Here we are at the end of E3. Has it been worth it? I’m not entirely sure. Let’s just hope Nintendo has something of worth to offer.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate
A new foe has appeared- it’s Kazuyka from the Tekken series! But what’s that he’s holding? Is that the corpse of Ganondorf? Is that the corpse of Captain Falcon? Is that the corpse of President John F Kennedy? Oh no, Kazuyka, what have you done?!
Life is Strange Remastered Collection + Life is Strange: True Colours
Call me old fashioned, but it is not my belief that just because a game series has a lot of entries it is thus entitled to a remastered collection. And yet here we are; the first Life is Strange came out in 2015, and I just don’t think that six years is long enough to warrant a remaster.
Even worse, Life is Strange: Before the Storm came out in 2017! THAT WAS FOUR YEARS AGO! You know, Fallout 4 came out in 2015, so going by the same logic Fallout is due a remaster. If I had Max’s time rewinding powers, I’d go back in time and kill Zack Snyder, because the Justice League has set a precedent for remakes that must be ignored.
Anyway, Life is Strange Remastered Collection (featuring the first game and Before the Storm) is coming to the Switch later this year, with True Colours making its way onto the system on 10 September.
A New Donkey Kong? No!
It’s a Super Monkey Ball remake, you dunce. A collection of remakes to be exact, including Super Monkey Ball 1, Super Monkey Ball 2, and Super Monkey Ball Deluxe. This series is known for its deceptive difficulty beneath the cute monkey aesthetic, and putting the three original games into one collection seems like an incredible decision which will please a lot of long-time fans. Super Monkey Ball Banana Mania is coming to the Switch on 5 October.
Mario Party Superstars
As somebody who refuses to pay £50+ for a digital board game, Mario Party will never be a series I purchase for myself. Instead, I shall continue to play the Ignorant Grandma Lottery of supermarket-bought video games, praying that I end up with a game like Super Mario Odyssey and not Mario Pinball Land.
Anyway, there are a gazillion Mario Party games, so what’s special about this one? Well, on 29 October it will bring 100 classic minigames and five boards from the Nintendo 64 and Gamecube instalments, allowing modern audiences to relive the old games. A bit like a remake.
Oh my god, it’s just another bloody remake.
Metroid 5
“Currently we are working hard on the latest game in the Metroid Prime series, Metroid Prime 4, which we previously announced. But today, we’d like to introduce another new entry in the Metroid franchise. Please take a look.”
The trailer starts. It’s Samus from Metroid Fusion. A title screen: “Metroid 5”. “Not actual gameplay footage” and spooky placeholder music. There’s a Xenomorph from Alien on the ceiling, but it’s white, immune to rockets, and a robot.
And then the actual gameplay began, showing Samus fleeing the robot xenomorph through a 2D spaceship landscape. Eventually it outruns her and we get to see a short death cutscene before the real title drop. Metroid: Dread. FUCK YEAH! The game that never was has finally risen from the grave and fans have been losing their shit. And rightfully so; it has been 19 years since the last mainline 2D Metroid game and I’m pretty sure most of us had given up on the idea of one altogether.
Alas, I just hope it can hold up to the greatness of modern metroidvania games such as Hollow Knight which have stolen the limelight in Metroid’s absence. Though if aesthetic alone is something to judge these games by (it definitely isn’t, but I’ve got pretentiousness quotas to fulfil) then I must say that I’m more excited for Silksong than I am Dread.
Sorry Samus stans.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot
Ah yes, one among many games in this Nintendo Direct that are coming to the Switch some time after their initial release on other major consoles. I don’t really have anything to say about this one, I just figured more of you would care about this game than the piece of shit car racing mobile port they decided to show after the Metroid trailer.
Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot comes to Switch on 24 September. I’m getting bored of this, let’s just make like Rizzle Kicks and skip to the good bits.
Mario Golf: Super Rush
I tell you, whoever is pumping out the titles of Mario games recently deserves a pay rise. I mean “Super Rush”? What a stroke of genius.
The E3 presentation demonstrated a number of game modes, such as Standard Golf – you can probably guess what that one is about. There’s also Battle Golf – each character has abilities that help them play golf better like in Mario Tennis Aces – Speed Golf involves hard drugs, and Golf Adventure will use the Switch’s Mii function to take your Miis on… golf adventures. I didn’t even know the Switch had Miis.
Those scoundrels also teased us with the promise of free updates such as new playable characters and courses like New Donk City. We all know what that really means though; they haven’t finished the game yet but need the money from pre-orders and early sales now.
Wario Ware: Get It Together
Okay so the gimmick of this one is that you can play the microgames with one of many unique characters who each have different ways of solving the puzzles. Oh and there’s two player multiplayer.
Advance Wars 1+2: Re-Boot Camp
I can’t get mad at this remake, they put it in the title! The originals are Gameboy Advance classics so this crowd-pleasing trailer put a spring in the step of the livestream’s chat. I, personally, have no nostalgia for Advance Wars, though from what I saw in these trailers it seems they have accurately recreated the spirit for modern hardware.
Zelda
Finishing off the night, finishing off E3, was the franchise everyone was actually here for.
Breath of the Wild 2 is coming in 2022 and it looks incredible – it seems that they are expanding the realm of Hyrule into the sky which, besides the ocean, seems like the next natural evolution for the kingdom. It does make me wonder if they will start to treat the map of Hyrule like that of Fortnite; when will we see Link’s adventure begin from the crash-site of an alien vessel or from within a drained Atlantis-esque region.
Notable moments of the trailer include a Stone Talus with a Bokoblin platform on its back, a yellow time manipulation Sheikah Slate ability, a green goopy ability which allowed Link to move through the walls, and a brilliant shot of Link donned in Greek robes falling between the many floating islands of Hyrule.
Everything about the teaser was exactly what fans were after, although the 2022 launch date feels somewhat ominous, and either spells for a late 2022 release or a delay to mid 2023.
Either way, we’re fucking stoked.
Images: Nintendo