Author: sick skills

Welcome to the latest instalment in our nostalgia-inducing column, Memory Pak, where we deep-dive into some of the most memorable moments in gaming – good and bad.

Today, Jim is reflecting on a years-long dilemma he faced over an oft-forgotten DS game, and wonders how we deal with “video game brain fog”…

You probably don’t remember every game that you have ever played. Nowadays we have the eShop’s ‘Previously Downloaded’ lists, constant GOTY conversations and tracking apps like GG or GameTrack to remind us what we have been playing, but that wasn’t always the case. In truth, not all games are life-changing experiences and, chances are, the more you played in the past, the more you are prone to forgetting.

If you have been gaming for most of your life, then this list of forgotten games is likely something that you have learned to accept (after all, you’re probably blanking on it for a reason, right?) but what about those games that are only partially forgotten? The ones where you can remember one small, generally “ungoogleable” element of it like a particular gameplay mechanic or a snippet of cover and nothing else. These are the really annoying beasts.

Until this week, I had this very issue with a game that I remembered had many pixel art scientists in lab coats on the front cover, but that’s it — no recollection of gameplay, platform or the all-important title. To say this had been driving me up the wall would be an understatement. There are only so many times that you can search for “Pixel art scientist DS game” or “GBA pixel art professor lab coat” before recommendations of “Did you mean Professor Oak?” become frequent enough to make you want to pull your hair out.

This cycle had been going on for years — yes, plural — and I had resigned myself to the fact that I would never find this game (who knows, maybe I even made it up), but then, while listening to a podcast this weekend, I heard a mention of a 2000s RPG starring an old professor and the title immediately sent alarm bells a-ringing: Contact.

Contact was released in 2006 and was developed by none other than Suda51’s own Grasshopper Manufacture. You take control of Terry, a young boy who is enlisted by a mysterious professor, who has crash-landed on a strange planet, to help gather the cells that power his ship.

I say “take control” specifically because you — the player — are actually a character in-game. The professor speaks to you throughout, and you control Terry by using ‘decals’ (stickers) to give him power-ups, but most importantly, the professor doesn’t want Terry to know you exist. Despite being an RPG, the game is incredibly short, which might be why I struggled to remember it.

Looking back on it, Contact carries more than a little EarthBound in its visual DNA — come on, that professor is Dr. Andonuts — but it turns out it comes down to more than a few visual similarities. The game launched just a month before Mother 3 in Japan, and there was apparently some confusion between the two games’ marketing.

Thanks to a flash animation that Marvelous Interactive published in September 2005, which featured the aforementioned professor, many suspected the animation to be a teaser for the long-awaited Mother 3. A few days later, the teaser was revealed to be for Contact, and not related to the Mother series at all. Mother series fansite Starman.net covered it extensively back in the day, from the teaser all the way to the confusion and eventual reveal.

Of course, I was oblivious to this as a kid. To me, Contact was just a game with a cool-looking scientist on the cover. Ness? Lucas? Never heard of them…

Despite the fact that I had initially remembered so little, a brief look at a Contact playthrough on YouTube (thanks, Jax Longplays) brought it all flooding back. The fourth wall breaks, the contrast between top- and bottom-screen action, and the ending really got under my skin as a young buck.

By all accounts it wasn’t a particularly great game — even I don’t remember enjoying it that much — but the search was over and I could finally sleep.

Without that podcast or the above YouTube video, Contact may have stayed well out of contact in my mind. I’m not sure what I would have done had I not remembered, but it’s a cracking feeling — a relief, I’ll admit — to finally clear the video game brain fog.

In fact, there’s an entire subreddit called r/tipofmyjoystick where fellow gamers can share their own stories and details of the games they barely remember, while community members try to solve the mystery of “what is this game?” There’s a step-by-step guide on how to format a post to give you the best possible chance of rediscovering that lost B-tier game from your past.

So after my years-long search for Contact in the depths of my mind came to an end, I thought why not open this dilemma up to the wider Nintendo Life community and find out whether any of you lovely lot have found yourself in a similar position?

If there is a game that you can’t quite put your finger on and it has been bugging you for a while, drop everything that you can remember (platform, cover, gameplay etc.) into the comments and let’s see if we can, collectively, dig up these almost-forgotten titles. And don’t forget to vote in our poll to let us know.

After being revealed at the June Nintendo Direct showcase, we now know that Batman Arkham Trilogy will be bringing the Caped Crusader to Switch on 13th October.

The package will consist of Batman: Arkham Asylum, Batman Arkham City, and Batman Arkham Knight and is also set to bundle each games’ DLC in there with it too — how nice! If you are after the physical release, it’s worth bearing in mind that only one title in the trio — Arkham Asylum — will be appearing on the game card, requiring you to download the other two.

