone reacted to the near empty final year of the Wii? Yeah, that’s how support used to be handled at the end of a console life by Nintendo, and people hated it. But here, people want it? Why? It’s a dumb decision and should never be done that way.

Regarding the games still coming to 3DS, yes they could have been made with Switch in mind, ignoring late localizations like Dragon Quest. The majority of first party titles have been smaller studios owned by Nintendo, outsourced remakes like Metroid and Superstar Saga, or again, late localisations. Or third parties, who do whatever they please, and Nintendo would be very unwise to turn around and say hey, stop making games for the 60 million plus 3DS systems out there. They already had a bad rap with developers for their controlling ways with the NES, why go back there and force people onto a new platform?

 

Secondly, really now? You want them to throw away all investment into well in-development projects and have the extra time, money and man hours put into changing everything for the new architecture of the Switch, its features, and HD development? Sure some 3DS games have been ported up, like Monster Hunter XX and Resident Evil Revelations (Albeit that was ported elsewhere first) and games like Fire Emblem Warriors came out on both systems, but doing that is in of itself splitting the game in two sides. One version will be inherently inferior, but unlike a game across Vita and PS4, there is nothing gained by having the Switch version except TV play and maybe a boost in sales from the limited install base, and an extra feather in the library of a young system. IT would likely sell to the biggest audience anyway (Obviously), and frankly, many companies wouldn’t want to spend the extra time and most importantly money.

Is this normal?

 

This is the thing, systems are allowed a crossover period. It’s normal. Normally the last few already in-development first party games trickle out, and third parties catch up with localizations and support dries up over a year or two, save for the odd third-party game to cash in on the install base and drive software sales from, get this, late adopters.

So coming back to the New 2DS XL, it is the Wii Mini to the 3DS. The PS3 Super Slim. The Xbox 360 Elite. When manufacturing a system gets cheap enough, it’s actually very wise to leverage that huge back catalog accumulated over the years the system had, and sell a revised, cheaper to make, more affordable to the consumers budget system, which is exactly what the New 2DS XL is. For suspiciously half the price of a Nintendo Switch (Wink wink) you get the entire 3DS backlog (And DS backlog too!) on a now very cheap to make system.

As a deal to late adopters, those who pick up systems late in life, it’s a great way to squeeze potential last sales with a low price and huge catalogue of games. Just as the PS3 and Xbox 360 and even the Wii were sold for a few years into their successors lifespans with their cheapest models and games, so will 3DS.

This image tells a thousands stories on its own…

7 years is a very long time, and for Pokemon and other games, they have a new home, a new ceiling to jump towards. This happens with any system, and any system is wise to be revised and made the budget option for families or Little Timmy’s first system. This extends to even the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X now: The premium models, like Switch, to their now cheaper to make, huge catalogue, revised systems in PS4 and Xbox One S. Difference here is yes, it is a completely different ecosystem, but the reasoning is the same.

It’s time to move on, but it’s not wise to just kill the system where it stands. Let it trickle out slowly, as other systems do. Oh, and please, get used to the idea of upgrading your hardware, it’s been 30 years already.

 

As always if you enjoyed this article, give it a share on social media and leave your thoughts below, and until next time, Happy Gaming!

Mid-Tier Games: Why We Love Them and Want More!

Sean Alexander 1 Comment

Mid-Tier Games are some of the highlights of the industry. But where did they go and why are they now returning?

 

Sonic Mania is a perfect example of a mid-tier release from a major company

A perfect example of a “Mid-tier” game!

The immediate thing any gamer needs to understand is the distinction between a Mid-Tier or “AA” game, and something that is commonly called a “AAA” game. The difference is actually night and day!

A “AAA” game is quite simply a game with huge potential reach in terms of customers. monetization and one massive budget backing it all up are other features.

A “Mid-Tier” game is a sizeable project, but marketed within reason. No game will be blown out of budget. A game knows the audience and the publisher will be happy reaching them. It doesn’t need to sell tens of millions after all.

