E3 2022 Cancelled? Geoff Keighley Hegemony Awaits?!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Seems like a disaster to me!

I have been trying to ping the Entertainment Software Association for some time now for when exactly E3 2022 would be this year. The idea of an all-digital event is fine with me. Just do something better than last year's awful virtual portal. I gotta plan what to do during the June time period since it's a KoopaTV tradition to dedicate it to E3!

While the ESA never got back to me, they did send out messages to some privileged people, including a PR guy named Will Powers, as well as to IGN. The message is that E3 2022 is officially cancelled. As of publishing, the ESA still hasn't updated their E3 website, and it still says to wait for E3 2022 to come next year. (It's been saying next year since 2021. And if it means to keep saying that in 2022... well, it'll be E3 2023 then.)

FAKE NEWS.
And I'm very frustrated that the ESA won't make their own public announcement about this.
Seems weird and cowardly. Alternatively, the E3 webmaster quit and they can't update their website...?

Samus Will Smile in the Presence of Round Things

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Samus's opportunities for happiness.

When Metroid Dread released on the Nintendo Switch last October, fans of heroine bounty hunter Samus Aran rejoiced at their new game and its characterisation of Samus as a badass (though less thoughtful than how she was in Metroid Fusion). However, some writers, like Ian Walker of Kotaku (different writer than the Kotaku editor that promoted piracy of Metroid Dread), believe that “Samus Doesn’t Need To Be An Emotionless Robot To Be Badass.” (Note that the Kotaku article spoils the story of Metroid Dread, which I promise isn't the point of the KoopaTV article you're currently on.) They wanted Samus to vocally express herself when grappling with revelations about herself and her past. Instead, as fans will point out, Samus expresses herself with subtle body expressions (and sometimes facial expressions when you can see her face through her mask). She's not emotionless. Just quiet.

The Kotaku writer went as far as to say that he'd expect “someone in that position to let her guard down a bit and ask a few questions, maybe even crack a smile. But no, Samus Aran is Samus Aran: cold, emotionless, unfazed.” In other words, Samus needs to smile more. I'm not familiar with Mr. Ian Walker's full line of work, but I wonder how much he asks male characters that they need to smile more and write articles about how they're deficient for not contorting their facial muscles to his liking.

But it is true that Samus rarely smiles. But there are reasons for that. Samus Aran enjoys her life in only a few circumstances—when surrounded by round objects. That's according to the Super Metroid 4-koma manga published in Shounen Oh Game Comic back in 1994. The first issue, “Round and Round”, written by manga artist Matsumoto Hidetaka, shows Samus Aran in many contexts only expressing happiness and satisfaction when encountering round things. Unfortunately, it takes a much longer time than the average, usual Metroid game for Samus to acquire the Morph Ball ability in Metroid Dread—and that's an excellent reason for her to be cranky when she can't do this:

What'll come out first? Metroid Prime 4, Advance Wars 1+2 Re-Boot Camp, or the Sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild?

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Three delays... little answers!

Let's play a game in the comments section. What will be the relative release order of these three cursed Nintendo Switch titles? All of which were mentioned or shown at Nintendo's E3 2021 Direct.

1. Metroid Prime 4, which never had a release date (it's still “TBA” in Nintendo's financial documents). In January 2019, it was announced that its original team was off the project and Retro Studios would be on the assignment. It never received a release date or details. At E3 2021, it was described as being worked on hard, but they quickly changed topics to reveal Metroid Dread
2. At E3 2021, Nintendo announced Advance Wars 1+2 Re-Boot Camp for a December 3, 2021 release date. Then in October 2021 it was announced that Advance Wars 1+2 Re-Boot Camp got delayed to be... a higher-quality product to release in the spring of 2022. In the February 2022 Nintendo Direct, they announced the new release date to be April 8, 2022. And then earlier this month, Advance Wars 1+2 Re-Boot Camp, which is presumably now a finished product, was delayed indefinitely to a To Be Determined date thanks to “recent world events”... Unlike the other two games on this list, at least Advance Wars 1+2 Re-Boot Camp has a Nintendo.com listing. While pre-orders were once available, they have now been cancelled and disabled.
3. They first announced the sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in a cryptic way at E3 2019 without a release date (another “TBA”). Then more footage appeared at E3 2021, with a release year of... 2022. But today, the sequel to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild got a video similar to what Metroid Prime 4's got:
   
   

Ace Attorney Trilogy HD Mobile Getting Replaced (in Japan)

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Good. Or, may I be so bold as to say... TAKE THAT!?

