In the US it's $50, which is 2.5x the base price. I might have been willing to pay $10-15 extra, but $30 is ridiculous, and with the way they've handled NES and SNES games, I was already skeptical.

I wasn't going to upgrade as I have Mario 64 in the Mario 3D All-stars collection, I own the Sega Mega Drive Collection and whilst I'm curious to replay Lylat Wars / Sin and Punishment, I don't think in reality I likely would do given the backlog.

But my daughter loves the look of the DLC, so I may bite...

Can't decide though whether to just buy the DLC as I guess access to that stuff ends if you unsubscribe?

Personally it's less the fact it's £35 a year, and more than I don't think the additional features are worth double the cost, so I won't be subscribing. Maybe if they'd launched with more games/more games I wanted/a format I actually wanted to play, I'd be more inclined, but I've got very little interest in revisiting N64 games, have played most the Megadrive games to death and have no intetest in the Animal Crossing DLC.

Even as a die hard Nintendo apologist, the price of the 'Expansion Pack' is utterly ludicrous. I would have grudgingly accepted an additional $5 or $10, but a 150% increase is absurd for what they are offering. Tempted to just cancel my current sub in protest - I don't play online, and despite the initial lineup of titles being generous, the 'updates' since have been extremely lacklustre.

Yeah it seems as though it's a rare case of US customers seeing a bigger price hike than in the UK. Wonder what prompted that.

I imagine it's going to also vary in importance from person to person. I had a 64, I played the 64 games I wanted to play. In a perfect world, I'd love to replay Ogre Battles 64 but it's not going to happen. And Sega games, well, I got those on Steam in that mega collection. But, for someone younger who wasn't around or just missed out, it might be worth it for a while.

Apparently the emulation for n64 for switch online leaves a lot to be desired.

Oh really? It's notoriously one of the more difficult systems to emulate - even struggles on the Series S, but I'm surprised Nintendo haven't got that shit locked down. I've been on the fence about upgrading my Online to be honest, so this is perfect justification for not doing so, if it's really not that great.

Shoulda gone with GBA, Nintendo. Shoulda gone with GBA...

I think in a world where the wiiU exists with a functional virtual console aside from the obvious advantage of portability the price doesn’t seem to be warranted. Obviously for anyone who doesn’t own a WiiU it’s more attractive but not by much.

The N64 occupies a weird place in that it's probably the retro console that I have the most nostalgia and affection for, but I don't really have any desire to revisit any of its games. Even Mario 64 can be a bit of a pig to play nowadays.

The forum/reddit chat and several YouTube video says its kinda crummy on quite a few of the games, particularly ocarina of time, which is a shame. My experience with N64 games is almost entirely from remasters and remakes, so i find the originals very difficult to go back to anyway. OOT running at 20 FPS was a real shock to me the first time i saw it, compared to the silky smooth 3DS version.

Apparently I set up Google Authenticator on my eshop profile a while back (I have zero memory of doing this, might have been when there was that data breach). Since then I have also upgraded my phone, and the codes I generate do not work, so now I am locked out of my account and cannot sign in or buy any games.

Contacted Nintendo but they said they couldn't help me as my account is a UK account (despite me setting it up in the US). When I contacted Nintendo UK they just fobbed me off. So I'm honestly a bit stumped...

That's brutal. I have a great fear of the same thing (got about 5-600 eShop games). Can you recover the old codes by contacting Google? It seems like such a shit system. It'll get me one day I'm sure but I'll hopefully be too decrepit to care by then.

So Shin Megami Tensei V was advertised as a world wide release. Turns out it is for everywhere except Canada.

They just arbitrarily moved the release date ....... and didn't bother to tell anyone or make any announcement about it.

I spent two and a half hours on Friday going to stores and being rebuffed because I didn't know it had been delayed and was sure they were wrong.

Delays happen, and I get that, but have enough god damn courtesy to tell your customers it's going to happen and don't let them find out by surprise.

The whole thing has left a completely sour taste in my mouth about Atlus, Sega and Nintendo. Just a total lack of respect towards customers in Canada.

Nintendo are sending out emails asking for in depth feedback on Metroid Dread and the series in general. If you're a fan and get one, it might be worth filling it in if you want more!

Quite a lot of news in the Direct yesterday that I'm interested in.

Splatoon 3 got a vague release timing of 'Summer' (it might have had already).

Front Mission 1 is getting a remake. I played a fan translation of the SNES version back in the 2000s. Good mecha strategy RPG that. Includes buying new parts (arms, legs, etc) for upgrades.

Chrono Cross is finally getting a European release. I've only played Trigger (2000s SNES piracy days again)

Klonoa 1 and 2! Wahoo!

Live A Live is getting a remake in the Octopath Traveler style. Its another SNES game I played a fan translation of in the 2000s. Also I think it handles the multiple characters with different stories better than Octopath oddly enough. I've seen the price on the e-shop though. €50, ouch. Also there's a new Triangle Strategy demo.

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 was announced. I've been on the fence about ever playing 2 though.

How do people feel about the Mario Kart 8 DLC? 48 remade tracks for €25 doesn't sound bad.

Yeah I was pleasantly surprised by the Direct to be honest.

I'd buy No Man's Sky again in a heartbeat if it's a good port. Never played the Portal games properly, so looking forward to those. Pleased with Mother and Earthbound for the online service. The Mario Kart upgrade is a bargain. Xeno 3 has made me want to get the first one for Switch as I really liked what I played of it back on Wii. Chrono Cross was a surprise, and I really hope they drop Trigger on either the eShop or the online service to go along with it.

Mario Strikers and Switch Sports my kids will want. And Kirby probably.

And there were a couple of tasty looking things in the highlights reel.

All in all, possibly the best Direct since the Mario anniversary one.

I did see this though: https://www.techradar.com/uk/news/mario ... -not-cheap

"Mario Kart 8 Deluxe gets new tracks at last: Expensive vroom vroom"

Shut up. It's less than 50p a track.

I thought the MK8DX news was absolutely wonderful. Expensive!? Fuck off.

Live A Live looks cool, but I don't really like JRPGs that are more episodic and bitty. My heart leapt for a minute when I thought it was a FFVI remake, but alas not.

I'll probably pick up the Klonoa remakes and will definitely pick up both Front Mission remakes. I had the FM DS remake back in the day. Solid game.

Will inevitably pick up the MK DLC too.

Not much else of interest to me personally, but certainly lots of variety on show.

I'll get the MK8D DLC but I was amused that after all the recent MK9 chat and after the years of begging for more tracks had died down to nothing, they release more tracks. I no longer find Nintendo endearingly quirky, though.

Beyond that, there were a lot of old games I had little interest in playing then and less now, but I appreciate that people like remembering things and getting excited about stuff they probably won't play.

Switch Sports seemed like a no brainer five years ago but now we know how poor the Joycons are, it's got no appeal. New Mario Strikers means people can stop misremembering the quality of Mario Strikers.

I've adored the Switch since I got it day one, I have five or six hundred games for it (digital because I'm an idiot) but I find it technically lacking at this point and the last Nintendo game I really loved was Fire Emblem:TH. I'm also no longer looking forward to BotW2 when the performance on first party games has been so un-Nintendo for the last few years.