Not every game needs to be Call of Duty in terms of sheer size or market value. Indeed every company will have a few massive well-known titles but a good developer leaves room for the smaller games.

 

So what are these smaller games?

Crash Bandicoot returned in 2017 with what can be best described as a AA release

Crash Bandicoot N. Sane Trilogy is the perfect example of a big company stepping back into Mid-Tier gaming!

Smaller games come in all shapes and sizes. Companies are fond of putting out experimental ideas and seeing how well they sell. Franchises can even start as a smaller release and explode into the mainstream!

Splatoon was originally a smaller release. Simply a unique idea that ended up exploding in popularity to become on of Nintendo’s top franchises. Sticking with Nintendo, a franchise like Yoshi or Kirby also falls under this category. Notable and recognised characters that won’t sell in high quantity, but will make a return on investment.

PlayStation is also very good at pushing Mid-Tier releases. Gravity Rush, Fat Princess and LittleBigPlanet, all sit alongside the big releases. So why are these games all so important?

 

Why are smaller games so important?

Bayonetta 2 is a game that also fills the smaller game niche.

Bayonetta 2 is yet another example of a game that fills this niche

Try and imagine a system like the PS4. It gets all the huge AAA yearly releases. It holds the top of the tier first-party titles. But imagine the system without Persona 5, without Nioh, without Ratchet and Clank. Do you start to see what is missing?

Smaller games provide one key thing: Variety! If your system has nothing but huge games that need to sell millions for the publisher to consider it a “success”, then you will be presenting a surprisingly narrow selection of games.

Smaller games can afford to offer different experiences. They don’t need to cater to as many people as possible after all. Can you envision a Kirby title with the budget and scope of Call of Duty? That would never sell enough to be worthwhile. Yet being a mid-tier game allows Kirby to be unique, to be different and offer something worthwhile to a library.

So why are these games making a resurgence?

 

This is an easy answer. Cast your mind back to a decade ago, the height of the Xbox 360 and PS3. Everything wanted to be Call of Duty, the next blockbuster hit. The industry chases trends, currently Battle Royale games apparently, and the trend was to go big.

Even first party developers fell to this. When was the last Jak and Daxter? Sly Cooper? F-Zero? The mid-tier game fell to the side in pursuit of mega hit after hit. Every kind of game has a place in the market, but what felt strange was the almost overnight shift.

It’s hard to look back on the PS3 and PS4 and not wish it was like the PS2. Yes they got smaller games, even from first parties. Doesn’t it feel like they haven’t been pushed like they used to? Gravity Rush 2 is losing online connectivity, though that was recently delayed. I didn’t even know Fat Princess was a thing that existed. Tearaway isn’t mentioned anymore.

New games like Concrete Genie show up for sure. But it’s not in the volume it used to be. The variety suffers.

Metroid Samus Returns is a recent example of a smaller title and revival of a franchise

Metroid: Samus Returns was not only the revival of a fan favourite, but a commitment to smaller titles

The same happened for Nintendo. Only recently have we seen renewed interest in smaller games. A few popped up on Wii U and 3DS but Switch singled a shift. Snipperclips, ARMS, Bayonetta (Again). The Wii U had Wonderful 101, Captain Toad and 3DS has BoxBoy and Dillon.

The games supplement the library of huge titles and this is what makes a system truly attractive. Variety. It’s where Microsoft has fallen short. Swamped with the huge releases but smaller releases are hard to come by especially on a first party front.

 

So where are we going next?

 

Well this is also easy to predict. Third party developers will forever be inclined to pursue the big hits. They locked themselves into a cycle of monetization and marketing. Some are branching out to smaller games like Activision with Crash and Spyro or EA funding smaller titles from indies. By and large however that will remain a smaller part of their strategies.

Where this really comes into play is with the platform holders. They can throw out as many small titles as they want alongside the Marios and Uncharteds of the world. They have the resources and hardware sales to accommodate it.

It’s from first party software that you see the most variety. This word keeps popping up but to truly have something for everyone you need to be varied. Know that a game will sell only so much and plan accordingly.