I have a really long history on earlier-days KoopaTV of ranting about mobile trash and the release of Ace Attorney ports on mobile ecosystems like Apple and Google's Android.

But Ace Attorney Trilogy HD on mobile predates KoopaTV's existence, so I don't think I've gone into any level of detail into it. Now's my chance, since today CAPCOM has put out a notice (only in Japan) that it's going to be taken down this June, on the 9th. (I suspect the only reason anyone noticed is because it was mentioned on the Gyakuten Saiban social media.) There is no equivalent notice outside of Japan... so it's unclear if this impacts anyone outside of Japan. Some media outlets are outright implying this is worldwide with no evidence. My friend Samantha Lienhard has an assumption that it'll happen globally.

I'm quite sure this is coincidental to the pending removal of several Ace Attorney games from the Nintendo eShop happening a year from now.

Anyway, the important part to me is the bit where they say that sometime in the summer of 2022 they will port Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy 2019 to mobile devices. Suckers who have the current version won't be able to get the new version for free and there won't be any links or connections or data transfers from the old to the new. This is good because the current mobile title is riddled with bugs (and never even came out on Android in English). Here are some examples of what the reviews say:

Ring Fit Adventure Fitness Log Week 69: Finalia, Fitness Master Edition

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - It's the very last world of Ring Fit Adventure. Like, for real this time. THIRD TIME'S THE CHARM.

This is it. Today, this KoopaTV Fitness Friday... will probably be the last KoopaTV Fitness Friday. I will document my adventures through World 69: Fitness Master Lv. 392 of Ring Fit Adventure. This should be fairly obvious, but... this will contain spoilers for how the game ends. ...On its third playthrough. Which will share a lot of similarities for how it ended on the second playthrough, World 46: Extra Fitness Lv. 284.

I'm already ~65 levels above what's recommended.
Why is Ring Fit Adventure outright telling me to grind for experience points?
The time for that is over. Now we're in the last world. It's time to win.

First of all, when we got to World 69, Ring commented that Dragaux's energy is... radiating from the Dragaux Stadium. Therefore, we need to grind for levels and make sure we're confident in our ability to beat him for the zillionth time. ...And second of all, I got a notification that all of the games’ catalogs have been completed. I HAVE COLLECTED EVERYTHING IN THE GAME. (Except for all of the Titles.)

With everything done, nothing else really matters at this point.

And third of all... now we can see what the Metallic Neuron looks like. This is the super special fashionable outfit we received at the very end of World 68 last week. Here's a photo collection:

Kirby 30th Anniversary Music Fest? And Kirby and the Forgotten Land release

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Plus some behind-the-scenes info into its development.

Tomorrow (March 25, 2022), Kirby and the Forgotten Land, the franchise's first mainline 3D platformer, releases!

And I admit that after playing it for myself... I'm not a fan of it. Well, I'm not a fan of 3D platformers in general. (The last 3D platformer I played before that was BALAN WONDERWORLD, and at least Kirby and the Forgotten Land is leagues better!) But for Kirby in particular, I've had concerns about how a 3D game would translate and still feel like a Kirby game and stay true to his character. Developer HAL LABORATORY has also had those concerns. There is a brand-new four-part interview between HAL and Nintendo going into the game's development philosophy, and how the 3D gameplay ultimately affected the world-building and setting.

While HAL seems confident that they made the correct design decisions (and that the Wild Mode difficulty is actually hard?), I'm... not as favourable in that assessment. But, hey, the professional reviewers seem to like it.

But what I really want to talk about is the upcoming Kirby 30th Anniversary Music Fest happening August 11, 2022. This promises to be a FREE, WORLDWIDE livestream of gorgeous Kirby music that apparently features Meta Knight playing the saxophone. I think that's very exciting. Marx, who you may remember from Marx Day, is also playing the guitar(x).

Reggie Fils-Aime on the Metaverse (and Meta/Facebook) and GameStop

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - He's roasting Facebook, but is it for the right reason?

Former Nintendo of America executive and current... um... I'm not really sure what he does now besides be a foolish Twitter personality. He's promoting a new book he wrote called Disrupting the Game, I guess! Regardless, he was at South by Southwest a week and a half ago, signing MOTHER 3 cartridges and giving speeches. Here's one that a very bad media outlet (with very bad video embed technology) has gotten a hold of about the “metaverse”:

Reggie himself wanted us to watch this interview, so let's commentate on it.

