Play CAPTURE THE CONFEDERATE FLAG here!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - On your browser, for free, on KoopaTV! (Press-kit at the bottom, advertisement video even further below, game embed after page-break.)

You've waited a year since our last game, but the time for patience is finally over. You can at last enjoy yourselves by playing KoopaTV's third videogame! What a great way to close out 2015, and shame to all the other gaming sites that have already declared their game of the year for 2015. This may be the last game to be released in the year 2015 (and in some timezones we're in 2016 already), but at KoopaTV, we've intended it to be a contender for the best.

We would like to introduce you to Capture the Confederate Flag. This is a game thematically inspired by all of the confederate flag controversies earlier in 2015. It'd be cool if the game could release immediately during that fallout, but game development takes time and can't take advantage of current events.

We're aware that in the digital space, the Battle Flag of Northern Virginia is being censored from many gaming portals. We hope that won't happen to our game for its tasteful portrayal of Southern heritage.

Capture the Confederate Flag features characters and themes that avid KoopaTV fans may recognise, such as Robert E. Stoutland and Confederate Metagross. It also uses the Stars and Firebars sprite I made over two and a half years ago that I thought was clever enough to be its own article. (Though it wasn't the only article that day.) We've also seen one of the villains. So let's just embed the game already:

Suing Videogame Companies for Becoming Addicted?

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - That's what one clearly irresponsible moron in Russia is doing right now!

Videogame addiction is a serious issue. It plagued Chad Joseph in hit KoopaTV game Trayvon Tyson's Punch-Out!! and it threatened to ruin my own life. Maybe it already has ruined my life and I just haven't come to grips with it. I thought that wait-to-play games could stop it, but if you end up being a cash whale then that's not helping. Now we're at the point where we're evolving in revenue models to pretty much be virtual casinos. Obviously, those are designed to get you addicted and lose your money for prizes of zero value. Sweet deal if you can manage it and rope kids in.

But this isn't a passive-aggressive attack on Nintendo. It's... some level of defence. I guess.

Turns out that in Russia, there is this moronic man who is suing Bethesda for 500,000 rubles (which is a little under $7,000) because Fallout 4 is too addictive. As a result of his addiction, he got fired from his job ('cause he was absentee) and divorced from his wife ('cause... who would want to be with a pitiful man who puts a videogame over their spouse?) and he's seeking vengeance. Apparently he just played it for three weeks straight and didn't eat OR sleep. Is he trying to put a third option in the Eating vs. Sleeping Splatfest, being "screw my biology I'll just play games day and night"?

The money is for emotional distress. But is Bethesda responsible for causing emotional distress? 

What's the deal with Undertale's popularity?

By LITTLE FRUINI - The reason lies in all the obsessed fanbases all over the web!

As those who follow KoopaTV already know, Undertale has been (actually, it IS) a virus for the Internet, whether you go on YouTube or Twitch and see streams and Let’s Plays for the game (something that is frowned upon here), or to the obvious Tumblr and Reddit populations and see players with their fan arts, findings, or post on their next target to invade. Most notably, the game has gone hoops under and over winning the respected title of GameFAQs’s Best Game Ever with an underwhelming victory. Underappreciated jokes aside, there is one thing to blame, and if you don’t know why, then I recommend you to read the subtitle.

That’s right: the fanbase. I’ll give Undertale the benefit of a doubt and say it really IS a good game, with its witty dialogue, music, and visuals (I haven’t played the game, so I may do it injustice), as everyone says. However, it’s a shame, because the game could be a cherished diamond shared and replicated by many. For lack of a better simile though, some just keep talking about how beautiful the diamond is and how they keep finding new things in it. For a comparison, some fanbases are tame, while others have this website that they all like to log on to, hang out, and talk about how valued a game is (EarthBound’s very own Starmen.net is a great example). And even if everyone approaches a game in a different direction, Undertale's fanbase is simply an entire different story.

