According to a well-known Nintendo insider, another Mario sports game is already in development at Nintendo, Bandai Namco, and Now Entertainment. The insider continues noting that it’s “very likely” that this will be a new Mario Baseball game, which has been dormant since 2008 when Mario Super Sluggers was released via the Nintendo Wii. Unfortunately, this is the extent of the report other than a brief tease that it will have guest characters, and, specifically, Pac-Man. The report comes the way of Zippo Speaks, an insider and leaker who has proven reliable in the past, particularly when it comes to Nintendo and Persona. And for what it’s worth, they’ve relayed word of previous new installments in the Mario Sports series before they were officially announced.
“In today’s ‘no s**t’ news, Nintendo is preparing a brand new Mario Sports game, this time being developed by Bandai Namco and Now Entertainment. This is very likely to be a new installment in the Mario Baseball series, which hasn’t seen a new entry since 2008’s Mario Super Sluggers, though baseball did appear in Mario Sports Superstars for the 3DS in 2017.”
Given that tennis, golf, and soccer have already all got their new installments on Switch, it seems inevitable that baseball will now get its shine as the last core sport in the series not to be touched yet. In other words, in addition to a report, this is also just a safe prediction.
For now, take everything here with a grain of salt. This is all unofficial information, and even if it’s accurate, it’s also subject to change. This game could get cancelled or kicked down the road and all of sudden all this information will no longer be accurate or relevant, assuming it’s either in the first place.
As for Nintendo, it has not commented on this rumor and the speculation it has created. Typically, it does not comment on rumors or leaks or anything of the unofficial and speculative variety. There’s no reason to expect this pattern to break in this instance, but if it does, we will be sure to update the story accordingly.
When you tune into Twitch streamer Perrikaryal’s channel, you might see her playing FromSoftware’s role-playing game epic Elden Ring with fourteen, unfamiliar black sensors stuck to her scalp. It’s her—as she said during an informational stream earlier today—“just for fun” electroencephalogram (EEG) device, something researchers use to record the brain’s electrical activity, which she’s repurposed to let her play Elden Ring hands-free.
“Okay what and how,” publisher Bandai Namco responded to a clip of Perri (whose name seems to refer to the perikaryon, the cell body of a neuron) describing how she linked brain activity to key binds to help her play the game, shared by esports reporter Jake Lucky on Twitter.
Cue the disbelief (“I’ve gotten a lot of stuff online being like, […] ‘are you for real?’” Perri says in that Twitter clip) and cries of Ex Machina.
It does look incredible—in the clip, you see Perri simply say “attack” to her screen like a gamer girl Matilda and then, after a short delay, her Elden Ring character responds by casting Rock Sling at an irritated boss. But I spent my undergrad fixing eye-tracking devices to my friends’ heads while they helped me fill my lab requirements, and I know that, although brain technology can look complicated, some of it was still easy enough for me as a 19-year-old. So I reached out to my former classmate, University of Michigan cognitive neuroscience PhD candidate Cody Cao, for his thoughts.
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“EEG has really good temporal resolution,” he said, “meaning that the collected neural response to gaming stimuli is down to milliseconds. If the neural responses corresponding to available actions present vastly different neural patterns, algorithms can decode or differentiate which is which after training. Then, you play the game with EEG.”
But playing a game with your brain—something Elon Musk tried to shock the public with in 2021, when his brain-computer interface company Neuralink released a video of a monkey playing Pong using its technology—won’t give you an advantage.
“Decoding is still janky,” Cao told me, “60 percent to 70 percent accuracy is considered pretty good,” compared to 90 to 100 percent accuracy in performing an action manually (which also requires your brain!).
“It takes algorithms a lot of training to get to an acceptable performance. They likely need to experience a lot of different examples of the same thing (like Perri saying ‘attack’ before attacking) to be able to account for a vast majority of attacks,” Cao continued. “It’s like FaceID on your iPhone—it gets better with the more examples it sees.”
Perri also emphasized in her stream today that she isn’t necessarily innovating, but bringing the possibilities of EEG usage to the general public’s attention.
