Nintendo

Fire Emblem Heroes Gives Me The Structure I Need Right Now

Mobile gaming is a pitfall of crude monetizations and flash in the pan games. Most people I know have moved on from Fire Emblem Heroes. But it’s become a crucial part of my day to day. Initially, Fire Emblem Heroes provided a gateway to the other games. The bright characters and their brash personas ignited a…

Four Indie Games Launch On Nintendo Switch

For all of the hullabaloo about the Switch having a minuscule launch lineup, Nintendo’s hybrid system has actually come out stronger than most new consoles. That’s mostly thanks to Zelda, of course, but there’s also Specter Knight and now a bunch of indies coming to the Switch this week. Next time Nintendo updates the Switch…

If You’re Playing Zelda, Try Fast Traveling Less

So you’ve been playing Breath of the Wild for more than a week. You’ve made some decent progress. You’ve finished some of the story and unlocked most of the map. It’s only natural that you’d start fast traveling. A few days ago I noticed that this was how I was playing, at least. After several…

My Quest For The Prettiest Horses In Breath Of The Wild

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild offers players a remarkable amount of freedom in terms of gameplay. For the moment, however, I’m completely obsessed with taming the prettiest horses. The huge world of Breath of the Wild is dotted with wild horses you can tame to get around on. In order to tame…

Fire Emblem Heroes Is Getting A Hardcore Battle Mode

An upcoming update to horny strategy game Fire Emblem Heroes is making some major changes to the game. New battle modes, arena fixes, and an additional way to collect feathers should help breath some life into the game. Fire Emblem Heroes announced a major update through in-game notifications today. The “April Update” has a few changes. One…

Tips For Playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is a big, brilliant game full of secrets to uncover. It’s a blast to explore on your own. But you might need a little nudging. UPDATE (3/15/17): Now that Breath of the Wild has been out for a couple of weeks, we’ve updated this post with some…

How To Play Switch On TV If You’re Worried About The Dock Scratching Your Screen

Between reports of screen scratches and concern over blocking the heat vents on the back of the tablet, some folks worry that docking for TV play isn’t the best thing for the Nintendo Switch. Good news for them—all it takes to bypass the dock is a simple USB-C extension cable. While folks like me were…

Announced last fall, here’s a better look at Mario Sports Super Stars for the Nintendo 3DS. The game is, of course, getting an English release, but here is a recently released Japanese-language trailer. 

Seven Years Later, Pokémon Player Finally Maxes Out Pokéwalker

For over seven years, Japanese Twitter user Suica has been carrying around the Pokéwalker pedometer that was bundled with Pokémon HeartGold and SoulSilver. And now, Suica has discovered its secret felicitations. When Suica’s Pokéwalker hit 9,999,999 steps, a message reading “Congratulations!!” (おめでとう!！or omedetou!!) appeared on the pedometers tiny screen. An in-game message also appeared, stating,…

Despite Nintendo’s Stumbles, Breath of the Wild‘s Fans Have Embraced Crossdressing Link

Breath of the Wild is light on plot, which makes any missteps stand out. One brief costume change illustrates how designers can fail and how fandom is left picking up the pieces. Here’s the moment: looking for help in the desert, Link seeks to enter Gerudo Town to speak with their ruler. Gerudo Town is…

Even Nintendo Seems To Be Abandoning Game Instruction Manuals

One of the last reliable supporters for the concept that video games should have instruction manuals appears to be backing off. Nintendo has released its first games on its new console without instruction manuals: nothing on paper and not even a digital manual. Nintendo’s 1 2 Switch party game has no paper manual inside it,…

At First, Nintendo Couldn’t Agree On How To Depict Zelda In Breath of the Wild 

The Legend of Zelda has legacy, and every entry in the series is a chance to embrace or refute that tradition. Nintendo’s considerations on how to do away with conventions even trickled down to established characters, such as Zelda. Today, Nintendo released a 3-part series on the making of Breath of the Wild in which…

Star Fox, by Tyler West

Player Becomes First Woman To Win International Pokémon Tournament 

Last weekend’s big Pokémon tournament in Australia saw many famous players, including two world champions, duking it out for the top title. Zoe Lou, a player with no previous major finishes, stunned and thrilled the community by rising above competition. In doing so, she has become the first woman to win an international Pokémon event…

I Swear, If It Rains In Zelda: Breath of the Wild One More God Damn Time

Breath of the Wild is an amazing game, but I do have some gripes with it. My biggest annoyance has to be the rain, an entity that has caused me more pain and suffering than Ganon’s evil forces. Estimating conservatively from my ~60 hours of playtime, I’d say it pours more often in Hyrule than…

Painting Nintendo Switch Joy-Con Different Colors Isn’t As Scary As It Looks

Truly painting your Joy-Con controllers will require taking them completely apart. The process looks gnarly but the people who have done it say it’s not that bad. Take Imgur user Retaihec for instance. Not satisfied with the neon-colored Joy-Con that arrived with the Switch they took to disassembling them so they could spray paint both…

Drifblim Used To Be Terrible, But Now It’s Everywhere In Competitive Pokémon

Drifblim is typically not fast or strong enough to be offensive, and its base defenses are pathetic. Even though that hasn’t changed with the latest games, the the haunted balloon Pokémon’s usage has actually been surging significantly in 2017. Here’s why. Pokémon Sun and Moon introduce items called seeds, and they are consumables tied to…

Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Players Are Tricking Amiibos To Grind For Rare Loot

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild is amazing in its own right. Its world is breathtakingly gorgeous and bursting at the seams with surprises. So why am I and other players wasting so much time resetting the Nintendo Switch’s clock so we can keep spawning new treasure chests with our Amiibos? For me…

Speedrunner Completes Zelda: Breath of the Wild In Less Than One Hour, A New World Record

One week after release, the speedrun for The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild has fallen under one hour thanks to a slew of optimizations and new techniques. Yesterday, speedrunner gymnast86 completed the game with a time of 58 minutes and one second. It is a significant time difference from the game’s first completed…

Zelda: Breath Of The Wild Is Full Of Amazing Little Details

The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild manages to be both massive and unusually detailed. The sprawl of Hyrule will take weeks or even months for most of us to explore, not just because of its square mileage but because of how much there is to see and do in a given field or…