Sometimes appealing to more people over multiple lower selling titles is better than aiming for the top every time.

 

 

Thanks for reading, and if you agree or disagree, feel to shout on social media. This is an interesting discussion spurred by trying to work out where I find my enjoyment for a system as a whole, naturally it’s that word again: Variety.

Happy Gaming!

Behind The Game Update – 02/05/2018! Inklings Approaching!

Sean Alexander

Surprise! Meet the NL Inklings!!

Yep, finally after who knows how long, we’ve got our own domain (Obviously, it’s why you’re here!) and we’ve now integrated the NL Inklings!

The NL Inklings logo!

The NL Inklings logo used on all our streams and media!

What are the NL Inklings? Well it’s a Squid Squad for Splatoon 2 that we here participate in (I happen to be a tyrannical overlord or something like that…) and we live stream matches sometimes!

But that’s not all! On our official Discord (Link in the bar above!) we set up matches and cooperative efforts for other games like Minecraft, Rocket League, Overwatch, Pokemon and more! So come on by, check the Discord widget on the side of the site to see who is online and get an invite!

We also have @NLInklings Twitter updates. Give it a follow if you want to know when we are streaming some Splatoon action! It’s down the side of the site too!

We aim to have sessions every Saturday (Splatterday!) at 7pm BST/8pm GMT!

What does the NL Inklings community do?

The Binding of Isaac Session 3 - Available on YouTube and Twitch.tv

An example of our advertising for streams

But that’s not all! We now have live stream integration too! What will this mean? Well if you’re viewing this site on a desktop, you will get a notification that we are live on Twitch! Simply click it and boom, there you go. We will also publish posts to watch the stream embedded if you wish!

We will be live streaming play-throughs for future reviews, fun, competitive gaming with the Discord crew and maybe even more. Follow on Twitch or @BritishPlaying on Twitter for immediate notifications about those events!

 

That’s all for now! More will follow in the week! Keep playing and happy gaming!

Nintendo Switch eShop – UK Sales Charts (29/04/2018)

Sean Alexander 1 Comment

Is Football Manager still at the top? Did South Park make an impact as a new release? What indie games shot up in sales or otherwise? Let’s see…

Numbers in brackets 


 1: Football Manager Touch 2018 – £29.99
2: Stardew Valley (Up from 3rd) – £10.99
3: Minecraft: Nintendo Switch Edition (Up from 4th) – £19.99
4: Oxenfree (Down from 2nd) – £15.99
5: Rocket League (Up from 6th) – £15.04
6: Robonauts (80% OFF) (Up from 10th) – £2.69 (u+Usually £13.49)
7: Arcade Archives: Vs. Super Mario Bros. (Up from 8th) – £6.29
8: Sonic Mania (Up from 12th) – £15.99
9: Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove (Down from 5th) – £22.49
10: Streets of Red (Down from 9th) – £6.29
11: Don’t Starve: Nintendo Switch Edition (Down from 7th) – £17.99
12: Celeste (Up from 13th) – £17.99
13: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Up from 14th) – £49.99
14: South Park: The Fractured But Whole (NEW) – £49.99
15: Adventure Pals (Down from 11th) – £10.79

 

 

So what can we gleam from this look into the UK eShop? Well…

Football Manager Touch 2018 has firmly cemented itself as a top seller, making up what will likely be the top 4 for a good while now alongside Rocket League, Stardew Valley and Minecraft. At least until FIFA (Maybe) comes out on the Switch this September.

Arcade Archives remains around the middle of the charts, further showing nostalgia sells, as does Sonic Mania right behind perhaps in preparation for the DLC this July.

Streets of Red maintains it’s place despite no longer being on sale, while Robonauts hugely benefits. Of course Shovel Knight and Don’t Starve continue to drop down, while Celeste and Adventure Pals maintain the lower ends of the charts, with Celeste being a recent return.