“It’s not that crazy, it’s really easy to do. And it’s been done since 1988,” she said about gaming with her brain. “It’s not necessarily anything new that I’m doing, I’m just not sure that it’s very well known.” But now you know, and maybe you’ll figure out how to mind control me a grilled cheese that doesn’t hurt my stomach next.
This week, all at once, a perfect storm of deals, discounts, and sales has hit the Nintendo Switch eShop. Batten down the hatches, open up your wallets, and check out some of these limited-time deals, including massive savings on numerous Lego titles, Mortal Kombat games, and hits from Capcom, Ubisoft, and Bandai Namco.
Before we go any further, just note that—with the exception of Ubisoft’s Mario + Rabbids—there aren’t any Mario, Zelda, or Kirby games on sale. Instead of first-party discounts, all of these sales are focused on third-party publishers and developers. But there are still plenty of great games to grab up for cheaper than usual, even if Mario and Luigi aren’t part of it.
Here are some of the best deals I spotted cruising through the various sales currently happening on the eShop. While all of these sales are ending at slightly different times, you more or less have until the end of the month (or a few days past that) to take advantage of these discounts.
Now, with that out of the way, here are the best deals I found so far. (The figures in parentheses are the normal prices.)
In the down moments of playing a distressingly long Mario Party 2 gamethis weekend—my friends get a garbage truck full of NES and Super NES games with their Nintendo Switch Online membership—I started wondering what other retro games were only a download away on publishers’ official storefronts.
By that I mean the Microsoft store for Xbox-compatible games, Nintendo’s store for the Switch, and so on. There are actually some hidden freebies therein, and you might not have realized these five games were so directly within your grasp. So hang your hat, partner. The long night is over. Keep reading and check out five throwback games you can download now for free.
1943: The Battle of Midway
In 1987, Japanese developer Capcom published Street Fighter, Mega Man, and, among other arcade games, the vert shoot ‘em up 1943: The Battle of Midway. It was a somewhat disconcerting followup to Capcom’s also-disconcerting shooter 1942, released in 1984. Both games center, oddly, on the players’ U.S. army planes gunning down Japanese fleets during World War II.
But if you don’t often analyze the presence of war in games and aren’t concerned with why a company decided to kill off its own country’s soldiers to appeal to Americans, then, well, 1943: The Battle of Midway is kind of cool.
It’s simple—make the evil planes explode!—but its colors are vivid, its music is dynamic , and its repetitive shooting will make you feel so zen that you’ll instantly forget the plot of any anti-war documentary you’ve ever seen. It’s available for free when you download Capcom Arcade Stadium on PlayStation or Switch, and you can add on four other 19XX games for $2 each.
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Up to $100 credit
Samsung Reserve
Reserve the next gen Samsung device All you need to do is sign up with your email and boom: credit for your preorder on a new Samsung device.
Download from the PlayStation Store or the Nintendo Store.
Pac-Man
Fortune cookie-shaped Pac-Man started eating his way through a ghost-lined maze in 1980, and publisher Bandai Namco is still trying to stave off his endless hunger in its often-updated mobile version of the arcade phenom.
This version contains the traditional Pac-Man maze you probably associate with arcades—a midnight blue map spotted with edible dots and bonus-point fruits—along with additional “story mode” mazes, themed “adventure mode” events, and a leaderboard for its “tournament mode.” Submit to the sounds of whiny ghosts and download for your Apple or Android device.
Download from Apple’s App Store or Google Play.
Sonic the Hedgehog Classic
1991 Sega Genesis side-scrolling platformer Sonic the Hedgehog gets another life on mobile while retaining, for the most part, its original look and feel—pixelated waves and trees, tufts of grass and blocky dirt patches that frame the way to taking down bad baldie Dr. Robotnik.
This refreshed version features a remastered version of the original, the classic sparkly soundtrack by Dreams Come True, and is compatible with Xbox controllers. You can play on Apple and Android devices.
Download from Apple’s App Store or Google Play.
Pinball FX2
Microsoft Studios published Pinball FX2 in 2010, not reinventing any wheels, but providing a solid virtual pinball experience with different-themed tables (the aquatic Secrets of the Deep, a Las Vegas take on Rome, etc.). Flicking switches won’t feel or sound as snappy as in a real pinball game, but then again, you can’t typically play those from the safety of your couch. You can play Pinball FX2 on Xbox, and download free trials of additional themed boards like Star Wars and Aliens vs. Pinball, too.
