bigsocrates

@hungrymatango: Thanks for the kind words!

The one thing I'd say is that the Bowser's Fury section is pretty short. It's really good but there are only 100 Cat Shines to get, and many of them are quick little things like a 20 second time trial race or a 1 minute boss fight. If you do not plan to play 3D World it's hard to recommend at full price, fun as it is. Of course if you do plan to play 3D World again then it's a pretty attractive combined package.

I'm going to give the very unsatisfying answer of "it depends."

There's a lot of solo content in Smash Ultimate, not just including World of Light (which I think is just kind of so-so but is at least quite long) but also arcade ladders for each of the dozens of characters and various other modes and custom battles. So if you like single player fighting games especially in Smash's style then there's a ton there for you.

On the other hand there's no strong solo story like in a Netherrealm game, and the customization stuff is much weaker than in something like the Namco games (which also has better story stuff) so it really comes down to whether you enjoy the wacky fighting with tons of stages, weapons, and rule variations.

Personally I enjoy Smash and I played it almost exclusively solo when it came out and got about 40 hours out of it, so I wouldn't discourage you. But the Smash gameplay doesn't gel with everyone, and the stuff around the gameplay that a lot of fighting games have added (better stories, great character cutomization, etc...) just isn't there.

World of Light is essentially just a series of reasonably fun challenges against various opponents and formats, with a few boss battles thrown in. It's nothing like Subspace Emisary. But if the idea of playing a whole lot of single player Smash appeals to you then there's a ton to do in the game, it's polished, fun, has literally the best soundtrack in gaming with all the music that's in there from various games, and still manages to surprise and delight from time to time.

@senorsucks2suck: Gamestop was in no way a bastion of obscure titles. I have no idea what you're talking about here. Obscure titles have been sold either online or in small specialty game stores for many years. Gamestop stocked more mid-tier titles than something like Best Buy, but they haven't stocked the actually obscure stuff for a long time.

You also don't appear to understand how Ebay or buying at many online marketplaces work. Those kinds of competitive auctions are only for rare or unique items. For normal games (even relatively obscure ones like the PS3 Puppeteer game) most listings are "buy it now" and have a defined price. Or you can shop on Amazon marketplace and get a defined price. Auctions are the exception for this kind of thing.

I already said that Six Days in Fallujah is not bypassing physical sales because of Gamestop. It's because physical games don't sell. Reviving Gamestop won't change that. Gamestop still has thousands of locations, but people are not buying physical games there. You completely misunderstand the dynamics of this. It's the disinterest in physical sales that are the problem for Gamestop, not Gamestop being the problem for physical sales. Six Days in Fallujah may not release physically but it doesn't matter how many Gamestop stores there are. If there was a market they could always sell it on Amazon and other online retailers. There's no market. That's the fundamental issue.

Shopping malls are a dying business and do not represent diversification from a physical goods business. They are both suffering from the same issues.

You seem very confused about what's happening.

1) People have greatly reduced their purchase of physical games for various reasons (predating Covid-19).

2) Because of this fewer game makers are producing physical versions.

3) Also because of this and also because of competition online Gamestop's business has fallen off a cliff.

4) Gamestop is closing locations and trying to restructure to stay in business.

Your main issues here are 1 and 2. That's why Six Days in Fallujah may not get a physical release. If you were able to reverse #4 (save Gamestop) that will have no meaningful effect on 1 and 2. 4 is not driving 1 and 2, 1 and 2 are driving 3, which is driving 4.

Ebay exists.

Amazon marketplace and similar things exist.

Small scale game stores exists.

The idea that Gamestop is the only place to buy used physical media is...very wrong. There's like 10 places online I can get Croc: Legend of the Gobbos for a reasonable price right now and none of them are Gamestop.

The idea that Gamestop's woes are driving the decline of physical media is also wrong. It's the other way around. Games aren't not getting physical releases because Gamestop is suffering. Gamestop is suffering because people aren't buying physical. And Gamestop doesn't carry the obscure games in physical first run anyway. They have a bunch of Madden and Call of Duty but many of the smaller games that do get physical releases get them online, because Gamestop doesn't care.

I understand why some people are upset about the decline of physical games, but Gamestop's issues are a symptom of that, not the cause. If Gamestop got a $10 billion cash infusion right now it would not use that money to buy shopping malls of all things it would use it to diversify the business because physical games are becoming a niche business.

You've misdiagnosed the problem here, and also tying this to the notorious Six Days in Fallujah is just a really weird choice. There are much less controversial and better obscure or small game projects to talk about.