For reference, let’s take the first battle that Undertale had in GameFAQ’s ‘Best Game Ever’. As you can see, these aren’t users natively from GameFAQs, they’re actually people from a rally, and if that wasn’t the case, then there shouldn’t be a spike in the charts!

 

Digitised Manuals Means Less People Read Them

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Putting the environment ahead of the player.

All of the videogame publishers (if you can find a counter-example go ahead) have gone ahead and eliminated physical instruction booklets. Now on all the big videogame consoles and handhelds, if you buy a new physical copy of a game, all you get is the card/disk and a health warning or something. You might also get an expired Pokémon Omega Ruby/Pokémon Alpha Sapphire Special Demo code and other advertisements. But nothing on the game you bought and how to play it.

Here's a statement from Microsoft as to why this is the case:

“As of 2012, Microsoft no longer includes printed manuals for most Xbox games. This change allows us to improve the environmental impact of our products and saves you the need to manage additional materials.” 

Meanwhile, a "JM Garcia" from Sony's PlayStation Blog has these contradictory quotes about the digitialisation of instruction manuals (while advertising the PlayStation's repository of digital manuals, Docs for PlayStation):

“If you’re like me, you don’t like having to search through a paper instruction manual [...] Docs launched alongside PS4 last November and it has replaced printed manuals for first-party PlayStation titles, as well as select third-party games.”

So because this random guy doesn't like using the table of contents in an instruction manual, they'll eliminate the option altogether and instead put that very same table of contents and structure in an exclusively digital format. ...Morons. Let's hear from someone else.

Don't Object This Christmas: Become an Ace Attorney on a Budget!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - If you want to buy yourself a Christmas gift, here's a great suggestion.

If you want to feel like a million bucks, you'll only have to spend $15 or $20! You can make better deals than Donald Trump this Christmas if you go to the Nintendo eShop on your Nintendo 3DS or Nintendo 2DS or New Nintendo 3DS or whatever and search "Ace Attorney". There, you'll see that CAPCOM's amazing Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney series is on sale until January 1, starting now! (Along with other Capcom games.)

You can get Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney — Dual Destinies for only $15. You can buy Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy for only $20.09. That's seven cents less than a cute $20.16 campaign contribution to your favourite presidential candidate.

You won't be able to vote for Phoenix Wright for president yet.
...I feel like if I had Santa Larry Butz here, he'd scare people away from buying the games.

If you like %s, here are some: Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney — Dual Destinies is 50% off. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy is 33% off. I'm pretty positive that's the best sale for Dual Destinies ever, since it was only 44% off nine months ago. Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy is at its lowest price since a month ago on Black Friday.

That's amazing. But to sweeten the deal...? 

The Turf WAR ON SQUIDMAS

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Have a great Squidmas! It's important we call it that.

NGYES! It's the night before Squidmas! It's the best day of the year. If you think us squids celebrate and party hard during Splatfests (and I hear Ludwig the Koopa keeps writing articles about that), you haven't seen anything yet for Squidmas.

So Squidwig is here to tell the great readers of KoopaTV (and you guys really are great people in accepting me as one of you) of a problem. Because it wouldn't be a KoopaTV article without a problem, right? What could possibly be problematic about the awesome holiday of Squidmas?

Squidmas is almost here! Like, tomorrow!

There's a war on Squidmas. Kids these days are more concerned about splatting one another than celebrating the holiday, which is supposed to be about peace and love. To the point that people are butchering the name to be "Splatmas"?!

Original post here.

(Favouritism Bracket) Ludwig's Best. Game. Ever. 2015 Votes

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - A parallel universe where the only voter is Ludwig.

I think anyone paying attention has noticed that I'm really not happy about the final result about the GameFAQs Best. Game. Ever. 2015 contest. And believe me, I went and rallied for the result I wanted. And in a pretty despicable way at times.

Let's pretend that didn't happen. Let's go off of the games that I voted for back in Round 1 of the GameFAQs Best. Game. Ever. 2015 contest. Let's suppose that every game I said I'd support in Round 1 won! We'll call this "Ludwig's favouritism bracket". And I'm going to have this go over every round in the contest. Let's see this to its conclusion and settle it:

What videogame do I like the most? (...Assuming it's in the bracket. And it probably is.)