Download from the Microsoft Store.
Shadow Warrior Classic
Former Zilla Enterprises bodyguard Lo Wang gets a wakeup call in the 1997 first-person shooter Shadow Warrior: Megacorporations are bad. He learns this after his power-tripping former boss sends a slew of demons after him as punishment for quitting, which he responds to by blasting them in the face as he runs across Japan.
Good for him. Though, Lo Wang is undoubtedly a racist caricature, with stilted dialogue lines delivered in an awkward accent. And though the game was built with the same engine as Duke Nukem 3D, a modern audience might instead note how simplistic the graphics look by modern standards. It’s far from perfect.
But, like in Duke, Shadow Warrior’s fast-action gunplay holds up, and developer 3D Realms’ obsession with packing every square inch with secret rooms and unexpected (sometimes crude) references provides an enlightening trip back to the weird early days of first-person shooters.
Download from Steam.
What other official freebies have you found in your sojourns through the Switch, PlayStation, and Xbox app stores? Tell me your best finds in the comments.
In really stepping things up news, it’s just been announced that Amazon Games is set to publish the next Tomb Raider game. Following Square Enix’s retreat from the Western front, and the sale of both developer Crystal Dynamics and the Tomb Raider license itself, it was unclear what might happen to Lara’s ongoing adventures, coming up on five years since her last outing. Now we know, although we don’t know very much.
In a press release from both Amazon Games and Crystal Dynamics, the newlyweds announced an agreement for a multi-platform game to be globally published by Mr. Bezos and company.
Now, it’s not news that there’s to be a new Tomb Raider, not least because of course there is. But also because we learned earlier this year that Crystal Dynamics (CD) are planning to develop it using Unreal Engine 5. However, that was revealed a month before Square Enix’s surprise decision to sell off most of its non-Japanese assets to the Embracer Group, assets which included Crystal Dynamics itself, leaving everything mysterious for anyone outside of what must have been tumultuous circumstances.
It seems that as the dust has settled, Amazon has swooped in to claim a pretty enormous prize, and finally have a title in its gaming collection that everyone will have heard of. It’s also an opportunity for Crystal Dynamics to try to reclaim some lost ground, following the ongoingslo-mosightoftheveryblandMarvel’sAvengersbeingdriven into a bridge.
In a very press-releasy press release, everyone involved says how terribly excited they are to be working on such a wonderful property of such majestic joyfulness, but I imagine in the offices of both companies it was mostly enormous “PHEW!” sounds. While Amazon Games has delivered a couple of interesting MMOs, until now they’ve only had Bandai Namco’s Blue Protocol to boast about for next year, and that’s not a name that your aunt’s heard of. Tomb Raider will finally put the publisher on the map.
We know nothing whatsoever about the new Tomb Raider, not even its name. Today’s announcement calls it a “single-player, narrative-driven adventure,” which tells us not a bit, but does rather peculiarly describe Lara Croft as “multidimensional.” This is a power I’ve not seen her use before, if you don’t count coming back from the dead.
It’s been four years since Shadow of the Tomb Raider, and given how early this new game clearly is (we’ve still not seen so much as a piece of concept art), it looks like this follow-up could break the record for gaps between entries in the franchise. The last longest was between the close of the series’ best trilogy (fight me), 2008’s Underworld, and one of its worst entries, the awful, stupidly named 2013 reboot, Tomb Raider. I predict we’ll see this announced for March 2024, and it’ll release in November that year.
Last night’s Game Awards was one of the annual event’s biggest shows yet. With a flurry of surprise appearances, awards, excellent speeches, game reveals, and other oddities, it was easy to lose track of everything. But if you’re a fan of anime MMOs and you find the idea of a sci-fi fantasy adventure focused on rebuilding the future after an apocalypse appealing, then Bandai Namco and Amazon Games might have something pretty cool in store for you. It’s called Blue Protocol, and it’s shipping next year as a free-to-play title on PC, PS5, and Xbox Series consoles. Oh, and you can sign up for a free, closed beta expected in the near future.