This date was revealed in an official tweet from Nintendo, which promised that we will soon be able to “Experience Gotham City in a whole new way” and revealed some sweet new artwork.

If you are looking at that date thinking, “hmm, isn’t something else coming out in October too?”, you would be correct. In fact, the month is looking really rather stacked with the likes of Super Mario Bros. Wonder, Metal Gear Solid: Master Collection Vol. 1, Detective Pikachu Returns and many more coming our way in the neat 30-day window — our poor wallets…

Will Batman Arkham Trilogy make it into your October purchases? Swoop down to the comments and let us know.

After being announced for Switch back in June, publisher Graffiti Games and developer Team Ugly have today revealed that the spooky platformer Ugly will be coming to Switch on 14th September.

In Ugly you play as a troubled nobleman (is there any other kind?), whose past you will gradually unravel as you make your way through the series of levels, solving puzzles, navigating tricky obstacles and taking down giant bosses. You will do this with the nobleman’s combat skills (of course), but there is also an interesting-looking mirror mechanic, where you can make a reflection of your hero and navigate the rooms from an alternative perspective.

For a game called Ugly, the visuals are anything but. From what we have seen in trailers so far, a vibrant art style help to emphasise some of the game’s more creepy chills from grotesque monsters to detailed environments — here’s hoping that it all holds up on Switch.

For a little more information about the game’s features and a look at some screenshots, check out the following from the Graffiti Games website.

– Secrets, secrets, everywhere. From hidden rooms to hints about your tragic past. Do you dare to find them all?
– Overcome enormous bosses and tricky puzzle rooms using a satisfying mix of skill and strategy.
– A large variety of puzzles to challenge even the keenest mind. Most puzzles can be solved a variety of ways, so each player’s experience will be different.
– Each puzzle room offers fresh challenges and provides a new piece of the story. Solve them all to get the full picture.
– A stunning art style, detailed animations, and plenty of interactable elements bring this dark fairytale to life.
– After solving all of the puzzle rooms to reach the interactive ending, you can try to unlock an alternate ending by solving all of the hidden rooms.

Ugly will be available to download from the Switch eShop on 14th September.

Does this look like it will be up your street? Let us know in the comments.

Polish developer Cave Games and publisher Leoful have announced that Little Devil: Foster Mayhem, a stealth game all about causing chaos in your foster homes, is coming to Switch on 25th August.

Playing as a little kid who is passed between different foster homes, your goal is to create as much mess and trouble as possible without getting caught by your foster parents. That means getting hold of tools kids shouldn’t be holding, such as screwdrivers, saws, and spray paint to make a mess of multiple different homes.

Here are some more details about this unusual take on the stealth genre from its eShop listing:

It can be annoying when you don’t get what you want… so why not stir up a little mayhem when no one is looking?

Take control of a young mischievous boy called Little Devil as he sneaks around the house to destroy electronics, craft traps, and spread mayhem in the lives of his foster parents. Will his actions ultimately get him what he wants in the end?

Explore your foster parents’ house to find tools and gather intel. Use a variety of everyday items to distract, disarm and delay until you’ve successfully destroyed the entirety of your foster parent’s home. Perhaps the next parent will provide a better lifestyle for you – or at least more gadgets for you to mess with!

Features

• Avoid getting caught as you unleash mischief
• Find and deploy common everyday items such as hammers and spray paint to prank your foster parents
• Destroy furniture, disable security equipment, and ruin precious jewelry
• Craft elaborate traps and bribe animals with food
• Explore the unique homes of a variety of foster parents
• Collect secret story fragments to uncover the backstory of the Little Devil
• Complete optional achievements to raise your high score

Little Devil: Foster Mayhem is available to buy on the Switch eShop with a special 10% discount from now until 4th September 2023, but the chaos doesn’t start until 25th August.

Will you be taking the hand saw to the sofa in Little Devil: Foster Mayhem? Let us know in the comments.

Over the past few years, there’s been a rise in ‘cozy’ games popping up in the indie space, offering an alternative to the typically achievement-based design of pretty much everything else. While these games do require a different mindset due to their generally short nature and simplistic gameplay, there’s something to be said about immersing in something more focused on delivering a brief, simple, and relaxing experience. Flutter Away from Runaway is the latest cozy game to grace the Switch, and while it doesn’t set any new standards for the genre, it’s still a decent experience.