You're probably smart enough to get why I chose that picture to represent me for this premise.

Wait for the YEAR TO END! Game of the Year Awards

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - That's what we do.

Suddenly, when it looks good for them, people take garbage like The Game Awards seriously. Whether it be Nintendo themselves or fans, they now have ammunition like "Best Shooter of 2015!" when referring to Splatoon. That's the opinion of The Game Awards, which those same fans (rightfully) deride as a trashy outlet in other years. Just 'cause you agree with my opinion for a year doesn't mean you get promoted out of being trash.

To their credits, a lot of other outlets haven't announced their game of the year awards yet for 2015. We're still waiting for IGN, for example. Giant Bomb, too. On the other hand, Metacritic, that aggregate of reviewers' scores, went ahead and announced the best games of 2015. How can an aggregate do that when not every outlet has announced their own?

Splatfest: Naughty Villainy RISING!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Looks like the so-called good guys keep losin'.

I think it's about time to observe the beginning of a trend. Sure, we only have two data points and you need three to become a trend, but who knows if there ever will be a third data point. New content for Splatoon will stop come January 2016 (so really soon) according to an interview with some Splatoon developers done by Game Informer. However, producer Hisashi Nogami specifically points out that Splatfests will still continue after that point. Still, we can surmise that they won't go on forever, and for whatever reason Japan is now repeating their own Splatfests. Which is even worse than Europe just taking America's.

Anyway, what I'm talkin' 'bout is this: In the Team Autobots vs. Team Decepticons Splatfest (which KoopaTV was solidly on the side of Team Decepticons), Team Decepticons won easily.

Team Decepticons had 42% popularity, but had 56% of the wins.

Meanwhile, we just had the Naughty vs. Nice Splatfest, and I was solidly on Team Naughty. The results?

Momentary Memetic Messes don't Mosey in Memory

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - If you're relying on meme power, you won't last long.

What are the games that stand the test of time? The games that are still talked about and talked fondly of even though they're pretty old? The recent GameFAQs Best. Game. Ever. 2015 contest could shed light on this question. The games that made the top, for the most part, are (really) old and have very solid game design fundamentals.

There's an exception to that, which is the September 2015 release Undertale. Which won the whole tournament, to my dismay. Its finals opponent, a former champion, didn't even try.

I voted for the last option, and was the 5th person to vote in the poll! (And was the 2nd person to vote the last option at the time.)

Yeah, I'm spiteful. I know it isn't logical and people have pointed it out to me already. So be more original in your comments in the comments section for this, okay?

Anyway, people claim that Undertale, a quirky game made by one dude, is amazing and changed their life or whatever. These people are freaks from tumblr who are very impressionable and probably have a crappy life up to that point, so it's pretty easy to change their lives. I'd give props if their lives are changed for the better, but all it seemed to have done is make them waste more time on tumblr and become "salt miners" where they voted for Undertale just to make GameFAQs and myself mad. That's not being a good person or being a change for the better.

They really like Undertale partly because of its "witty writing", and that's apparently expressed by people repeating the same few lines as memes over and over. This is a problem. 

Ludwig Von Koopa's Team Pizza Crusade

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I'm not done supporting Team Pizza!

We had a rather unfortunate result almost two weeks ago: Team Burgers defeated Team Pizzas in the Splatoon Splatfest, and I put my support behind Team Pizza. What ended up happening? Team Pizza had only 63% popularity vs. Team Burgers and their 37%... and Team Burgers won a whopping (no doubt from Burger King's Whopper) 56% of the time! Since the scoring system heavily weighs winning over popularity, Team Burgers won.

So did my team end up sucking? ...Yes. But we had spirit. I will fight for that slice of pizza!

It looks so scrumptious! Give me!

But... Team Burgers didn't want me eating the pizza slice. They probably wanted me to eat a burger. So, I summoned my pizza-friendly minions.

