So, what you playing at the mo? Retro Edition

Continuing the Metroid theme, I finished Zero Mission and have moved on to Fusion. It's quite different! Both it and Zero Mission seem to spoon feed you the main path, although more so for Fusion so far!

I also had a quick go of Metroid Prime. My original save of that it at 89% just before Ridley! Turns out I never finished Metroid Prime! So I guess that'll be played again. I did buy Trilogy digitally on my Wii U, but I prefer the original controls too.

I didn't finish the 3DS Metroid game either so I'll have to give that a bit of attention before I even think about buying Metroid Dread.

Polished off We Love Katamari and Taiko Drum Master on the PS2 there this week. We Love Katamari is how you do a sequel when you've already milked the core concepts for all its worth, in that they give you new goals/limitations entirely in addition to the usual "get x by y." Taiko is kind of limited in its appeal when you're playing with the standard PS2 controller, feels a bit like cheating at times. It can still get tough when it really wants to, mind you.

Moved on to Outrun 2006: Coast 2 Coast after threatening for years. It's the right mix of addictive and tricky, though I feel as though I've broken it a bit by upgrading to some of the OR cars - they just let you bomb through the competition in the races.

How are you with the Switch in handheld mode?

I only really ever play Nintendo handhelds, have loads of others but don't really play them beyond a casual 10-15 minutes.

Nintendo ones didn't fully click with me until the DS, mainly down to how badly the screens were lit.

You sold your Switch? Madness! Such a fantastic system. I do play mine most of the time in docked mode these days tbh.

Although I've seen how good emulation is for it now so can totally understand if someone was just playing Nintendo games on a PC instead of on an actual console.

I'm hearing great things. I have a reserved copy sitting in Argos waiting for me and just haven't had a chance to collect it yet!

Aye sold it over a year ago. Was a gen 1 unpatched unit, so was running Atmosphere custom firmware. Still wasn't enough to hold my interest unfortunately. I've nothing inherently bad to say about the Switch, but I definitely don't view it as a console, hybrid or otherwise. It's a low/mid range handheld machine with a display out on it, and comes with all the limitations you'd expect from that. Serious machine for handheld fans, but that's just not me.

Do you at least have another means of playing Nintendo games like via emulation on a PC?

I absolutely love my Switch. Sure, it's way underpowered in a modern sense, but it's a Nintendo console through and through IMO. The list of games coming out on it is fantastic, I seriously can't keep up - even for the indie games alone!

Mind you, mine is 100% up to date firmware wise and I'm paying full whack for games, so am definitely in that 'savor each and every game' mode with it rather than the 'try absolutely everything out via homebew and get spoiled for choice' one which I'd be afraid might happen to me if I installed CFW.

Ah yeah I've got my main emulation setup that handles anything I need. Plus I still own a physical nes, snes, gc, N64, wii, and wii u....along with a gb, gbc, gba, ds, dsi xl, and a 3ds xl....so kinda sorted for ninty stuff :)

You're dead right about cfw, it will 100% devalue the experience, if caution isn't exercised. Flash cart syndrome is real.

Re the Switch being underpowered, it is obviously underpowered compared to more recent consoles, but you'd expect that as its a handheld. Compared to Xbox 360 and ps3 it actually fares well, its impressive considering we've that level of power in a handheld. What was a problem for me though, was not even big AAA multiplat games, it was certain first party Nintendo titles chugging down to sub 30fps, at standard definition resolutions...that was a real disappointment, considering how buttery smooth Nintendo games often are.

BotW in particular, is essentially a Wii U game, and can bring the switch to its knees. Links Awakening is another one, bizarre how Ninty let that one out the door with its performance.

For most big games and indie content alike, I find it's PC I'm most comfortable with. Consoles I tend to play exclusives on. I'll prob pick up an OLED Switch at some point just to keep the lineup complete, but I'm OK without one for now.

It's successor, whenever that appears, will likely be a very interesting machine. I'd say the days of Nintendo making static consoles are over, so it'll be a Switch U (!)

Metroid Fusion at the moment. Just got to a spider robot boss that's ended up being a big difficulty spike. It's really hard to avoid the initial grab move he does, but even when you do, there's a second phase that's also really hard to navigate.

I was playing on a GBA with an IPS screen, but had to switch to GC player because I was afraid I'd break something!

EDIT:

Right after I moan about it I manage to kill that boss just before lunch is over!

Finally started playing Dread myself yesterday, I'm not usually a massive fan of 2.5D visuals and prefer when games like this are sprite based - but this looks fantastic, really suits the style of the Metroid universe, some of the backgrounds look incredible.

Not too sure if I'm sold on the parry action as of yet, makes the game feel more like a modern fighting based Metroidvania like Dead Cells (which I'm sure is the point) than an explorative one.

Only mild niggles really, enjoying it immensely so far and cant wait to get back to it this evening!