Bobfoc

Besides the Virtual Boy, I think the Nintendo 64 was Nintendo's worst system. I've never liked the controller, the cartridges made multiplatform development a nightmare and the Playstation had a far greater quantity of good games. It wasn't awful by any means, but it's aged poorly. I'm also influenced by someone I knew at school who used to rant on and on about how the N64 was a god-like machine while every single game on the Playstation was tripe only used by only people who weren't clever enough to play Nintendo games.

On the plus side, Doug Bowser seems to be a keen gamer and Nintendo fan, so I'm not worried about Nintendo of America changing dramatically. It won't be like Don Mattrick at Microsoft.

I've always liked Reggie, so this is sad news. I can only hope that his successor is as personable and enthusiastic. Here's a picture that's both uplifting and sad at the same time:

Isn't the dagger Arya now uses Valyrian steel?

I didn't realise that was happening. I may be tempted to pick up the Switch version once the whole package is available.

Joking aside, he's backed Neal Ardley in the transfer window, despite putting the club up for sale. He's been happy to let Ardley bring in the types of players that suit his tactical style and who'll battle hard in a relegation fight. He's incapable of using Twitter responsibly and clearly has some issues in his personal life, but he's got the interests of the club at heart.

Great day today. Notts were all over Mansfield and got the win, putting them just two points from safety. That's seven points from nine against the teams placed first, second and fourth in the league over the last couple of weeks. Fantastic.

I've only played part of Yakuza 0, but I'm inclined to agree. With so many open world games opting for vast expanses of empty space, it's really refreshing to play a game that packs so much into a relatively small geographical area. If I think about my favourite game locations, I'm thinking of Shadow Moses from Metal Gear Solid, the region of Yokosuka from Shenmue and the police station from Resident Evil 2. They're all fairly small settings that become increasingly familiar as you continue playing. Contrast that with the sprawling mass of nothingness you get in games like Far Cry, which are so much less memorable.

I think one of my biggest problems with piracy is that it punishes the wrong people. By and large, it's the publishers who dictate whether or not a game includes the kind of anti-consumer features that drive people to pirate games. By choosing to play the game illegally, chances are that the higher-ups will leave more or less untouched and the developer will be more likely to have to get rid of innocent staff members to account for what publishers deem to be disappointing sales figures.

Flower is now available on PC. It's a nice, relaxing experience that is worth a look.

If you buy games on Steam, you have a two-hour play time window to request a refund if you don't like it. That's a demo of sorts.

I thought it was created to remind us that Jerome Flynn existed.

Give me crazy nonsense in a WWE game over a repetitive, directionless career mode any day.

Final Fantasy IX is £16.99 on Switch. I know it's a long game, but that's taking a not insignificant amount of piss.

I think it's just a "last person standing" game where you only focus on your own performance.

My problem with panel shows is that there are a lot of good concepts, but I find that the guests aren't to my taste more often than not. Hypothetical sounds like an interesting idea, but I find Widdicombe and particularly Acaster more annoying than funny, so it's probably not for me. Really, there are only a select few stand-up comedians who do anything for me right now. Reginald D Hunter is someone whose appearances on panel shows I relish, as is David Mitchell, although he's more of a comic actor/writer than a stand-up. By and large, I think it's the non-comedians who entertain me most, with Richard Osman and Victoria Coren-Mitchell always delivering. A small number of performers, particularly Russell Howard and Sarah Millican, I'll actively avoid.

Lots of interesting under-the-radar stuff there. I thought it was a good showcase.

This looks as though it could be a good starting point for the Fire Emblem series. I've been looking to get into it for a while. Link's Awakening has been given the Trumpton remake treatment.

Super Mario Maker 2 is coming in June.

Not really. MGS 4 got great review scores at the time, but most Metal Gear fans don't consider it to be the best one. I'm with them, although I don't think it's anywhere near as bad as some people do. While we're talking about Metal Gear, I liked playing as Raiden in MGS 2. Yes, the codec calls with Rose were tedious, but I thought his character arc was good and it was interesting to see Snake from the perspective of someone else. As for highly regarded games I don't like, Bayonetta comes to mind first. I wouldn't argue against the claim that it's mechanically solid, but the initial buzz wore off for me quickly. I found the titular character herself thoroughly unlikable and the story a poorly told mess, but my biggest annoyance was that it just seemed to be trying way too hard to be funny. Finishing off enemies triggered these elaborate QTEs that might as well have been saying, "LOOK! HERE'S A CLOSE-UP OF HER BOTTOM! DID YOU SEE? DID YOU SEE? ISN'T OUR SATIRISATION OF MALE FETISHES SO RIPROARINGLY HILARIOUS? WE'LL SHOW YOU AGAIN IN A FEW MINUTES IN CASE YOU MISSED IT!" Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance had a similar problem, albeit without a comedically "sexy" player character. I find the whole "too cool for school" vibe Platinum goes for to miss emphatically, and it really puts me off their games.

What stopped me were the platforming sections. The controls are terribly ill-suited for jumping and the camera is so much of a hindrance that it's too frustrating for me.

There's a Nintendo Direct tomorrow at 10pm GMT. It's going to focus on Switch games, with Fire Emblem: Three Houses being the only named one so far.

On that subject, are there any really good MyPlayer-type modes in other games? I enjoyed the NBA 2k versions a few years ago, but I understand they've become mires of microtransactions.

RTTS is the mode that I've played by far the most on the two versions of the series I own. I like controlling one player, rather than a whole team, and baseball is a sport that lends itself very well to that style of play. That said, it can get annoying when you're pitching a shutout and your own team can't score. That always seems to happen far too often to me.

England's greatest keeper, I'd say, and I don't think that's a controversial opinion at all. "What a save, Gordon Banks!" is one of English football's greatest commentary soundbites, and it's been immortalised by the Lightning Seeds too.