dartmonkey

I've played about half an hour and did the first two levels. I found myself holding A when I didn't want to but otherwise I think the controls are magic. I want to get back and practise. Mind you, I left most of the coins behind. It feels very Viva Piñata-y and the music's great 👍

I'll be picking up Snake Pass tonight. It'll be a nice prelude to Yooka-Laylee. So I've been playing KoF '98 a bit. It would have been good to have the resolution options explained more clearly - I had to search and test for the cleanest option at 720/1080 - and if you want to use a joycon each in 2 player, you need to set that up before you start the game. It took a little time to get my head around the Neo Geo CDBA button arrangement (and I think Hamster could have done a better job of explaining beyond the list of letters and icons), but it's a nice package. The sticks are too jittery on the menus (I've taken to using the d-buttons to navigate them) but work fine in-game for a button masher like me. The game itself, though? The art and animation is incredible! I'm shite at fighting games but it's fun to turn the difficulty way down and just see the fighters and the stages.

Zoink. This video shows before and after the patch - still not perfect but a significant improvement. The third area shown is the only one where I've felt my enjoyment affected by the choppiness, mainly because it's one of my favourite places. Minor location (and equipment) spoilers, I guess (it's woodsy). Good call @RubixsQube on the Spirit Tracks score. The credits music really highlights how great it is. It says I'm over 95 hours into BotW now. I've been to the castle on a recce but without fighting Ganon. I was going to do the Death Mountain dungeon last night but I keep getting distracted. Edit. Okay, just tried out the patch. It's a real improvement in the third area - docked is far less choppy, and handheld is better than that. Obvious issues remain but I'd say it's no longer distracting. I'd be really interested to hear more about the process and the tech behind the port. Is it emulating any part of the Wii U here? With such different architectures I'm assuming it's doing a lot of work that's not immediately obvious, and that the framerate would be solid were it built from the ground up for Switch (and maybe 60fps?!) It'll be really interesting to compare it to Mario and other bespoke Switch games - a category which, I think, only includes 1-2-Switch atm, no?

I'd pay to see Calamity Ganon bonked in the nose with a soup ladle. Edit. Bonked ON the nose. Bonked in the nose...well, that's just unsavoury.

So once again I am Switch Wanker in the cafe. The more time I spend with the system on the go, the more I like it. Sitting with the screen on the table and a joycon secreted in each palm, I'm no more noteworthy than anyone with an iPad or laptop (although this is an old man bar and newspapers are the newest media going). The screen is fantastic, the battery's fine, I can throw it in my bag no problem. Crucially, breaking off the controllers means I don't feel like I'm getting the lite, cramped, handheld experience. After playing Oracle of Ages a few weeks ago, it's amazing to play full 3D Zelda, uncompromised by input limitations, sitting at a bar. The next iteration could improve several things. Although the screen size was the right decision for portability, Switch 2.0 could reduce the bezel and expand the screen out a few mm. You shouldn't be able to slide the controllers on upside down by accident (I haven't done that yet, but I'm pretty careful/anal). The power socket should be on the top so you can charge it in tabletop without needing another lump of plastic from Hori. And the power button should be an embedded slide switch that can't be pressed accidentally inside a case.

Jeez, rerelease or no, World of Goo is such a wonderful game! For me, up there with Galaxy on the Wii. I've just played it for 5 mins to test the controls but I'm so looking forward to revisiting it after, what, a decade?! Still looks nice and both touch and pointer feel great. Anybody played Human Resource Machine? I got Little Inferno on PC but never HRM. The only thing making me want to fire up the Wii U atm is to finish the Splatoon SP. Maybe I'll do that before hitting the sequel. Gonna miss the test fire thing.

Make this, Nintendo.

As a D-pad, the buttons are useful only for navigating menus. The sticks work fine for casual play. A single joycon is obviously suboptimal but being able to break them off for 2player is worth it. For extended periods you'll want two, or the pro if you're serious. I'm hoping Nintendo will release a yellow left joycon with a d-pad in place of the stick, not the buttons. Then you've got the best of all worlds.

Has anybody tried the Neo Geo games? I downloaded King of Fighters 98 out of curiosity - never played a KoF and this is supposed to be a good one. I fired it up briefly to look at the display options. You can move, rotate and resize the screen and add scan lines to your heart's content. I can't find a 1:1 pixel mode but the package seems pretty good, if sluggish. I'll play it tonight. It was tough to find any solid opinions or information on these games. Does anyone have experience with them (either on Switch or previously)?