KoopaTV Judges the CNN Republican December 2015 Presidential Debate!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Let's order this by who should still be here.

Last night, we had two debates for the Republicans on CNN, again. Yeah, we already were on CNN, but there are only a few "approved" channels left after the CNBC disaster.

See the list of people that were in the debates here. Or, represented here in these graphs of talking times:

Numbers provided by CNN.

The huge differences between the amount of time the earlier-debate candidates got compared to the later-debate one is important. You might ask why anyone would want to show up to the larger debate when only I'm-going-to-keep-talking-and-ignore-the-moderator-telling-me-to-shut-up Ted Cruz got to talk more than anyone in the lower debate, but you got to consider the larger debate had three times as many viewers. 5.7 million vs. 18 million.

It was a big point of contention for candidate Rand Paul, because the media was massively reporting days before the debate that he wouldn't qualify for the prime-time debate and that he'd have to drop down to the scrub one. Some folks were even reporting that he was going to be DROPPING OUT of the race! Didn't happen, but if Rand did go to the lower debate he could probably fight for double the amount of speaking time than what he actually got last night. Could balance the one-third of the viewers?

In honour of Rand's dilemma, I'm going to organise my thoughts based on three tiers. "Stay in the debates", "Figure something out", and "Drop out already". I might be biased here, so feel free to call that out in the comments. And of course, our awards at the end.

KoopaTV's FINAL Smash Direct Live Reactions!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Taking you from start to finish in this journey by Sakurai.

Today is super-busy. There's the finals of the GameFAQs Best Game Ever tournament, where Undertale is dominating and it shouldn't. There are two Republican debates tonight, one going on right now as of publishing. (The one you care less about.)

Yet the most important (arguably?) of the events today? Masahiro Sakurai giving his final presentation ever on Super Smash Bros. For Wii U and Super Smash Bros. For 3DS. And let's not kid ourselves, it's mostly the first one.

I'm Nintendork 13 13 and the only other guy who talks is Vortexica. Kamek still exists, as the first line says. Just... in another world.

Uh, anyway.

Which character was in the 1st Worldwide spot for the fighter ballot? ...Spoilers: Not Phoenix Wright.

 

Team Naughty Ain't Evil

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - If you want hypocrisy, look elsewhere. I'm being consistent.

There is another Splatfest this Saturday in North America, making the gap between them only two weeks long as opposed to three. Are you naughty, or are you nice?

A certain element in society is drumming up a Turf War on Squidmas...

 
Are you on Team Naughty, or on Team Nice?

I thought about bucking your expectations for the heck of it, but, nah, I'll be true to myself. OF COURSE I'm on Team Naughty! I mean, come on. I don't really need to explain why, right? ...Well, I might have to.

Callie is also on Team Naughty, though it's never explained why and she didn't seem to have a choice in the matter.

Well, I can't (canonically) explain Callie's Team Naughty position. However, I can explain my own since you're due some explanation for someone out there.

"But Ludwig!" A strawman might begin, "You've been claiming for over a decade that you and Koopa Kingdom are the good guys, and Mario is evil!"

(Quarters, Semis, Finals!) Ludwig's Best. Game. Ever 2015 Votes

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Eight games to four. Four to two... Two to THE BEST GAME EVER.

The GameFAQs Best. Game. Ever contest will have its last day on Tuesday, December 15. Not counting bonus polls. Same day as the Super Smash Bros. 4 Direct, and Night 5 of the Republican Presidential Debates! So that'll be a busy day.

But before we get there, we need to go through the quarter-finals. And then the semi-finals. And since we'll be going through this quickly, might as well dedicate this one article to the rest of the contest!

You can participate and vote here. You don't need to have an account or anything.

It's three rounds in one article, so... Let's just write "FINALS" in a funky font.

See my Round 4 picks here. The quarter-finals are two a day, the semi-finals are one a day, and the finals is one. There may be bonus polls afterwards. This article will be updated Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday, so be sure to check out this page then.