Blue Protocol was originally announced back in 2019. And while what we saw during last night’s trailer for the anime MMO was quite fresh, fans have gotten a look at the game before via server tests, and there’s been a fair bit of speculation and discourse about it over the years on the game’s unofficial subreddit. It’s otherwise been a little elusive though, with some concerned about the game’s development given the lack of updates. But last night’s trailer at the Game Awards proved that development is very active and the game will be arriving next year. It also revealed that Amazon Games, which has previously published Lost Ark and New World, will be serving as publisher. Check out last night’s trailer here:
Bandai Namco / The Game Awards
I mean, come on, this looks pretty damn cool. And there’s a lot of potential in its premise, described by executive producer Sokichi Shimmoka as “a project that takes players on a heroic journey through a planet teetering on the brink of destruction after millennia of conflict and technology overuse.” Details on the gameplay, which offers five different classes to choose from, an “action-based combat system,” and neat-looking summons called “Echoes,” are featured on the game’s official website.
While many are likely delighted to see some new footage of this game, perhaps one of the more surprising twists is that Amazon Games will be publishing the MMO. In a statement to The Verge, Amazon’s vice president of its games division, Cristoph Hartmann, spoke to the experience of working with the team behind Lost Ark previously and emphasized that the lessons learned from that game will carry over to the publisher’s support for Blue Protocol. And based on statements from Hartmann as well as Shimmoka, Blue Protocol might have some broader IP plans with potential “transmedia opportunities.”
With a nice blend of science fiction and fantasy aesthetics, and a focus on bringing some hope and positivity to a doomed world, it’s great to see more post-apocalyptic stories that are about striving for something meaningful. The post-apocalypse is far too often a narrative space for doom and gloom, without much meaningful reflection. Let’s hope Blue Protocol changes that up a bit.
@QualityGeezer I don’t enjoy FromSoft games because they’re difficult, exactly. If I just wanted difficulty I’d just whack up the difficulty on everything (I actually play on normal or even easy on most other games)
I think it helps that there’s no difficulty levels.
And when I beat a boss, if it’s on my own (with Spirit ashes or NPC summons admittedly) there’s a sense of accomplishment. If I do it with a mate or two, and we’re communicating different strategies, it’s immensely satisfying. There’s almost always a sense of overcoming something.
Plus FromSoft games are 99% gameplay. I love that games are getting more cinematic and story driven, but there’s nothing more frustrating than getting in the rhythm and flow of combat before a walking section, then a fairly mediocre puzzle and a long cutscene.
I absolutely understand why the difficulty of the games puts a lot of people off. I had so many moments in ER where I was ready to quit, whether it was Margit or Caelid in general. Or Malenia. The difficulty spikes in this game could get disgusting at times. Which is why I can also understand ER winning best Multiplayer :’)
Earlier today, artist Thomas Feichtmeir dropped an interesting piece of news on his Twitter feed: back in 2016 he was part of a pitch that wanted to reimagine Dark Souls 3 (or at least its world) as a 2D Metroidvania game.
With an NDA he signed over the project now expired, he was for the first time in six years allowed to talk about—and share a single image—of what the project could have looked like.
This looks cool! Before you go screaming at Bandai Namco for not approving it, though, know that this kind of stuff—namely, people and studios pitching projects involving a publisher’s IP—happens all the time. We just rarely get to hear about it, or see the results.
I spoke to Feichtmeir—a pixel artist who has worked on a bunch of games, from Blasphemous to Songs of Conquest—earlier today, who as part of the NDA he signed is able to now show his work and talk a little about it, but not talk a lot about it.
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“The art was created around 2016 as everyone wanted to have a cool 2D, Souls–like Metroidvania, as the genre was new and the hunger for a game like this strong”, he says. “Of course someone had to try a pitch to Bandai Namco.”
With his experience as a pixel artist, Souls community member and YouTuber, Feichtmeir can see why he was chosen to help out on the pitch. Sadly it never went anywhere—like I said, pitches come in and get rejected all the time—but you could argue that part of its spirit would eventually find its way to another game.
“A lot of people [on Twitter] pointed out that this looks a lot like Blasphemous, with which they are right and it also makes a lot of sense, as a few years later I actually would work on Blasphemous as an artist”, he says. I wrote about Blasphemous back in 2017, just a year after this pitch, and said it was basically a “2D Dark Souls”, so there you go.