@wollywoo: You're not the first person to ask "Why did Nintendo waste its time with Mario 64 when it could have been making Croc: Legend of the Gobbos.*"

The answer is, I think two-fold. Part of it is just a desire for innovation and making new and better games, which Miyamoto has always had. The other part is cartridges. It is difficult to fit a huge number of varied levels onto a cartridge, especially one as small as the N64 cartridges started out. It's much easier to put a game that reuses a bunch of smallish playground worlds on there.

Mario 64 was only 6 megabytes. It's worth noting that the N64 actually didn't have a lot of long level based platformers, partially for this reason. Obviously later in the machine's life the cartridges got much bigger (as much as 64 megs) and compression got better, so you see wizardry like Resident Evil 2 being put on the machine, and something like Donkey Kong 64 is massive and sprawling despite having a lot of backtracking, but the more open world collectathon structure of Mario 64 and Banjo Kazooie plays nicer with the cartridge format, especially at the launch of the system.

*Okay, okay. Crash Bandicoot.

@therealturk: This isn't entirely correct. There are, in fact, vision cones and the like (most notably from the characters who can see through your disguises.) It's not the only mechanic in the game, but it's definitely there, and you can use those traditional stealth mechanics (luring people with coins, hiding bodies etc...) to play through entire levels. Mostly they are used in pursuit of sub objectives like getting the right disguise or some equipment, but they're there to be used as much or as little as you like.

I've completely revised my opinion after getting deep into the game. This game is great. I do think it takes a little while to get going (unlike Odyssey) but once the level design starts clicking and some of the new mechanics come into play it is a really really good Mario game. I still probably like Odyssey more because it's more my type of game, but there are lots of great little touches and some fantastic levels.

So my answer to my own question is that it holds up well. It's got that timeless Mario charm.

I started the game thinking "Is Mario no longer for me?" By the end of World 6 I was thinking "Am I going to go to jail for being a hater? I deserve it!"

Something to remember is that every Mario game is intended as someone's first Mario game because these are ultimately kids games, so I should have had more patience as an old hand for it to get through the "introducing the basic mechanics" stage and into the "yo check out these wild levels" part.

@giant_gamer: I'm not going spelunking for Youtube Nazis for you. Of course being a literal Nazi is banned, but the algorithm isn't perfect and this stuff definitely exists there. https://www.propublica.org/article/despite-crackdowns-white-supremacist-and-neo-nazi-videos-take-stubborn-root-on-youtube

But the point is not whether Youtube "allows" literal Nazis. The point is that this dude pointed all of us to a Youtube channel he made about the murder of Ahmaud Arberry and called "Berry Buster" and that disqualifies him from fun debate. And the fact that Youtube "permits" it (the channel is far too small to be noticed by the moderators and the algorithm is notoriously unable to pick up on this kind of thing anyway) doesn't make it okay.

You're trying to change the subject away from the actual behavior at issue because you know it's indefensible. And he's the one who raised it. He linked to that channel, and the channel's name is cruel and dismissive towards a murder victim, and that's the ball game.

@giant_gamer: Don't pretend to be naive. His channel is about Ahmaud Arberry and "berry buster" is clearly a crude reference to a murder victim, whose killing he defends. It's part of the reason the channel is so disgusting (if you wanted to make a good faith argument that the Ahmaud Arberry case was misrepresented you would call your channel something else.)

You may be willing to talk about games with people who actively reveal themselves to be defenders of white supremacist murder, but I am not. Tolerating that stuff is how we got to the horrible place we are in our society where we have regressed on racial issues.

The idea that Youtube is the arbiter of morality and carefully pulls all the wrong material down is beyond laughable. Youtube is famously a major vector of right wing and racist disinformation.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/06/08/technology/youtube-radical.html

https://www.technologyreview.com/2020/01/29/276000/a-study-of-youtube-comments-shows-how-its-turning-people-onto-the-alt-right/

@giant_gamer: We're not the one who changed the topic. He is. He linked to a Youtube channel called "Berry Buster" that was nothing but a few Sekiro videos and a bunch of apologia for a racist murder.

If I'm at the gym talking about lifting routines with a dude and he pulls his shirt aside to show me his pecs and there's a big swastika tattooed there with "Hitler Was Right" under it the topic has changed is no longer about the bench press and I'm not the one who changed it.

He could have made a new Youtube channel (or just not had one to begin with) or linked to other videos. The literal name of the channel he linked to is "political."

How far do you take this? If he linked to some Sekiro videos he had hosted on a Stormfront page are you cool with that too?

If you link to a Youtube account like that then you are the one who made things political.

Hell if he knew how to operate the forums he could have just embedded the video and nobody would have noticed!