Most notable then, is Mario Kart 8 Deluxe maintains it’s position as the sole charting digital first party title, and the only new entry this week is a respectable 14th place for South Park, a full price release of a game from October on other platforms. Maybe this one will pick up steam?

 

And that’s it for this week, so what did we learn? Football Manager is a hit, Mario Kart sells, indies are living the dream and South Park at least charted. Expect Donkey Kong to top next week though as a notable new release.

Nintendo Switch eShop – UK Sales Charts (22/04/2018)

Sean Alexander

This week in the UK eShop sales charts we get to see just what is going on with Football Manager, if it can hold its top spot after rocketing up the charts, and what other indie and third-party releases are sticking around yet again!

 

Numbers in brackets are previous positions based on: 15/04/2018 (Unless they haven’t moved)


 1: Football Manager Touch 2018 (NEW) (Up from 3rd) – £29.99
2: Oxenfree (Up from 8th) – £15.99 
3: Stardew Valley (Up from 4th) – £10.99
4: Minecraft: Nintendo Switch Edition (Down from 2nd) – £19.99
5: Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove (Up from 7th) – £22.49
6: Rocket League (Down from 1st) – £15.04
7: Don’t Starve: Nintendo Switch Edition (NEW) (Up from 13th) – £17.99
8: Arcade Archives: Vs. Super Mario Bros. (Down from 5th) – £6.29
9: Streets of Red (NEW) (20% OFF) – £5.03 (Usually £6.29)
10: Robonauts (80% OFF) (Up from not charting) – £2.69 (Usually £13.49)
11: Adventure Pals (NEW) – £10.79
12: Sonic Mania (Up from 14th) – £15.99
13: Celeste (Up from not charting) – £17.99
14: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Down from 11th) – £49.99
15: Kirby Star Allies (Down from 12th) – £49.99

 

So take aways for this week? A few things really. First, sales of Oxenfree and Shovel Knight have propelled up the charts to actually dismantle the usual three suspects of Rocket League, Minecraft and Stardew Valley.

Football Manager is very likely to remain a chart topper along with the usual three for some time now, especially at £30. Arcade Archives VS Super Mario Bros also continued to linger in the middle of the charts.

Don’t Starve seems to be selling really well, still climbing up to a respectable 7th. Streets of Red and Adventure Pals are the other new indie entries this week, one with a launch discount, locking themselves notable sales over other entries.

Celeste has also returned, as has Robonauts with a huge discount. UK gamers love cheap and cheerful after all.

More of note is the continued presence of Mario Kart as the evergreen digital first party release, as Kirby is about to fall from the charts entirely. Not surprising, but Mario Kart will also likely drop in the coming weeks with the release of Donkey Kong.

 

So that’s it for this week on the Switch eShop in the UK! Join us next Sunday when we see if Football Manager can remain on top. It probably can, it’s football. I said this last week too.

Can Nintendo wow again?

Pokemon Switch May Look Like A 3DS Game….Sort of (Speculation!)

Sean Alexander

So an unverified image has me thinking about Pokemon for Nintendo Switch, and how things are lining up to give us an idea of how the game will at least look.

 

Pokemon Switch is almost expected to launch in 2018, we find out if that has changed with Nintendo’s financial briefing on the 26th of April, but an unverified image doing the rounds that no one can seem to debunk is leaving some concerned. However, that concern is probably not justified.

 

So this image is quite simple, it shows a trainer in a water area riding a Lapras, like in X and Y, Sun and Moon etc. and while this isn’t new, the art style and quality of the visuals shown show what many call an up-scaled 3DS game. This obviously is leaving many disappointed, as Switch is leaps and bounds more capable than the 3DS.

However, I posit that this…is exactly what we are going to get. It is in essence going to be a “3DS game”. At least, underneath in the code it is.

 

What am I talking about? Well there are a few things pointing in this direction that the Switch game will reuse the engine used for the 3DS games, hence the similarities, just updated for HD and more complex animations and effects and so on.