“I hope you enjoy looking at the art as much as I had fun creating it back then”, Feichtmeir tells me. “It’s cool to finally be able to share it after all this time.”
Bandai Namco is apparently making this summer one for PlayStation platforming remakes! Pac-Man World: Re-Pac is out today on Switch, and — following on from Klonoa Phantasy Reverie Series — shows the Japanese developer is acknowledging and showing a little bit of love to some of our childhood favourites.
Early reviews have been dropping all week, and while we’re working on the NL verdict, we wanted to share what others think of Pac-Man’s return to 3D platforming. We’ll let you know what we think as soon as our review is up and ready!
So far, there’s only one Switch review at the time of writing this, from Pocket Tactics. The outlet gave the game a disappointing 5/10, saying that other platformers have already done everything that Pac-Man World does better:
“That’s the lingering question that I take away from playing Pac-Man World Re-Pac, the millionth-or-so remaster of a classic 3D platformer I’ve seen in the last couple of years, where exactly does the remaster train stop? I loved Donald Duck’s Quack Attack, another classic PS1-era platformer, but does it warrant a remaster? Spyro and Crash, I get, but when we’re reliving Pac-Man’s mediocre-to-good 3D adventure, I wonder whether the time and money might be better spent on a new IP.”
Our friends over at Push Square were a bit more generous, giving the game a 7/10 on PlayStation 5:
“Pac-Man World Re-Pac is a fun look Pac in time to an era where 3D platformers were far more prominent than they are today. While it doesn’t quite outclass some of its contemporaries like Crash Bandicoot Warped and Super Mario 64, Pac-Man World isn’t one to miss if you’re looking for another solid 3D platforming adventure.”
Destructoid felt similarly about the remake on PS5, also awarding it a 7/10:
“With the lower-key stakes (coupled with a lower-key $30 price point), and a firm consistency with level design, Pac-Man World Re-Pac still kept me interested throughout. I’m not sure Pac-Man World Re-Pac is going to lure in many more fans, but the ones it already had should be happy with this new packaging.”
God is a Geek reviewed the game on PC. They gave the remake a 6.5/10, citing the disappointing collectibles and underwhelming arcade-style levels don’t help Pac-Man to stand out from the pack:
“The level variety is certainly nice, but the fairly unimportant collectables and disappointing arcade-style levels let the game down. If you’re a fan of the hungry yellow puck you’ll probably have some fun with the remake, but don’t go thinking it’s an essential purchase otherwise.”
Digitally Downloaded brings us back to the PS5, and they gave Re-Pac a solid 8/10, acknowledging that it’s more for fans of the original and those nostalgic for ’90s 3D platformers:
“When I find that my complaints largely have to do with wishing there was more content in a game that is already perfectly sufficient, I know that I’ve had a good time. The original game sold 1.5 million units, was well-received by critics and justified a number of sequels. Bandai Namco is most justified in trying this on to see if there’s room to revive the Pac-Man World property.”
Are you playing Pac-Man World: Re-Pac on Switch? Let us know what you think of the game in the comments!
Update [Sat 23rd Jul, 2022 02:45 BST]: It seems this demo has already gone live on the Japanese Switch eShop. Provided you have access to a Nintendo account in this region, you can download it right now and play it with English subtitles. Enjoy!
Original article [Fri 22nd Jul, 2022 01:55 BST]: Following on from the news in May that SD Gundam Battle Alliance would be receiving a worldwide release for Switch on 25th August 2022, Bandai Namco has now announced a free demo. It’s releasing on 28th/29th July, but the Switch version will follow at a later date.
This demo will allow players to try out ‘Directory 1: Mission “Tekkadan”!’ and players will also be able to transfer across the demo’s save data to the full version of the game when it is released.
Here’s a bit about what to expect from this upcoming release, along with the original release date announcement trailer:
“After strange incidents known as “Breaks” occur across the Gundam universe, it’s your job to find out what’s going on and restore the proper timeline. You’ll do this by leading three mobile suits into battle – with this entry featuring over 20 different mobile suit Gundam series. There’ll also be the ability to battle alongside friends in online co-op multiplayer.”
Will you be giving this demo a go? Leave a comment down below.