Who Knows Why the PlayStation 4 is Selling? Defying Conventional Thinking?

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I dunno, it seems pretty conventional to me. What used to be conventional, anyway.

Remember in March 2015 when Sony's PlayStation 4 eclipsed 20 million units? Since then, it's supposedly gone up to over 30 million units sold. So the PlayStation 4 sold in little over half a year what the Wii U has taken nearly six times that amount of time to do. Surely, Sony has to have some kind of secret sauce, right? Are they ready to tell us what those ingredients are?

Apparently, they still have no clue why. It baffles 'em.

PlayStation/Sony frontman Shuhei Yoshida doesn't know what the PlayStation 4 did better than the PlayStation 3, other than making the PlayStation 4 easier to develop for than the PlayStation 3, which was notoriously super-powered and really hard to make games for. This easiness makes software much more available than the PlayStation 3, which was derided by memes 8-9 years ago for having no games. (I like to think you could still use those today, but I'm probably wrong at this point. Though, I wasn't wrong April Fools 2014, and it was still selling a ton then!)

He gives another reason. That GameSpot article says:

“Another reason why the PS4 has enjoyed such strong success, according to Yoshida, is that it's attracting people who never owned any last-generation console.” 

Personal Experience: System Transfer to New Nintendo 3DS XL

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - The media are still the bad guys, but there's a truth to their stories of complexity.

I have had enough of having a broken Nintendo 3DS. I'm not even supposed to have an original Nintendo 3DS, and I set out at the start of this generation that I would start with the revision. It's just Shigeru Miyamoto's lies got in the way, and bam, I get stuck with a sexy Midnight Purple handheld with built-in design flaws and garbage-quality shoulder buttons. And the Circle Pad peels off and ends up in random places in my house instead of being on the pad.

So, as part of the Black Friday sales, you and I could save $20 on a New Nintendo 3DS XL. I know my headline was about the Wii U bundle, but basically every retailer had that $20 off. So...why not do it? Replace my broken Nintendo 3DS with a New Nintendo 3DS XL! Then I can actually play Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon instead of write articles pretending that I'm legitimately able to think it's the best game of the year.

I therefore ordered the New Nintendo 3DS XL off Amazon. I remembered that you needed a very small screwdriver to switch SD cards, which I would need to do if I wanted to transfer all my data from my Nintendo 3DS (which has a 16 GB SD card and uses about half of its memory right now) to my New Nintendo 3DS XL! And I also needed to actually buy that bigger microSD card. And I also remember that when the New Nintendo 3DS came out, there was all the media commotion that went along with this screwdriver business. And I dismissed it, saying,

Your Big Nintendo of America Announcement? Minecraft Wii U!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - This makes Nintendo fans 0-2 in less than a week!

Following the disastrous speculation that Nintendo would have something major to announce at The Game Awards 2015 (and they most certainly did not), Nintendo fans quickly clung to their next speculative scrap of news. This came in the form of Nintendo's Damon Baker saying in a Nintendo World Report podcast that there would be "something happening on Monday" and that something would be "big." He didn't say YUUUUGE, though.

Would like to note that Nintendo World Report is on KoopaTV's shit-list before we continue this article.

So what happened? Cue the press release:

“Best-selling sandbox game Minecraft heads to Nintendo's Wii U console”

Or as Nintendo's Amy would put it:

“Your wishes were heard!”

I'd say the worst part is the “Hope you're ready to get creative with blocks this holiday!” line.

(Round 4) Ludwig's Best. Game. Ever 2015 Votes

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Division finals! Sixteen games left!

After this, I'm going to put Rounds 5 and 6 in its own article. Anyway, it's my picks for the Divisional Finals in the GameFAQs Best. Game. Ever contest, where GameFAQs natives and whoever gets rallied across the Internet come together and vote on the best game of all time.

You can vote here.

Best. Game. Ever. 20th Anniversary Edition ROUND 4!
It turns out the "H" in "20TH" makes for a good 4.

See my Round 3 picks here. There are still two matches a day this round, and two next round.

Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon Saved the Whole Pokémon Franchise

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Pokémon asked for a Rescue Team! And it got one.

There is this gross trend lately among Pokémon games. Someone among Nintendo and/or The Pokémon Company is getting all these third-tier development teams like Genius Sonority to make a slew of addictive-yet-destructive free-to-start Pokémon games for the Nintendo 3DS (and then to mobile). We've seen it with Pokémon Shuffle, Pokémon Rumble World (where it brings up very concerning ethical issues), and the just-announced-and-now-released Pokémon Picross. The latter of which was the only new game announcement from the last Nintendo Direct in November, amusingly enough.

Basically, Pokémon has devolved (in a series supposedly about evolution) into a series that uses manipulative revenue models to restrict great gameplay, all while preying on children. It sucks, and maybe it's the cost of not having a mainline game in the series this year. The Pokémon Company needs to leverage its brand for SOMETHING that will constantly be money-making, since it's specifically dedicated to just one franchise compared to other companies that have multiple levers to play with.

So hey, let's have games that would be over pretty fast if people could play them whenever they want. That means we don't have to work that much on content if people access it really slowly! Or pay to proceed. Or pay to access the content.

Yet one Pokémon game stands to defend the old way of gaming. One game... comes to the rescue.

Friends to the Rescue! No, not the show.

Pokémon Super Mystery Dungeon.

Ludwig Passively Reacts to The Game Awards 2015

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I have other things to do, and this always sucked.

I didn't know these were tonight. It's The Game Awards, hosted by Geoff Keighley.

...The Game Awards is notoriously awful.

So here's what they themselves put up:

It's advised that you didn't bother watching The Game Awards.

Still, Nintendo fans were hyping themselves into thinking there'd be some big Nintendo announcement. Spoiler alert: It was a trick. There was nothing for you.

I got more enjoyment out of eating my chicken than watching The Game Awards 2015, so here's my live reaction to it.

Ludwig and Team Koopa are Going to Rio

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - To play at the Olympics! And the arcade?

You know, playing at the Rio Olympic Games was never on my agenda. That's basically my whole August destroyed in foreign lands. You think I know Portuguese? Plus, all the training. We just gotta do it to represent Koopa Kingdom against plumber and Sonic. Well, I was honoured to be selected, so yeah, you'll see me there August 2016. I have no idea how this site will work during that time. Maybe it won't! Maybe you'll join the staff and pick up the slack. Maybe our existing staff will. I doubt it!

Remember: Training takes a huge investment of time if you want to do well. I know an Olympic athlete (and not counting King Dad's previous participation in Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games games) and she had to dedicate her life years in advance. Meanwhile, I'm just learning about this now and already regret it.

I think it's too late to turn back. Mario & Sonic at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games is going to take over my free time. (And I'm never going to actually buy it.)

KoopaTV's November 2015 Review Newsletter

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Hearing your feedback soft but clear.

KoopaTV is a site by a person and for the people. We want to be the best KoopaTV that we can! And so we're shoring up some issues, as you'll see in another "we have headers with anchors" edition of our monthly review newsletters!

So what happened in November? Great levels of activity, and greatness from us and you. Also, it went by SUPER fast.

Top Five Recommended Articles From November

Let's start with KoopaTV's greatness. As I always have written, every article on the site is worth reading, and that truism won't die down. But here are my top five recommended articles in chronological order that you really gotta read if you didn't read anything else from November! (And what's wrong with you, if you haven't?)

1. King Activision: Murders and Executions
2. Myth: School Takes Up All Your Time!
3. Was the November 2015 Nintendo Direct THAT Mind-Blowing?
4. Localisation Is Not Censorship
5. Gluten Wars the Splatfest: Pizza vs. Burgers

There are definitely awesome articles not included in the above list. It's just if I had more than five it'd be breaking tradition, and you'd be less likely to actually look at these! 'cause you might as well just look on the sidebar and randomly click things from November 2015. Not that I'm against you doing that. Anyway...