Flutter Away could be best described as a ‘walking sim‘ with just a hint of Pokémon Snap mixed in there. You play as a city-dwelling woman taking a solo camping trip to a rainforest for a few days, primarily to interact with the extensive butterfly population there. Over the five days of your trip, which together last about an hour in real-time, you’ll hunt three new species of butterfly each day to photograph and document. To get the butterflies to appear, you have to fulfill a series of simple objectives, such as helping a capybara get fruit out of a tree or setting up a campsite, all of which are fulfilled by a point-and-click interaction. The total play area is roughly the size of an actual campsite, so finding the next objective is usually a pretty straightforward process. There are also a handful of optional hidden objectives to fulfill along the way, such as photographing tree frogs.

It’s not a terribly ‘fun’ game in the sense that many games are, yet there’s something alluring about the quiet and serene atmosphere that makes the hour worth seeing all the way through. Slowly walking through a forest, journaling your findings, and sitting by the campfire has a nicely chill vibe to it, and the credits roll just about at the point that it feels like things are starting to get a little stale. There’s even a bit of replayability to be found in the optional objectives and a series of achievements you can collect for meeting various criteria.

Visually, Flutter Away feels a little lackluster, as you’re presented with a charming, but chunky world that looks just a bit cheap. Low-res textures, flat colors, and blocky models are par for the course here; not hideous by any means, though certainly not impressive. The illustrations in the journal are a nice plus, but it feels rather disappointing when compared to the more visually interesting styles of other walking sims. Couple this with the fact that it’s only an hour long, and it may not justify the $13 price tag for some players.

Flutter Away is relaxing but uninspiring. It does an excellent job of setting up a peaceful atmosphere that just gives you the space to check out some butterflies, but it’s also over nearly as soon as it starts, and there’s not a ton else to do on a subsequent playthrough. If you’re looking for a cozy one-and-done experience to disappear into for a bit, Flutter Away delivers before making good on its title.

By the time The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time launched in 1998, J.R.R. Tolkien’s ‘The Hobbit’ had already been on shelves for over 60 years. It should come as no surprise, then, to assume that the iconic fantasy title would have some influence on Nintendo’s own N64 adventure title.

According to Did You Know Gaming, however, who recently trawled through an extensive amount of old Nintendo interviews, Ocarina of Time was originally set to include its own original character called ‘Hobbit’. This was revealed in an interview with Shigeru Miyamoto himself, who explained that the role of the Deku Scrubs was originally intended for a separate character who would tell stories, sell items to Link, and more.

The development team ultimately ran out of time and repurposed the character into the Deku Scrubs we all know and love. All was not lost, however, as even Miyamoto states that the Scrubs are his favourite characters in the game, so it all worked out in the end. Still, it would have been a neat little callback to The Hobbit itself.

The video from DYKG contains plenty more interesting tidbits about games for the N64, so be sure to put aside some time and check out the whole thing.

Would you have preferred a ‘Hobbit’ character over the Deku Scrubs, or are you happy with what we got in the end? Leave a comment with your thoughts below.

LEGO Star Wars: The Skywalker Saga found itself at the top of the charts for the second week running thanks to some heavily discounted PS5 bundles. At retailers such as Currys, customers could bag a brand new PS5 console with the game included at a price of £399.99, though it appears that this discount is now no longer valid at the time of writing, so it’ll be interesting to see where Lego Star Wars winds up next week.

Switch maintains a strong showing this week, with FIFA 23, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom all taking the 2nd, 3rd, and 4th spot respectively. FIFA 23 sold the most on the Switch this week, making up 40% of the overall console split. Pikmin 4 also moves up a spot to land in the 8th position, which is nice.

Otherwise, it’s pretty standard stuff this week with only one new release in the form of Atlas Fallen at position 22. Curiously, digital copies of legacy Call of Duty games have been making waves recently thanks to the revived multiplayer compatibility on Xbox, but given that boxed copies of these titles are no longer being produced, they won’t show up here. So that’s yer lot!

Here’s this week’s UK top forty in full:

[Compiled by GfK]

< Last week’s charts

Did you pick up any new titles this week? Let us know your thoughts on the charts in the comments below.

There are constant requests for more Switch ports, and one company working around the clock in this particular field is the UK team at Feral Interactive.

In a recent post on social media, it shared a cryptic message about a few new sightings on its gaming radar. If you head over to its website, you can see two games coming “quite soon” to the Switch. Although there are no names attached, we do have some text and pictures.

One features the Switch logo next to an image of dolphins and the text “over our heads”. The other one has a Switch logo in front of what appears to be a pool table and the words “now you’ve got to play the part”. You can see some fan theories and speculation on the Nintendo subreddit.

All we really know for sure is that these titles are “upcoming” releases for Feral Interactive and they will be coming “quite soon”. The same company recently wrapped up work on The Lara Croft Collection for the Nintendo Switch and has previously released Switch ports for Alien: Isolation and GRID Autosport.

What Switch ports would you like to see next from Feral Interactive? Comment below.