Category: Nintendo News

If you cast your minds back to 1994, or allow yourself to simply imagine that time if you weren’t born yet, you may remember Mickey Mania on the SNES. Developed by Traveller’s Tales, this platformer also arrived on Sega Genesis and Sega CD, with one noteworthy element being its 3D, ‘into-the-screen’ chase – seemingly a first in game development at the time. So how was this achieved?

Well, YouTube user GameHut – who just so happens to be Jon Burton, ex-director of Traveller’s Tales/Tt Games, no less – has shared some insight into the process. The video goes into a nice level of detail, breaking down the individual elements on screen to show how the final gameplay was pieced together. Using a mixture of layering, repeated animations, and very cleverly shifting around a set of colour palettes, the final result was a huge success.

Seeing each stage come together – especially the moving floor – is rather fascinating, and goes a long way to show how game developers were utilising the technologies available to them at the time. If you found yourself marvelling at the chase sequence back in the ’90s, you can now rest easy knowing exactly how the magic happened.

Do you have any memories of Mickey Mania? Would you have guessed how the sequence works under the hood? Feel free to let us know below.

THQ Nordic has announced that This Is The Police 2 will be attempting an escape on a Switch near you very soon, with a release date of 25th September now confirmed for the title.

A mixture of adventure and management genres, This is the Police 2 picks up the original’s baton, introducing new mechanics in the process. It isn’t enough to simply manage your police force’s equipment and individual skills; every challenge requires your direct participation in tactical combat scenes where outcomes hinge on your decisions. 

This time around you’ll be playing as the new sheriff Lilly Reed, who has to deal with the criminal underworld of Sharpwood. On top of the features mentioned above, several extra tweaks have also been made since the original, including the addition of distinct personalities for each member of your police force. The game has received “mostly positive” on Steam, on which it launched just a couple of weeks ago, and you can view the game’s initial release trailer below. Please be advised that this video is intended for mature audiences.

Did you enjoy the original game on Switch? Have you been looking forward to this sequel? Let us know with a comment down below.

As the dust begins to settle, and as we finally manage to retrieve our well and truly blown-off socks, it seems like now is a good time to take a look back at the shenanigans, reveals, and juicy info that were all present in the recent Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Direct.

Many went into the Direct with a degree of caution, preventing themselves from any potential let downs, or even annoyance thanks to the Smash-heavy E3 presentation, but the online reaction since the event seems to have been mostly positive, leading us to question what else Nintendo and Sakurai-san could possibly announce.

Before we ask you for your opinion on all things related to the show (via the lovely polls and comments section featured down below) feel free to watch the full video again to recap if you need to. We had the character announcements for Simon and Richter Belmont, King. K Rool, and Chrom and Dark Samus as Echo Fighters; the single-player Classic mode was confirmed to be making a comeback; a handful of new multiplayer mode options were revealed; and even the shocking ‘death‘ of our favourite green hat-wearing moustachioed plumber amongst other things.

So, with all of that nicely cleared up, it’s time for you lovely lot to let us know what you thought. Go ahead and leave your votes in the polls, and make sure to share any extra thoughts with us in the comments down below.

Mario Kart VR has been a thing in Japan for a while now, but the concept has only recently made its way to the UK, with Namco Bandai setting up a unit at Hollywood Bowl inside the O2 in London this month.

Simon Davidian paid a visit and shares his thoughts in the video above. As you can see, it looks like jolly good fun, even if it is a little limited in scope – you can’t select your character, for example, and are assigned one depending on which unit you pick.

Weapons are physically thrown using your hands, which naturally makes the whole thing feel a little bit different to the ‘normal’ Mario Kart – Davidian likens the experience to a ‘tech demo’, which seems a fair conclusion.

The other catch is that it costs £7.99 per person to play, or £24.99 for a group of four people. That’s a lot of cash, but then again this is a pretty unique proposition. 

Let us know if you’ll be making the trip to the O2 to play it by posting a comment below.

During the Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Direct which took place on Wednesday, one interesting section towards the end of the show revealed the game’s main menu. One section of this menu was blurred out, with Sakurai teasingly saying that we’ll have to wait for more news on what it might be, but one fan has been working hard to decipher what might be hidden underneath.