Some Thumbsy grenade references in this Eurogamer article. Something I've been considering over the past week - how does Breath of the Wild's success affect Skyrim's reception on Switch? The reveal was understandably muted. I'm not sure how the jank will go down now.

Mine came with about 50% battery, I think. They have about 20 hours in them.

It's a Rosy Rupee Rudolph Hunt!

DLC!

I'm all about the Phantom Ganon. Dorf. Calamity Ganon just makes me think of Breath of the Wild being narrated by the Bastion guy. 'Kid went wild smashing pots.'

I just ordered a couple from eBay, for a few euros. I'll report the quality when they turn up. I wasn't aware about the steamy bathroom thing either. I read yesterday that your playtime per game shows once you've owned a game for 10 days. I just checked and I've clocked up over 40 hours on Zelda so far, only one dungeon in!

The horses vary SO much! I was pretty happy with Geronimo, my 4 stirrup star, but I just went after a nice looking horse (turned out to be a side questy one) and it's like I'm walking on air. Also, maybe everyone's doing this and I'm an idiot, but if you jump off your horse and draw your bow mid-air you get a whole bunch of awesome bullet-time slowdown. I accidentally equipped a bomb arrow and the bob-ombobklin explosion was epic. And Geronimo caught fire

I've got tempered glass on my phone and it's great. I've seen one for Switch which I will probably get but it will add a half mm of thickness and exacerbate the supposed scratching effect in the dock. So I'd rather get some sort of felt tabs for the dock before I replace the standard protector that's on it now. Man, felt tabs!?! I used to despise the very notion of screen protectors. I got old

Don't the seawater Zora and the freshwater Zora have beef? Maybe I dreamt this. No! It's in Oracle of Ages. Not beef, but rivalry. All the Zora in Ages are saltwater. I reckon Medli's simply got a Zora ancestor in her family tree. The Zeldaverse is definitely down with mixing races (it seems all the Zora princesses have got the hots for Link, no?) I must have played 25 hours and I just got my first Divine Beast last night. I think I'll visit Gerudo Land next (desert is also my least favourite 'theme' and, although I've done a bunch of stuff in the North East, the tower seems unclimbable at the moment.) South West for the Gerudos, isn't it? Hearing the bard play Epona's Song on the accordion along with the stables music was sweet.

LORE SPECULATION ALERT! - rather than the Rito evolving from the Zora, maybe Medli's mum/dad/ancestor was a Zora? I always thought it weird the Zora weren't in Wind Waker. Surely they'd be OWNING the place if the world became one big ocean. Is my memory playing tricks or were there one or two secret ones to find?

The official one is more of less perfect unless you want something louder. It doubles as a stand, holds a few loose carts and joycon straps (is anybody using those?) and comes with a screen protector. Although having played Zelda, that Sheila Slate one that came with the Limited Edition looks neat too. Does anyone know what the HAC on the product ref numbers stands for? GameCube was DOL for codename Dolphin, Wii was RVL - I assumed Switch would be NX-. Edit. Ok, I just checked and Wii U was WUP-, not CAF for Cafe.

I didn't realise they were so scarce. Is that the same all over the US? There seem to be loads lingering in Europe.

I'd probably investigate stores or Walmarts/Best Buys/Regional Equivalents that have just had an influx of Switch gear and will be looking to flush out their Wii U inventory on cluttering up their shelves in the near future.

Cheap secondhand Wii U? There must be some deals around or upcoming. I know, right? I'm pretty sure it was crit path the first time. It immediately brought to mind Gruntilda in Banjo-Kazooie! But she's presented in a fun, goofy, fairytale way. This seemed to be serious, which made me wonder if I'd missed something and this dude was a struggling, rubbish lyricist or something. I cringed through the whole thing!

Without being specific, somebody just 'sang' me the Calamity Ganon story in rhyming couplets and it was godawful! Is it intentional? The writing everywhere else is very good. Example:

I've got the Sonics, the Streets of Rages, Out Run, Shinobi, Space Harriet, Gunstar Heroes and now Hang-On and Ecco. I think I'm good - the last two were complete nostalgia purchases and I'm just considering others because they were cheap. I think the sale has ended now.