I’d probably be the first person to defend Pokemon Legends Z-A, but man is it tough to recommend the DLC. Cool concept of space-time rifts and weird alternate dimensions with new monsters. Cool extra story with deepened lore into the characters’ backstories and the world. But oh, SO. MUCH. RNG.

It’s too hot.

Annual reminder to charge up all your lesser-used wireless controllers to conserve long-term battery life. Don’t let them sit in storage for months!

It’s just turned midnight where I am! Happy new year to everyone, here’s to a peaceful, happy, safe and prosperous 2026.

Pheeeew! That’s the second time in my life I’ve done this, and I’m not sure I’m keen to go back and do it again. What an incredible game, just as magical and charming as I remember.

Wario World is a fantastic game to come to NSO, but why can we still not play Wario Land 1, 2 or Shake It on modern systems? Is this some kind of Captain Syrup censorship? Give me back my Pirate Queen, Nintendo!

Heads up to American Luigi’s Mansion fans: I sincerely recommend turning on PAL version titles on the GameCube NSO app for this one. The post-game stuff is very different!

Everyone’s saying that Close to You thing is obviously teasing a Pikmin project. Low-hanging fruit if you ask me. Crackpot Andrew says the baby is Illumination Peach from the second movie, before stumbling into the Mushroom Kingdom and becoming their princess. The other stuff is all a red herring!

Prices be damned, I for one am excited to be able to play Virtual Boy in some kind of official capacity, since the original was never sold in Australia. I love the ridiculous accessory, but my one gripe is that it doesn’t appear to come with a controller.

FATAL FRAME LET’S GOOOOOOOOOO

Anyone else finding voices and some sound effects to be SUPER low compared to the music in Kirby Star-Crossed World? I could have sworn Kirby himself was at least louder in the Switch 1 version… maybe I’m missing some settings somewhere.

…WHAT.

Finished DK Bananza last night. No spoilers from me but the game and the ending are magical.

Random gamer musings of the day: isn’t it weird that both Wario Land 1 and 2 are still absent from NSO despite the games being in arguably one of the flagship series on the Game Boy? Don’t get my hopes up for a Shake It style remake collection or anything, Nintendo…

The best thing about Switch 2 so far is unimpeded access to continuing my backlog on beefier hardware. I just might get around to finishing Age of Calamity now.

Switch 2 thoughts so far: - The system is solidly built. Everything feels sturdier and higher quality than the previous system. - I love that the System Transfer really does cover everything; all user profiles, friends, games, DLC, current menu theme, current settings. No fiddling with selections.

The red plastic gives the coloured insert art a strange horror vibe. The plastic of the cases feels thinner and a little flimsier than Switch 1 cases. I assume it’s to conserve plastic, which is okay I guess?

The deed is done.

Happy Switch 2 launch day! Time for coffee and a midnight drive home to start installing mandatory updates. And GameCube games.

5 minutes left…

Shiny~

Hello from Future Island (also known as Australia). Switch 2 launches in ONE HOUR!!

I just realised the #Zelda TotK trailer themes are included in the NSO music app. This makes me happy beyond words; the buildup and last minute or so of that “Third Trailer” score honestly makes me tear up. It’s little bonuses like this that more than make the NSO subscription worthwhile for me.

Can anyone recommend a decent high-capacity wallet or case for #Switch games? I’m talking 100-200 game cards, the bigger the better.

Video game developers should be banned from putting sliding picture puzzles in their games.

It is just me, or is the eShop considerably laggier since the update? It never used to chug while loading lists or starting trailers quite like this before…

So the NSO GameCube controller (understandably) features a C button. Makes me wonder if they’ll redo any older controllers to feature the button; especially the NES one with an actual USBC port and none of those silly Joy Con rails.

GameCube controller pre-purchase went live on Nintendo Australia’s store half an hour ago. The site went into maintenance for an hour beforehand, so all users who were logged in got kicked out. The site then predictably chugged with endless lag and gateway errors, and is now back in maintenance.

Wow, so over 2.2 million people in Japan alone registered to preorder Switch 2 on the official My Nintendo store lottery, not counting those who planned to preorder from external retailers. Orders have exceeded expected manufacturing numbers. “But it’s too expensive and nobody will buy it!”

It occurs to me that GameCube games on NSO will require emulation of removable memory cards for save files, which may function slightly differently to how the other systems use save data. I’m gettin’ my hopes up that they might finally do N64 Controller Pak emulation. I need my Konami KCEK games!