By zooming in heavily, excruciatingly checking out every frame in closer detail, and enhancing and juxtaposing the image, Twitter user @noctulescent seems to have figured out exactly what is said. In the Japanese presentation, the image shows ‘スピリッツ’, meaning ‘spirits’ – although, with eyes unfamiliar to Japanese characters, this may admittedly be quite hard to see.

In the English language Direct, the word ‘Spirits’ can be rather easily seen, however. Assuming this is true, and the word ‘Spirits’ remains in the game at launch, what could this possibly mean? The Direct opened with Luigi’s spirit seemingly being taken away from him, as part of the Simon and Richter Belmont reveal. While this initially seemed to just be a fitting way to introduce the Castlevania characters – and possibly still is just that – could it have a deeper meaning for another mode type in the game?

The possibilities are endless here, with ideas such as a much deeper story mode instantly popping into our heads, but time will tell what will come of this mysterious section.

Do you have any crazy ideas as to what ‘Spirits’ could be? Let us know with a comment below.

Hit a golf ball from tee to green on different holes is one of the Battle Pass Challenges in Season 5 of Fortnite. To achieve this, you’ll have to find the golf tee locations dotted across the Fortnite map.

Complete it and you’ll earn Battle Stars that will help boost you up the tiers for those sweet Season 5 exclusive rewards.

In this guide, we’re going to help you find the location of every single golf tee, then you can move on to the other difficult challenge this week, follow the treasure map found in Snobby Shores.

Fortnite – How to Hit a Golf Ball From Tee to Green on Different Holes

Epic has introduced a bunch of golf tees across the map, and you simply have to find these locations then whack a ball from them onto the green just like in the real sport.

You’ll know you’re at a golf tee when you find a numbered sign and two yellow balls. Stand in between the balls and hit the golf ball onto the green to complete this challenge.

Where do you find a golf ball, we hear you ask? Well, it’s a brand new toy that Epic introduced as part of season 5. You’ll have to get to Battle Pass Tier 27 to unlock it though, so go and do that first.

Make sure you then equip it to an emote slot though, or you won’t actually be able to do anything when you get to a golf tee.

Once equipped, you need only use the emote when you’re in the right spot and aim for the green to work on completing this challenge. It works in a very similar manner to previous the basketball challenge earlier this season.

It might take a few attempts until you get the hang of it, but make sure you stop and wait until the challenge is marked and complete before you rush onto another tee.

The difficulty with this challenge is surviving long enough to hit a golf ball before you’re attacked. Your best bet might be to join a team mode like 50vs50 and complete the challenge with swarms of friendly players around you.

Fortnite – Golf Tee Locations

Fortunately for you, this challenge doesn’t involve storming the entire map seeking out golf tees. This time, they’re all in one location: Lazy Links.

There are nine golf tees in total here, and seeing as you only have to hit a golf ball on five of them, this challenge shouldn’t take too long to complete.

The most difficult aspect is that every player and their mums is going to be spawning right on this location to complete the challenge, so you might want to hold off or play a team mode or something.

Despite being one of the first third-party games to be confirmed for the console, the promised Switch version of Steep has been subject to an unfortunate amount of doubt over the last year or so. Now, it seems that the game has been well and truly cancelled.

Replying to a Twitter user who asked for any news on the Switch port supposedly in the works, the official Steep account responded with news that they likely didn’t want to hear.

As you can see, Ubisoft has shifted its efforts towards making the Live Seasons in the game as strong as it can be – a feature that is naturally present in the already existing PS4 and Xbox One versions. In October last year, the game’s director Arnaud Ragot reaffirmed Ubisoft’s commitment to the cause, although we weren’t entirely convinced that the project would make it even then. Sadly, it appears we were right to be dubious.

Were you hoping to play Steep on your Switch? Let us know if you’re upset by this news in the comments below.

The Super Smash Bros. Ultimate Direct on August 8th gave gaming fans a healthy amount of previously unannounced information about the upcoming mascot-fighter. (By the way, what is up with Nintendo’s sky-high production on these character reveal videos? Who wouldn’t watch entire episodes of that?)