First is the most well documented – the in battle models for Pokemon up-scale to HD with simple mods in the “Citra” emulator for 3DS. They look strikingly good and with some new texture work, the models are already HD.

Creatures Inc., the company responsible for modelling Pokemon, has evidently future proofed the geometry of the models, and with some touching up, as shown by the simple mods on 3DS, they are already good to go for HD development. A simple time-saving measure of course, but it is notable that the 3DS engine can support what is easily a HD model (Textures aside).

 

However, if we are to go even deeper than that, there is one fact unifying the 3DS and Nintendo Switch that makes use of the 3DS engine very probable: The Nvidia Tegra X1.

 

 

Now what do I mean by this? Well it’s simple, the Tegra X1 is an ARM based chip. What is ARM? ARM is simply a RISC architecture (Reduced Instruction Set Computing). This means it takes fewer cycles to perform instructions. What ARM exactly is, isn’t important.

So ARM is the underlying architecture of the Tegra X1 used in the Nintendo Switch, it makes sense, it’s a battery-powered device. But what many people don’t know, is the 3DS is also an ARM based system.

Now the 3DS chips are significantly less complex than a Tegra chip, obviously. Dual core, much lower clock speeds, ARM11 chips vs the much newer technology and faster speeds of the Tegra, but the point stands that at their base, the level at which operations are performed, they share an architecture. Now there may be differences between the 3DS and Switch in how advanced that architecture is, but the way they process information will be remarkably similar at least.

 

So what does this have to do with the 3DS Pokemon engine? Well, everything. Why would they make a brand new engine, when the one they already have can store and use what are effectively HD quality models, be very easily modified to use said models at high resolutions, and is designed for the ARM architecture?

My reasoning is that Game Freak will port at least the core of the 3DS engine. The work has already been done. It’s compiled for ARM, and it already handles some of the assets at a level many people are happy with, just not on the 3DS hardware.

They most likely won’t bring the engine as is, instead choosing to modify that common base for Switch for API use and to better utilise what the system can do, but the image shown above that shows the rumoured appearance of Pokemon in HD?

It may not be that far from the truth.

 

 

Thanks for reading, and I could as always be completely wrong, who knows? They could CryENGINE for all we know! Whatever the game looks like however, I am fully prepared for an evolution of how it looked on 3DS, if the work has already been done at least use it.

Of course feel free to share this, see what you think, maybe someone out there knows something I don’t about the relationship between 3DS and Switch that either debunks or enhances this theory, but that’s all it is for now, a theory. Happy gaming!

 

Nintendo Switch eShop – UK Sales Charts (15/04/2018)

Sean Alexander

I figured we could start doing this, looking over the UK eShop charts on Switch.

Update (15/4/2018) – Yes, Football Manager Touch 2018 has hit Number 1

This week, the comparison data will be from the day prior, April 14th, as some interesting things have shown up. All future weeks will be compared to the prior Sunday!

Numbers in brackets are previous positions based on: 14/04/2018 (Unless they haven’t moved)
1: Rocket League – £15.04
2: Minecraft: Nintendo Switch Edition – £19.99
3: Football Manager Touch 2018 (NEW) (Up from 4th) – £29.99
4: Stardew Valley (Down from 3rd) – £10.99
5: Arcade Archives: Vs. Super Mario Bros. – £6.29
6: The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim – £49.99
7: Shovel Knight: Treasure Trove (20% OFF) (Up from 9th) – £17.99 (Usually £22.49)
8: Oxenfree (75% OFF) (Up from not charting) – £3.99 (Usually £15.99)
9: Snake Pass (Down from 8th) – £15.99
10: SteamWorld Dig: A Fistful of Dirt (Down from 7th) – £8.99
11: Mario Kart 8 Deluxe (Up from 12th) – £49.99
12: Kirby Star Allies (Down from 11th) – £49.99
13: Don’t Starve: Nintendo Switch Edition (NEW) – £17.99
14: Sonic Mania – £15.99
15: ARMS (Down from 10th) – £49.99

So what do we take away from this? Well a few things.