Do I want the costumes to be arranged in sub menus? Sure, but those who are complaining are completely overlooking that “sort” button in the bottom right of the screen. Zelda had it too, people just don’t like to read. Besides, it’s not like this wasn’t done before in a much more predatory manner…

So I got my hopes up about possible Koopaling battles in Mario Kart World, but it still looks like an amazing game! I preordered right after the Switch 2 direct, and I’m very much looking forward to June.

Finally saw The Day the Earth Blew Up. It was great! It was the only session showing that day, the cinema staff seemingly didn’t know about the movie until they double-checked their software, there were no posters anywhere, and there was only one other group watching. I hope Coyote fares better.

I saw Hands Off photos on social media, many of them. The headlines in Australia (and many other countries, I checked) read along the lines of “Thousands protest in rallies across USA”. Some say “hundreds”, some just claim “angry protestors”. It sure looked like a lot more than that to me!

Also seeing some knee jerk reactions about the return of region locking? It seems there’s a cheaper Japanese-only model, and a standard Switch 2 with multi language support. It seems that if your account isn’t set to Japanese you can’t use it on the cheaper model. This doesn’t seem unreasonable…

So the way I read all the info: If a Switch 1 game is compatible with Switch 2 it’ll work fine. Some (hopefully most) will get a free upgrade to improve performance and/or add minor features. Select games that have new content specifically for Switch 2 will have a cost to upgrade. This seems okay?

I have no predictions. Going in with a clean slate and I’m excited to see whatever they show! I hope, however, that they show a brand new, full 3D Wario game completely out of left field.

The Gradius collection reveal was cool and all, but not including the Parodius games was a huge missed opportunity.

Highlights for me: Dragon Quest, Metroid Prime 4, Eternal Life of Goldman, Z-A nightlife details, Tomodachi Life. Patapon, Gradius, Necrodancer, Rhythm Heaven and that Marvel game looked cool. Maybe Saga 2, but sprites looked kinda washed out. Groaned at that Disney cafe game.

I’m not sure I entirely understand or like that Virtual Game Card thing. Is this going to prevent us having a game installed on more than one Switch at once?

A Japanese Metroid account I follow posted their hopes that Other M gets a Switch port, and it got me thinking. Would the game be more widely accepted if they changed the Varia Suit authorisation issue, or was it just too broken by design? What would it take to sway public opinion of the game?

Of course, realistically though- we’ll probably see more of Metroid Prime 4, Professor Layton, maybe some Pokémon Legends Z-A. Possibly Kirby. We might be lucky enough to see ports of Zelda HD from the Wii U, maybe Silk Song? The presentation will be at 1am here for me. Time to set some alarms.

One more Direct before next week! I’m really not expecting any more major surprises this close to a new console release, so I’ll just reiterate the same wishes I have every time: - Ganbare Goemon collection - Fatal Frame 1-3 ports/remakes - More classic Castlevania - Metroid Prime 2/3 ports.

It baffles me how people can enter into a debate and use words like “Grok says…” or “According to ChatGPT…” and expect to be taken seriously like they’ve cited any kind of credible source of information.

Oh hey! Season 4 of Dr. Stone launched with apparently no advertising in my area. The bright side is that means I have more episodes to watch in one sitting! If you haven’t seen this anime but you have *any* interest in science or inventions, you owe it to yourself to check it out.

200%! I appreciate Modern Mode smoothing some frustrating difficulties of the original game, but it does perhaps diminish some of the feeling of accomplishment. It’s still a fantastic game and I’m glad to have it on modern systems. Screw Time Attack, though!

If NSO’s classic game libraries continue onto Switch 2, it’d be a really cool new feature to be able to read the original manuals for each game. Or, y’know, maybe translate the text in those JP-only games, huh?

2025 is going to be my “Finally get around to clearing some backlog” year. I finally played and finished Clocktower this year thanks to @wayforward.bsky.social and managed to cross off a long-standing bucket list item. It was so good! Next up is finishing Travis Strikes Again and starting NMH3.

Wishing everyone who sees this a safe and happy holiday to yourself and your loved ones. Hope your 2025 is full of joy and fun!

My controversial gaming take is that due to frustrating controls and unruly, clumsy, inconsistent animations that constantly block player input, games by Team Ico are just not very good games. They are incredible atmospheric *experiences* with fantastical stories, they’re just not good *games*.