There’s a ton to sift through, and fans will be happy to sift. The biggest headlines, along with notable updates, are as follows:

Plus, there were announcements regarding a litany of new assist trophy characters from across the gaming universe, new items, and lots of other odds and ends which were all discussed during Nintendo’s presentation. Even as a bulleted list, that synopsis is long!

So after all that, you may be asking yourself, “Okay, so what’s left?”

Good question. Nintendo said more info is coming. And while there are only a finite amount of announcements feasibly left, there’s actually plenty of stuff you can glean from what we know already, as well as from what’s been done in the series’ past.

(Fair warning: literally anything is possible with future Smash announcements. Highly educated guesses could be torn to pieces with an out-of-the-blue press release or something totally unprecedented. I am not claiming to have front-line access to Smash Bros. development. That said, this is the realistic landscape at present.)

What The Confirmed Stages Might Tell Us

There’s an otherworldly amount of stages in Smash Bros. Ultimate. As stated above, there are 103 before you even factor in the gameplay variations.

If you’re keeping track at home, and I know a select few of you are, these are the only stages from all other Smash Bros. games that apparently won’t appear in Ultimate:

• Flat Zone
• Flat Zone 2
• Icicle Mountain
• Jungle Hijinxs
• Miiverse
• Mushroom Kingdom Melee
• Mushroomy Kingdom 1-2
• Mute City Melee
• Orbital Gate Assault
• Pac-Maze
• Pictochat
• Planet Zebes
• Poke Floats
• Pyrosphere
• Rainbow Road
• Rumble Falls
• Sector Z
• Woolly World

Here’s what the stage menu looks like so far:

Besides endless variety, what can we take away from this? Mainly that from a UI perspective, the scope for more stages is arguably limited.

Now, I know what some of you are thinking right now: “But Alan! They could just make the screen even smaller! Or create a paginated menu!”

Well, yes, they could. Heck, the stage select could’ve just been a mockup made for display purposes. Nintendo could, in fact, announce even more stages (that would’ve required considerable more development time than the team probably had), bringing the total up a teensy bit higher.

All that to say, it’s simply more likely that those things aren’t true. Given the geometric rigidness of the stage menu as presented in the direct (and on the new website), plus the frank logic of development resources, there’s simply a better chance that this is it, for now.

And if that holds true, that also means that unless a brand new character doesn’t also bring with them a corresponding multiplayer stage (unprecedented in Smash history), that means that any already-developed new fighter has to come from the stages already present in the game.

So Which New Characters Are Still To Come?

Say a fictional or non-fictional entity out loud. Go ahead. Literally whatever you just said has already been suggested by somebody for Smash Bros. But there are far better ways to venture an educated guess.

For instance, before Dark Samus’ announcement in the most recent direct, sharp-eyed fans noticed that Samus’ “Dark Samus” costume was no longer selectable in the E3 demo. The Dark Samus assist trophy was also thus far absent from the demo. Given Samus’ nemesis Ridley was front in centre during the game’s blowout reveal at E3, combined with the concurrent in-development status of a major Metroid title (Metroid Prime 4), Dark Samus became a logical, educated guess. And then she was announced.

Yes, there are other examples like this one.

Here’s the most logical one: the “graduation” of recent Mii Fighter costumes. Originally conceived as a sort of “runner-up” consolation prize to several of the characters who (purportedly) finished behind Bayonetta in the Smash ballot survey, many people understandably feel most of the newest characters previously being costumes can’t be coincidental:

So who is left from the costume list (who aren’t also assist trophies, for reasons I’ll explain soon)?

• Akira (Virtua Fighter)
• Black Knight (Fire Emblem)
• Chocobo (Final Fantasy)
• Geno (Super Mario RPG)
• Gil (The Tower of Druaga)
• Heihachi (Tekken)
• Hunter (Monster Hunter)
• Jacky Bryant (Virtua Fighter)
• Lloyd Irving (Tales of Symphonia)
• Tails (Sonic the Hedgehog)
• Viridi (Kid Icarus)

Given the supplemental manner in which the Monster Hunter and fighting game characters from this list were used to regale other announcements at the time, the most reasonable names left are Lloyd Irving (Tales of Symphonia), Viridi (Kid Icarus), Geno (Super Mario RPG), and Tails (Sonic the Hedgehog 2).