Reggie defines “the metaverse”—besides as a buzzword everyone is talking about to justify any business decision—as “a digital space where you interact with your friends in a social and... I believe gaming-type of environment. So it's social. It's digital. And there's an ability to really interact with friends and people who have the potential to be your friends.” He went on to say that the metaverse is partly already here, like in Fortnite and Roblox. Epic Games certainly agrees with Reggie's assertion that Fortnite is a metaverse play—they claimed so in court.

FAKE NEWS Bloomberg's Emily Chang then brought Meta (formerly Facebook) into the discussion and asked Reggie's thoughts. Reggie said that Facebook is not an innovative company. Facebook has either acquired interesting companies (like Oculus) or they follow others’ trends (like how they steal features from Snap and TikTok).

Missions and Rewards (custom icon creator) Added to Nintendo Switch Online

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I... kinda like the idea of it, actually. Better than not having it.

Sure, this is three weeks old now, but I wanted to see how it'd play out. Nintendo updated the Nintendo Switch Online app (the section on your Nintendo Switch HOME menu, not the application on your phone—though that also did get updated but it's useless and certainly not worth an article) to have “missions and rewards.”

Those missions right now involve things like playing any game that supports online play (even something like Ring Fit Adventure does because it has online leaderboards, even if I don't use them), backing up save data (which is... automatic), opening the Nintendo Switch Online app at all, and playing a featured title such as Super Mario Bros. on the Nintendo Entertainment System emulator. While the Monster Hunter Rise Game Trial was available, there was a mission for trying that out as well.

The rewards for completing those missions are Platinum Points, which are the same ones you'll find on My Nintendo. And...uh... the rewards there that you can exchange the Platinum Points with remain iffy (well, now they have keychains based off Nintendo 64 game cartridges that you might find cool?). But the rewards that they're talking about aren't the ones on My Nintendo, despite the common currency. They're exclusive to the Nintendo Switch Online app, involving... custom icon creation. You know, the icons on your Switch profile that your friends and enemies see. Mine's been Master Bowser on a purple background since the start. They're offering new (and exclusive to this programme), limited-time icons (oh, this limited-time thing again...), backgrounds, and frames. So far, they've been based on Animal Crossing: New Horizons (corresponding to animals’ birthdates) and Super Mario Odyssey, with the latter's cycling through every week. In April, it'll change to something else.

Nintendo Switch Update 14.0.0 Brings GROUPS (which are not FOLDERS)

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - They're very different.

Today, you can update your Nintendo Switch to version 14.0.0. The big new feature? Groups. (And the smaller new feature are volume controls on Bluetooth audio devices.)

If you want to know more about how to create groups, there is a Nintendo Support article for you. Note that, as of publishing, they put captions under each image that only say “Caption”... That's a goof-up. Take it from the guy who publishes five articles a week: you want your captions to say something about the image. Not just say caption. There's an example of this later in this article. (I must warn you that sometimes KoopaTV's image captions are more humourous than educational... but there's a good balance.)

You may remember a feature called folders from the 3DS and the Wii U, the Switch's predecessors. You'll notice that at no point does Nintendo refer to the new groups feature as a folder, yet members of the (FAKE NEWS) media, as well as some average people, are using this f-word. So what is the difference?

Ring Fit Adventure Fitness Log Week 68: New mattress vs. Daylight Saving Time

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Which will impact my sleep quality more? ...Why is this my headline for the second-to-last world?

Time for... a scary week of fitness. I don't mean in a horror sense, but I do mean in terms of the amount of effort I need to exert this week to finish all of World 68: Fitness Master Lv. 383 in time. Very different than last week's filler world. Why? Because this is based on World 45: Extra Fitness Lv. 276, an insanely long world with 17 levels. I've been playing the entirety of Fitness Master mode at the highest difficulty level, 30. That ain't gonna change.

Before starting on Sunday, I went and got a new mattress for my bed. Hopefully I can sleep better and without waking up in back pain. I'll give progress reports. Sleep is particularly important now because Sunday was DAYLIGHT SAVING TIME in the United States. One of the worst days of the year, and a sleep-killer. As for starting Ring Fit Adventure, Ring asked a stupid question and said he's eager to show the Four Masters our progress. (C'mon, we saw them all as recently as the end of World 66, two weeks ago.)

