There should be a rule on how many people or how many times layoffs can happen before leadership gets let go instead.

If you skipped the Switch 1, I think it’s worth going for. It’s overpriced for the moment - there are only a handful of Switch 2 exclusive games worth playing this year. Even the flagship Mario Kart game is a little weird with how it does some of its modes. But the Switch 1 has an extensive library with plenty of great multiplayer options. If you’re ready for a purchase, might as well go ahead and get the 2 so y’all can play the new Nintendo games when you want.

I agree that Nintendo the company is really slimy though, and it does feel a little gross to support them sometimes.

Amazing game. I remember hearing folks describe it, before I ever played. I couldn’t get my head around the concept. Then you play, and all the rules just make sense.

When I played through Portal in dev commentary mode, I was surprised at the time to realize they’re basically trying to teach you things through the whole game (or at least heavily signpost). Made me realize a lot about game design, and design in general.

September 25, 2025

Not exactly games I guess, but https://neal.fun/ always has neat stuff. I think some of them are relatively recent.

Super Metroid

I haven’t played in a number of years, but I’m pretty sure fan-made servers are still running for Phantasy Star Online.

I was playing the GameCube version online well over a decade after that console was dead. Blue Burst on PC is well supported too, I believe.

Crazy now to imagine a console game letting you input a DNS server and IP address for online play. But it did.

Not to defend Nintendo much here, but the situation with game-key-cards is at least better than that. You can freely trade, give away, resell them like any physical cart.

It’s a step up from digital in terms of freedom, but a step down in convenience (cart has to be in the system).

Compared to real, physical, data-on-the-cart media though, these are a definite downgrade.

My niece introduced me to LKBC, and so far it seems like a lot of fun!

Wow, I had actually never heard that Doug Bowser was formerly at EA. Ooof

I get that it’s more fun to point out his name, I’m just surprised I hadn’t seen the comment made before.

Yep, I feel like people overestimate how much anyone cares about official support or security patches or whatever. People will assume it’s fine until they’re either forced out or something goes horribly wrong.

Regular folks will most likely let it be if possible, until it’s time for a new PC anyway.

I’m not big on the idea of open world racing. To me, driving between race tracks looks like a chore.

I’ve seen other racers do it, but I’ve never really delved into a game like that. Maybe once I do I’ll really like it.

I do think grinding rails and wall jumping around looks pretty fun in MK. But it could end up gimmicky and unexiciting once you’re used to.

Basically all a big ‘wait and see’ from my perspective.

Had a scare when first hearing this. But somewhere else on the site it does specify this as something like “some physical games”, and as quoted in OP they’re contrasting here with “regular game cards”. So it looks like real game cards will still be a thing.

So far I’ve seen screenshots of SFVI and Bravely Default boxarts marked as game-key cards.

I’ve seen box shots for Mario Kart and Donkey Kong that appear to be normal game cards.

Seems so. Notably, Switch 1 already has games with a similar warning on the box.

They’re just giving a name to it.

On one hand, I’m glad they’re up front about it (and I’d rather see an even uglier, larger warning on the cover for game key cards). On the other, I hope this isn’t a sign that they’re legitimizing it or that it’ll be more common.

Fair point, some games are very big. FFVII Rebirth and Baldur’s Gate 3 shipped on 2 discs though, it’s not unheard of.

Yep! And it’s really surprising to me that so many people are OK with that sort of defective-by-design anti-feature. It’s a single player game, why would it have any dependence on networks or servers of any sort?

Not to say that I’m against digital distribution altogether, I think that’s a perfectly valid preference w/ pros and cons.

But if you are going to sell the video game on a disc? Shipping a whole playable game seems like a pretty low bar to meet. Most games (that get a physical release) in [current year], for every year that exists so far, don’t have a problem managing to do this.

Game seems cool, but it requires a download to play. They don’t meet my basic requirements for a game I’d even consider buying.

Pretty late… but hopefully that makes the online more approachable.

Right, I don’t even know how you would cheat it. Down at this point, I guess I’m just lamenting that more games aren’t able to keep healthy communities after dev support ends.

Wasn’t Rising Thunder the one that at least handled part of shutdown right by semi-open sourcing?

But yeah, it’s all part of a wider problem. Personally I don’t want an invasive devloper over-tuning fighting games all the time, and I don’t want any microtransactions. But unless you keep dangling new shiny, very few players will stick with a given game, making it hard to find matches on-demand.

So bizarre to me that a game has to be a runaway hit to even remain accessible for any length of time.

Stopping updates I get (and good, most game updates are annoying), but shutting down servers completely and especially delisting it seem so over the top.

Sorry! Just wanted to say why people might, in case you were actually asking. 😅

I upvoted the post, but the caps and mulitple exclamation marks tempted me not too. Feels a little overbearing.

But overall, I guess I’m more glad to see the excitement than I am annoyed by the yelling.

Yep, that is indeed what I was thinking of (though I don’t have a link handy either).

Didn’t mean to imply that’s where experience levels were invented. The clarification is appreciated though.

And even thought I was alluding to that DQ comment, I’m sure it wasn’t the first game to adapt experience levels, and across the board making things easier wasn’t always the impetus.

Don’t know about CRPGs in particular, one way or the other. But in general I agree with you op.

If you level up, and it means your stats go up and all your enemies level up and stay at the same balance with you, it’s pointless. It still affords a moment of happiness ‘cool I levelled up’, but in a much less satisfying way.

The point of level up early in RPG video games was, to my knowledge, so that any one with time and patience could beat a game regardless of skill. The idea of level scaling is almost the exact opposite, to remove the advantage of levelling. They cancel out and both player level and enemy level should be removed if that’s happening.

That’s assuming a 1:1 unversal scaling though, which is rarely the case. In the details it can be tuned to something worthwhile - which enemies scale, how much they scale, etc.

Still, my thought is when games want level scaling, they should consider why. If you want players not to overpower enemies via stats, maybe get rid of the stats (or don’t change them on lvl up). Levels can still augment your player with new spells, unique abilities, or more options. Or maybe more carefully consider the placement of enemies and what their default level and stats are set at. Or maybe consider a lower level cap, or a lower range of stat values.

The possibilities are wide open, but level scaling done poorly can make level ups feel like a punishment.

I get this. Loved Tri and Freedom Unite, played a decent amount of 4, some of World, and barely started Rise.

They’re always exciting, and I don’t dislike any of the games, but it’s just a lot to get going, really invest the time, and get the value out of these.

The website https://nobsgames.stavros.io/ helps surface these, and let’s you filter out based on different things.

One that I like in particular is Gauguin. It’s a Sudoku-like with different math-y rules.

Anuto TD is a tower defense game that is also really good, but not so low stress.

Lichess, if you’re into Chess. It’s a great, no compromise, high quality app. Stressful if you get too worked up about competitive, but puzzles are at least relaxing.

Yeah, somewhat agree.

It’s great just to see it exist. And not every game needs to reinvent the wheel, especially when the series hasn’t had a game in 15 years.

But by the end of it, I was kinda left wanting some new hook.

Sylux showing up was a cool moment though. I didn’t expect them to honor that tease from Prime 3, and I appreciate it.

Ehh, I know it’s not the original source, but I saw it there. Then it was either link to that or Twitter.

Should be interesting.

I haven’t kept the closest eye on this - rumor is they’re planning to port more of their games to competing platforms, maybe allow 3rd party Xbox hardware, and phase out most physical Xbox games, right? Or am I way off the mark?