Lloyd seems like a stretch and has no proper stage. Viridi? Uh, maybe? Geno is perpetually suggested but seems likely to have been announced by now if he was planned for Ultimate on release, as he technically does not have his own stage. (Though with his neverending rumoured status, who can know for sure?) That mostly leaves Tails.

Here’s some related trivia: Tails already exists in the background of the Sonic the Hedgehog stage. However, so did King Dedede in an original Kirby stage, and Toon Link is removed from The Legend of Zelda: Spirit Tracks stage when you select him to fight, so anything is technically possible. Are you a Captain Toad fan? The above logic is about your only hope, seeing as Captain Toad appears in the background of the new New Donk City stage.

What other clues do we have? There are some assist trophies that might tell us something, as well as items. Let me unpack them.

Of previous Pokeball item characters and previous assist trophies, the only ones that have made the jump to being playable characters are Little Mac, Dark Samus and Charizard. Working backwards from there in order to show there’s a bit of a graduation precedent here, some characters (such as Knuckles and Zero) now have officially been “promoted” from Mii costume to assist trophy.

So which assist trophies from previous Smash games have not yet been shown?

• Barbara (Daigasso! Band Brothers)
• Isabelle (Animal Crossing)
• Shadow the Hedgehog (Sonic)
• Skull Kid (Zelda)
• Tingle (Zelda)

Perhaps not coincidentally, Skull Kid, Barbara and Isabelle were also Mii costumes. To line things up even more, all of these characters already have stages in their universes.

Now, this list in and of itself doesn’t prove anything. In the June Nintendo Direct, series director Sakurai promised 50 plus assist trophies and more Pokeball items than have yet been shown. It’s reasonable that some of the above characters could exist in the remainder. Or they might not.

Here’s one more thing. While it’s worth stressing that Nintendo Life would never, ever report an unsubstantiated rumour as fact, that isn’t going to stop me from doing it.

Back in May of this year, a user on the popular gaming forum GameFAQ made an unsubstantiated claim that they had advance knowledge of future Smash announcements.

Their totally baseless claims at the time? That Ridley and Simon Belmont were going to be announced in a staggered fashion, beginning at E3. They also then claimed that all characters from Smash Bros. 4 were going to be included on the roster, as well as the Ice Climbers. Later on, supposedly the very same poster stated that Snake would also return. What else was included among their strongly worded claims? This mystery person seemed absolutely certain Isabelle would be a playable character.

Verifying totally random posts online is a fool’s errand, and I’m not going to start now. But you’ve got to admit, even without these uncanny predictions, the case for Isabelle is strong, given the loose traces.

What About Single-Player?

Nintendo teased the above image, pixelation and all, regarding another mode yet to come. What’s going on here? Twitter user @noctulescent has probably the most convincing piece of evidence:

Read the thread to see how they did it, but the claim is that, at least for this image, the pixilated word that’s censored is “Spirits”. What the heck does “spirits” mean? Well, seeing that both Mario and Luigi have been strongly suggested to have flat out died in back-to-back Nintendo Directs, the most logical conclusion is that there could be some element of death (or playing from beyond the dead) in whatever the new Smash Bros. one-player mode is.

Also, why do I think the pixilated menu option has to do with single-player specifically? Well, every last single-player mode in Smash history has a green button. It’s that simple.

There is also the strong possibility that the single-player mode could be related to some sort of boss mode (similar to how players fought Ridley in recent Smash games), given how Monster Hunter dragon Rathalos was announced as both an assist trophy and a “boss”. Also, Castlevania antagonist Dracula also exuded some type of “boss-like” gameplay during the Castlevania stage reveal. There’s something here.

Final Predictions

There’s still a decent amount left to know about Smash Bros. before it launches. (Hello? We still know next to nothing about how it’ll play online!) Plenty more items will be showcased (come to me, home-run bat…), though I don’t predict we will see any more stages.