...If the Four Masters DIDN'T make their way back to Hades, WHY WOULD WE BE HERE TO BEGIN WITH?

Location-wise, we're in Hades... or basically the afterlife, because when you have a vore fetish, you end up killing people (or being killed, depending on where you are in that). So the filler world last week was us heading to the afterlife without committing suicide, but instead just... walking up to its entrance. I dunno. We'll similarly walk (or jog) through the world's first course, the Exercise Paradise. Same stage as Marathon Field back in World 66, but with scarier enemies. Like the last monster group has TWO Scuttlebells, and those are the sturdiest common foes around. After that trial, the game forces me to open a Treasure Chest with one EXP-doubling Carrot Soup inside. I'm sure there are many good opportunities I can use it for ahead. (Speaking of EXP, I'm at level 447 after finishing that, so... far above what they're asking for.) After that is the Town with nothing for me to really buy, though there is the old man saying his skeleton would have been better while he was alive if he just had more calcium and Vitamin D. ...And I'm Vitamin D deficient, so... he doesn't want me to turn out like him.

CAPCOM Publisher Sale of March 2022 (featuring $5 Ace Attorney)

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - They're smart after all!

One month ago, I wrote about the upcoming closure of the two last-generation Nintendo system eShops for next year: The Wii U's and the 3DS's. In the footer of that article, I wrote...

“Smart game publishers and indies will be sure to have their Wii U and 3DS titles on sale repeatedly between now and 2023 so you feel compelled to buy them before you are no longer able to. If that gets you to buy an Ace Attorney game when you otherwise wouldn't have, that's a good thing.”

It turns out that CAPCOM is a smart game publisher. Check out their CAPCOM Publisher Sale that lasts until March 28, 2:59 AM Eastern. (SQUARE ENIX also has a sale going on, and they're somewhat smart because they have a couple of 3DS games on sale, being FINAL FANTASY EXPLORERS at 60% off and THEATRHYTHM FINAL FANTASY CURTAIN CALL at 50% off.)

Take a close look at those prices. But I'll text it too.

(Shaymin and) Darkrai and Arceus Events in Pokémon Shining Pearl and Brilliant Diamond... with criteria

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Platinum events! With upsetting requirements.

One of the initial (and current) complaints I saw a lot about Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Pokémon Shining Pearl that I see a lot is that it doesn't include a lot of additions that Pokémon Platinum made to Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl—because people apparently expect content from a game that it's not a remaster of. Despite that, ILCA is making strides to include some of that content. We saw some of this in last month's Pokémon Presents with the Shaymin event. That event is still on-going, but it's time-limited. You have less than two weeks to open up Mystery Gift and receive Oak's Letter. You don't need to USE Oak's Letter by March 27, but you do need to receive it into your inventory. ...Just like Pokémon Platinum.

Notice that I'm thanking... my own website.
(Not the readers or visitors to my website but my website itself. ...Is that truly being grateful?)

Today, The Pokémon Company announced two more events: The Member Card will be distributed via Mystery Gift between April 1 and April 30. Like Oak's Letter, you will be able to receive the Member Card as soon as you can Mystery Gift, but you will need to see the game credits and get the National Dex before being able to use it.

More immediately, there was a game update today (version 1.3.0) making another event available right now.

Time for Year-Round Standard Time

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - DST is bad.

Have you been in the United States of America lately? (Or Inkopolis?) Are you feeling tired and fatigued and miserable? Do you live in a state that ain't Arizona or Hawaii? You're probably suffering from the impact of Daylight Saving Time (alternatively called Daylight Savings Time), which seems portray the daylight as being in more trouble than Princess Peach.

With regards to being out of trouble and not needing saving, Witch Princess was just telling me that the change from Standard Time to Daylight Saving Time ruined her home security system and caused an outage for that whole Sunday, leaving her security system... insecure and not doing what it's supposed to do. In an area where she is living among dweebish farmers and a vengeful Harvest Goddess, that could be problematic for her.

This says...
“Report Communication Failure
The control panel is unable to communicate. This is a serious condition as your security may be compromised and requires immediate attention. Please verify the network is operational.
If you need further assistance, please contact your security dealer.”
Seems like the security system can't handle time travel.