First, even though Football Manager Touch 2018 arrived with no fanfare, it’s skyrocketed up the charts – a surprise, but given FIFA does the same whenever it goes on sale, it’s expected especially when the UK is prime footy territory.

Another note is the resurgence of a few indie games. Snake Pass is fresh off of sale, and Oxenfree and Shovel Knight have absolutely shot up. Don’t Starve is the other new entry this week, showing a good showing for yet another release of the game.

Kirby is still hanging on, to my surprise despite falling hard out of the retail sales charts – and ARMS, fresh out of a sale and demo, is about to vanish again. Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has decided to show up again too, probably for some new Switch owners as it seems to be the go to game.

It should be noted the top of the charts rarely changes. Arcade Archives VS. Super Mario Bros. is a prime example of why Virtual Console most likely won’t arrive at all: Imagine all those games clogging the charts like this one does. But Minecraft, Rocket League and Stardew Valley always occupy top spots and have since launch – real mainstays those are.

So that’s it for this week on the Switch eShop in the UK! Join us next Sunday when we see if Football Manager can remain on top. It probably can, it’s football.

Steam is Pretty Much Gone for Indies…

Sean Alexander

Admit it, you all saw it coming right?

 

Steam has been heading down this path for a long time, and as the monopoly force behind digital distribution for PC games it has just sat and done nothing.

 

So what has happened? Well FDG Entertainment revealed that yes, Blossom Tales on Nintendo Switch in only three months, outsold its Steam release by 20 to 1. This has allowed the developer to stay in business.

A game styled like Zelda on PC has every opportunity to explode into a critical and commercial success on Steam. Low barrier to entry, great game, great basis, all a recipe for success. Alas, Steam failed.

It failed to deliver on what should have been a smash hit. It was buried under the waves of hundreds of weekly games and tech demos poured onto Steam in a market with no curation whatsoever. But that one move over to a console gave it all the light it needed.

It cannot be understated, it kept a company in business by moving away from what IS and SHOULD BE a huge market.

But it isn’t, at least not anymore, and its unlikely to ever be again.

share_steam_logo

Steam has long been the bastion of indie games, propelling lesser known studios to stardom to then propel their own games with their own marketing bucks to an even wider audience, rather than risking being a drop in the bucket trying to make a wave by luck.

Of course now, you are almost guaranteed to be a mere drop in the bucket. Steam doesn’t care. It got its fee – the users likely can’t find you, curators can’t curate, the market is over saturated.

The recent Nindies Showcase, while showcasing 14 games, was met with a lot of “Is that new”? Turns out a lot of the games are coming FROM Steam, where people didn’t even know they existed!

steam-greenlight

Back with Steam Greenlight, a mess though it was, games were announced to be coming to Steam via the program. It was a big deal. Now with Direct, the entry fees haven’t changed – the curation has demonstrably gotten worse – and the games just sort of…appear.

That’s all that happens. Games just…show up. No fanfare. Valve got your money now go try to sell yourself amid the wave of new games coming tomorrow.

 

A better way to word it, is imagine trying to sell your game, but your only chance at making enough money to break even is to basically be the Wii. A flash of lightning in a bottle. That system got huge success due to the right ideas to the right people at the right time.

On Steam, you need to be lightning in a bottle, and it needs to be immediate, or the wave of sewage will come and douse you.

 

Oh, and Steam also has THIS issue:

 

So that is where we are now. Games are finding more success on curated store fronts, where the console makers, Sony withstanding it seems, are more than happy to push indie games. They know these small developers will one day be the big shots. It’s a shame Valve has left itself become complacent.

 

As for the PC side, I can’t see things changing. Valve is in a position to not be challenged in distribution, so unless a platform for indies appears and explodes, you’ll have to be lightning in a bottle. Every day on Steam that window gets smaller and smaller though.

 

Thanks for reading and sorry for the huge delay and absence! Things will begin to pick up slowly! Let us know what you think of these revelations (It was obvious really) and see you all next time! Happy Gaming!