If there really are no more stages, I predict this means the most logical multi-million selling Nintendo title to have zero representation in Smash Bros., ARMS, will be relegated to eventual DLC. If, in fact, Smash Bros. Ultimate began development relatively concurrently to the system’s first wave of games, this only strengthens the likelihood that they may have needed more time (Splatoon did).

If you were to absolutely press me for which logical character announcements are to come between now and December, based on everything I’ve said above and using additional logic from past series decisions, I would guess this:

• Isabelle
• Tails
• Dixie Kong
• A generation 7 Pokémon

Animal Crossing desperately needs more representation given how popular the series is (including the mobile title), and Isabelle is the most teased candidate. Tails and Dixie Kong would be the most logical echo fighters, especially Dixie Kong, considering the strong tell by announcing King K. Rool, not to mention the success of Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze on Switch. In addition, not having a playable, new generation Pokémon representative would be unprecedented for the fighting series. And to reiterate, I don’t foresee any new third-party franchises represented before launch (though never say “never”). Tingle and Shadow I think are less likely than what I listed, but still totally possible as a new fighter and a shadow character, respectively.

What about Waluigi?!

Nintendo seemed completely caught off guard by the groundswell of Waluigi support during E3. You may forget this fact after all the online memes, but he was already shown in Ultimate as an assist trophy! It is completely possible Nintendo is acting dumb. But if they aren’t (and who knows, right?), taking into account the needed development time and presuming he wasn’t given top development priority, that does not bode well for Waluigi’s immediate inclusion into Smash, only a likely eventual one, ala Ridley. Therefore, I predict both Springman from ARMS and Waluigi to join the fight as DLC, in due time. It’s hard to imagine Arms won’t be represented in this game, whether it’s sooner or later.

Finally, when might we get some more official announcements? The game launches in early December, so I’d bet on only one (two at a push) more Directs between now and then. A drip campaign might be possible, but as we recently all experienced, Nintendo definitely loves their big, celebratory announcements.

What do you think? Is this all a bunch of horse hockey? Do you agree with Alan? Who and what do you want to see announced for Smash Bros.?

Special thanks to Smashboards contributor Kyle “Thinkaman’ Brockman for some key insights into writing this feature.

Japanese publisher Happinet has today announced that its very not happy looking game, Haunted Dungeons: Hyakki Castle, will be making its way to Switch at the end of this month.

Featuring a slightly different approach to the traditional real-time dungeon RPG genre, Haunted Dungeons: Hyakki Castle encourages players to split up with its ‘two-party system’ (you can see it in action in the trailer above). Players must use unique skills and move-sets to destroy the genuinely creepy monsters throughout the game, facing distinctive attacks and behaviours from the various enemy types on offer.

The game is set during the Edo Period of Japan, based on the eerie Hyakki Island – a place where prisoners are sent to live in exile. A mysterious castle suddenly appears on this island, bringing with it a terrifying group of monsters known as Yokai in Japanese literature. Here are all the features you need to know:

Game details:
– Real-time RPG Action: Execute various tactics such as flanking, distracting, and more for your party in real-time as “Yokai” appear throughout the castle to bring death upon players
– Twice the Possibilities: Split your group of assassins into two parties at any time to deal with traps, puzzles, and enemies for unparalleled strategy and party options
– Explore a Monstrous Castle: The enormous castle is filled with cunning traps—some of which can only be solved by dividing your party—and tough boss monsters, testing player instincts and judgement
– Explore Japanese Character Classes and Races: Choose to play as an Oni, Tengu, Human, or Nekomata with four distinct races on tap to add diverse skillsets to your party
–Tutorial Mode: Learn to survive and defeat the Yokai and bosses in a tutorial mode that provides an in-depth explanation on all the mechanics and tactics needed to survive
– Redefined UI Experience: Experience real-time gameplay with improved UI designed for console gameplay and beginners of the real-time dungeon RPG genre

The game will be available to purchase directly from the Nintendo Switch eShop for $13.99 / €11.99 / £10.99. Will you be trying this one out for size?