Last year, KoopaTV mentioned the Sunshine Protection Acts of 2021 in the Senate and the House of Representatives), as well as a huge contact list. We then provided an update, upon DST 2021 finally ending, of the total lack of legislative progress besides a few more cosponsors. For 2022, the same bill is still around (bills last two years before there's a new Congress), and there are... a few more co-sponsors since then. (Like Senators Dianne Feinstein and Tommy Tuberville... or Representative Lauren Boebert. People who aren't in the relevant committees.) But still no actions taken.

And that's a shame, because besides Witch Princess's defences being shut down, she—and hundreds of millions of Americans—can also be at risk of many health problems because of the switch to Daylight Saving Time that wouldn't be present in year-round standard time. That's according to articles like “Daylight Saving Time May Be Killing Us — So Why Haven't We Abolished It?” Let's look into what that article says for the rest of this article. (They cite a doctor, and I'm just a politician/military leader in a foreign universe, so I'll stick to what I'm good at and commentate.)

Happy MAR13 Day for Squid Sister Marie!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Well, THIS one is happy, I think. Unless you're an Octarian under DJ Octavio.

Today is one of the worst days of the year because it's Daylight Saving Time day. Unfortunately, that's on the same day as MAR13 Day, or Marie Day. Named for the Squid Sister Marie of the Splatoon series. So... it's not a great situation. But I'll try to save DST ranting for Monday's article and focus on Marie.

If Marie and I think the same way about Daylight Saving Time...
... Then yes, we're moody! (Marie was on Team Sleeping, after all!)

I'm not going to rewrite history: I voted for Callie in the final Splatoon Splatfest. However, it was Marie that ultimately won, which dramatically impacted the storyline for Splatoon 2. And I'm happy it turned out the way it did. Marie was a good sidekick. Entertainment-wise, since she's much more snarky than Callie would be.

Unfortunately for Marie (and unfortunately for me because I wanted this to be a big part of my article today), the Splatoon 2 tournament that Nintendo of America just held this weekend (the Splatoon 2 North American Open March 2022) featured very little Charger use in the finals. The one Charger main was Team Papaya's Bamboozler user, and that doesn't reaaaally count because of how different it is than a normal Charger, like what Marie uses.

Ring Fit Adventure Fitness Log Week 67: The last filler world

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - And the third-to-last world in general.

Sigh... one last... filler world, really, left in Ring Fit Adventure. That's what I'm bringing you today. We're venturing in the land that's between the physical world and the... afterlife. After last week's Fitness Log had a vore sequence. This is World 67: Fitness Master Lv. 376, which you should think of as a storyless version of World 44: Extra Fitness Lv. 269.

Ring seems pretty happy that Dragaux's digestive system isn't instant, so we can dick around this filler world.
Those three warp portals contain a total of six additional courses and three overworld Treasure Chests.
(Two levels, two Game Gyms, a Battle Gym, and a Fitness Gym.)

The first level we're going to is called Jog-On Bog. Doesn't sound fun. And it wasn't. Foggy, too. They could've named it the Fog Bog. Of a bit more interest is that I've done my 2000th Revolved Crescent Lunge Pose repetition here, so I earned the Crescent Nebula Poser Title. I guess that's all the Revolved Crescent Lunge Poses I'll do for the playthrough now? This gave me access to General Store Number 61 (and the world's Town... but there are zero NPC inhabitants). The only clothing that I haven't bought yet is the Game Machine III, but I need three Zircon for that and I only have one. I also have access to the first warp point and the two Game Gyms: Squattery Wheel (Advanced) for a Defense Drink and Robo-Wrecker (Advanced) for a Strength Drink. ...I got A ranks on both on my first try, though Squattery Wheel's was pretty iffy at 84 points. The overworld Treasure Chest here had one Dragon Fruit. Pft.

MAR10 may be Mario Day, but I'll remember it as the day I became a LEGO

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - No one would read this website if THIS was my author avatar on every article.

Today is MAR10. ...Or Mario Day. Or “National Mario Day” if you're Nintendo of America trying to promote a limited-time sale. It's a bad day for everyone, especially for Koopa Kingdom. That's why KoopaTV has been publishing articles this year that are alternatives to MAR10 Day, such as MAR5 for Mars, MAR7 for Marth, and MAR8 for Marx. (Stay tuned for MAR13 for Marie Day.) And while all of Mars, Marth, and Marx are ruthless killers, none of them compare to how ruthless Mario is. I understand that. You should understand that if you're a long-time KoopaTV reader. But even so...

