13th June 2018, 9:15 AM
So, this year at E3, Nintendo has decided to focus on a single game for the third year in a row. In 2016 it was Zelda, last year Mario, and this year it's Smash... but people seem to be a lot more upset at that focus than they were the last two years, as I'm seeing a lot of criticism of Nintendo's lack of games this E3. That criticism is accurate, as they have very little to show other than Smash, and there may be even fewer games shown than there were the last couple of years -- they aren't mentioning the 3DS at all for example, sadly, unlike 2017 (this is really unfortunate! The 3DS needs more games...) -- but it doesn't seem THAT different.
That said though, I've never loved this focus-all-on-one-game thing, so yes, I wish that they were showing more. In particular, what's going on with Retro? It now has been five years since they last released a game, and still we heard nothing about whatever it is they're making. They must be having development problems, five years of nothing is not normal. And not hearing anything about Metroid Prime 4 is also a disappointment, they should have had something to show of that here.
Nintendo does have a few non-Smash games to show, including a DLC addon for Xenoblade Chronicles 2, a new Mario Party game they just announced (and are showing on the Treehouse stream right now, as it's taking a break from its heavy Smash focus for the moment), some mech game called Daemon x Machina, and details on the upcoming Switch Fire Emblem game (which has been delayed to 2019 and looks like Fire Emblem), but there isn't a lot. And again so far there hasn't even been any 3DS on the Treehouse stream, which, again, I do think is a mistake. Oh well.
As for Smash though, it looks pretty good. It seems that they're building it on the core gameplay of the last one, Smash 4 (Wii U / 3DS), but with a lot of changes. The last game's good, if not quite on par with Melee, so that's fine. It'll have every single character from all past Smash games, plus a few more, and every character has had some changes to their looks, moves, and such. The E3 Direct mentions some of the major changes for just about every character, and some sound good. Link now is the Breath of the Wild Link, for example, and bombs can be remotely detonated. I don't like the new Zelda design, however; they went with the Link to the Past Zelda this time, and I think it's the least good Zelda design yet in a Smash game. Going from the fantastic TP Zelda design from Smash 4 to this is a huge downgrade... ah well.
Visually, on that note, this game has a very cartoony style, more than I remember past Smash games looking. It looks nice, but different from before. The gameplay is mostly the same however, though there are some balance changes, such as to dashing. I am, of course, not the biggest Smash fan -- they're good games, but I've never loved them enough to play huge amounts of the games, Melee sort of excepted -- but the game does look good and I'm sure I'll get it eventually. Smash is very popular and should be enough for a good holiday season this year, but it'd have been better to have a bit more than they seem to have... though Microsoft doesn't seem to have much either, almost everything major they showed was for next year. It's kind of a weird year, it seems.
That said though, I've never loved this focus-all-on-one-game thing, so yes, I wish that they were showing more. In particular, what's going on with Retro? It now has been five years since they last released a game, and still we heard nothing about whatever it is they're making. They must be having development problems, five years of nothing is not normal. And not hearing anything about Metroid Prime 4 is also a disappointment, they should have had something to show of that here.
Nintendo does have a few non-Smash games to show, including a DLC addon for Xenoblade Chronicles 2, a new Mario Party game they just announced (and are showing on the Treehouse stream right now, as it's taking a break from its heavy Smash focus for the moment), some mech game called Daemon x Machina, and details on the upcoming Switch Fire Emblem game (which has been delayed to 2019 and looks like Fire Emblem), but there isn't a lot. And again so far there hasn't even been any 3DS on the Treehouse stream, which, again, I do think is a mistake. Oh well.
As for Smash though, it looks pretty good. It seems that they're building it on the core gameplay of the last one, Smash 4 (Wii U / 3DS), but with a lot of changes. The last game's good, if not quite on par with Melee, so that's fine. It'll have every single character from all past Smash games, plus a few more, and every character has had some changes to their looks, moves, and such. The E3 Direct mentions some of the major changes for just about every character, and some sound good. Link now is the Breath of the Wild Link, for example, and bombs can be remotely detonated. I don't like the new Zelda design, however; they went with the Link to the Past Zelda this time, and I think it's the least good Zelda design yet in a Smash game. Going from the fantastic TP Zelda design from Smash 4 to this is a huge downgrade... ah well.
Visually, on that note, this game has a very cartoony style, more than I remember past Smash games looking. It looks nice, but different from before. The gameplay is mostly the same however, though there are some balance changes, such as to dashing. I am, of course, not the biggest Smash fan -- they're good games, but I've never loved them enough to play huge amounts of the games, Melee sort of excepted -- but the game does look good and I'm sure I'll get it eventually. Smash is very popular and should be enough for a good holiday season this year, but it'd have been better to have a bit more than they seem to have... though Microsoft doesn't seem to have much either, almost everything major they showed was for next year. It's kind of a weird year, it seems.