...I was unprepared for today's joint MAR10 announcement from Nintendo and The LEGO Group. It can be summarised in this picture... although I'll go into more text-based detail for sure:

Lemmy Koopa and I join Larry Koopa as LEGO victims.
Were we targeted by The LEGO Group because all of our names begin with L?

A Forgettable Demo of Kirby and the Forgotten Land

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I'm... just not a fan, I guess.

Just an upfront disclaimer: I don't like 3D platforming games. I never asked for the Kirby series to enter this genre. But I have written before that I'd like to try out a demo for Kirby and the Forgotten Land before I pass judgment on it from just its trailers (which made it clear that it's not an open-world game, unlike what some other websites were saying). Here's another trailer:

The call to action at the end of that overview trailer (omitting the... odd amiibo part) is to pre-order Kirby and the Forgotten Land and then try the demo. I figure I'd do the demo first. After all, the Kirby Star Allies demo, released four years ago, sold me on that game.

And I got to the end of this Kirby and the Forgotten Land demo and its call to action was...

MAR8 Day Brings... Marx Day. Yikes!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - The second worst Marx in recorded history.

Why does Marx get a day (MAR 8 is MARX Day)...? The guy is a nut. ...And I mean this Marx:

MARX IS FIRIN' HIS LASER.

Alright, sometimes he looks a lot more friendly and innocent.

Hello, hi, howdy.

Marx from Kirby Super Star (which you can play with a normal Nintendo Switch Online subscription) is a pretty popular guy. Even his Kirby Star Allies bio declares him to be famous. But let's go over why on his special day.

MAR7 Day for Crazy Altean Marth

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Crazy might not be putting it well... murderous or callous?

I guess this isn't a really happy day, but today is MAR7, otherwise known as Marth Day. You might know Marth from the Super Smash Bros. series, where he's been speaking in Japanese until Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. But you should know he's a prince (and then king) of the nation of Altea, part of the Archanean continent. As for what his troops think of him?

...

That's silence. Now, Marth does have troops around. But they dare not speak. Mainly because they don't have any lines, but also because if they stand out, they might not remain much longer. That's because Marth's Hero King moniker is propaganda. In reality, he's a heartless, callous monster.

Happy MAR5 Day for Team Galactic Commander Mars!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Best woman!

This is very abnormal I'd even publish anything today, but for Team Galactic Commander Mars? Totally worth it. Today is MAR5, otherwise known as Mars Day! And Mars has had a HUGE year with the release of Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Pokémon Shining Pearl, where she is equally as wonderful as she was in Pokémon Diamond and Pokémon Pearl.

At this point in the story, you've already encountered Mars.
...But the stupid kids involved forgot her. How could they? Idiot whelps.

That said, she did get some... extra development in Pokémon Platinum that doesn't exist in these modern remasters. For example, she never actually mentions Cyrus in her dialogue in the originals/the remasters, but she's much more heavy into her devotion for “Master Cyrus” in Pokémon Platinum that was picked up on in both the original Sinnoh series anime and in Mars's recent appearances in Pokémon Masters EX in the Sinnoh Villain Arc. I guess that's another thing that's making Mars currently relevant.

Ring Fit Adventure Fitness Log Week 66: Regularly Scheduled Vore

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - I can't handle it.

In these uncertain editorial calendar times, one fortunate KoopaTV “mainstay” (...well, not by the end of this month, actually, since there's four worlds left and four weeks in March) is KoopaTV Fitness Friday. Last week we discovered Dragaux's third wish as a child. This week, we're heading to World 66: Fitness Master Lv. 370. This is based off World 43: Extra Fitness Lv. 263, and the lore of the world is that it's a dark place where Dragaux is constantly exercising even during the night, so no one can sleep. Lack of sleep is a problem I've been having, though it doesn't seem to be a problem right now because Fitness Master doesn't do story, and as a result, there's no constant Dragaux banging noises in the overworld like there originally were. When I entered the world, Ring asked if I've been doing the opening and cooldown stretches, and he expressed that they may be tempting to skip, but I shouldn't skip them, because it's fun to see how my body is getting better at stretching. ...For his information, I don't skip them. Ever.

Yes, and I've done so for every day this week, too.

In fact, it's fairly important to have stretched, because the first two challenges in World 64 are a Fitness Gym and a miniboss fight. Starting with the Fitness Gym... it's the Trapezius Set. And there are SIX Fit Skills involved, which is more than the five for the past several worlds. Here's the list and my thoughts on each. Remember that for the entirety of Fitness Master, I've been on difficulty level 30 (the highest it gets), so the rep counts reflect that:

The Blue Birds: Quaxly and the Ducklett

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - PECK YOUR BEAK. ...STRETCH OUT YOUR NECK!

I have seen a lot of people compare Pokémon Scarlet and Pokémon Violet Starter Pokémon Quaxly to the likes of... Donald Duck or other DuckTales characters. But as I said in my live reaction log on Sunday when they were first revealed, I see Quaxly as akin to the Blue Birds from Rhythm Heaven. See clip below:

The Blue Birds consist of a captain and three ducks, and I know the perfect roles for them.

Captain Quaxly is a little intense.
He'll get mad if you mess up, but just let it roll like water off a Ducklett's back.

Quaxly already has the hat or hat-looking thing on his head. With sunglasses, he looks just like Captain Blue Bird. And the normal Blue Birds are also ducks, and are pretty much Ducklett with hats.

It makes sense for Quaxly to be the captain, because Water starter base stat totals have ranged from 308 to 320; Ducklett's is only 305. It should be guaranteed that Quaxly will follow the trend and have better base stats than Ducklett, and thus deserving of the higher ranking. (Though I will say that Quaxly and Ducklett both have the exact same height of one foot and eight inches, while the Captain is portrayed as much shorter in Blue Birds.)

I... don't have anything creative to share with Fuecoco and Sprigatito. So it's probable that, if I get either Pokémon Scarlet or Pokémon Violet (and that's far from a guarantee—I specifically did NOT buy Pokémon Shield because doing so would've been a signal to GAME FREAK to make an open-borders Pokémon title, and that's now how they're advertising these new titles), I'd pick Quaxly as my starter.


By the way, open-borders games is now how Ludwig is going to refer to open-world games. Because he dislikes open borders as a political concept, so he might as well associate it with the gaming trend he also dislikes. Let Ludwig know if you'd like less Pokémon content (because it's tended to dominate the Artistic Corner)... or if you'd like more Rhythm Heaven content, though he's not sure how much more he can do because Blue Birds is already his favourite minigame.


While Ludwig doesn't think of Donald Duck when he sees Quaxly, he thinks of Darkside when he sees Grimmsnarl.

KoopaTV's February 2022 Review Newsletter

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Ah, THIS is what you came for. Right?

Sorry about not publishing this yesterday. We were... rudely interrupted.

But here is the actual KoopaTV monthly newsletter, February 2022 edition! Published at the beginning of (but unfortunately not the first day of) March 2022 so we can properly review what happened in the month that just passed. Starting with...

Top Five Recommended Experiences of February 2022

Here are KoopaTV's top five recommended experiences published in chronological order during February 2022:

1. The Official Pokémon DP Sound Library (and thinking about The Wonderful 1237) — This is more here for The Wonderful 1237 discussion than the Sound Library, though that sounds nice, too!
2. Happy Valentine's Day to Incineroar and Clawroline — This article is recommended because it's important for you to know what kind of person runs this website.
3. 2023's Demise of the Wii U and 3DS Nintendo eShops (Explained!) — This article has a good combination of being informative AND opinionated, as it goes to details about the Wii U and 3DS eShop end-of-life timelines while giving facts about the Memories.
4. What I Think About the TRIANGLE STRATEGY Prologue Demo — A really great game is coming out this Friday! Here are Ludwig's thoughts on the demo.
5. Thoughts about Nintendo Switch Sports Online Play Test without violating the GAG ORDER — I'm mostly proud that KoopaTV hasn't gotten a DMCA request yet for publishing this, so I'd like to brag about that here.

Every article not on the above list is still worth reading, by the way.

KoopaTV Calendar for March 2022

I don't normally tell you ahead of time what my content calendar will be for the coming month, but I do want to note that there'll be even more weekend publishing for the first few weeks. Remember last year's Four Superior Nintendo Character Day Alternatives to MAR10 Day article? That wasn't a joke. We'll be doing articles for all five of those days as they happen in March. But a couple fall under weekends. I'd still like to publish five articles a week, so some weekdays might just end up... empty as a result.

This will mean that we won't be as timely as we'd like to be on the day's big news or whatever. We'll still get to it if it's interesting. Just not that day. Or that week. But I'd rather have an interesting topic backlog than the opposite.

KoopaTV Live Reactions: SOTU 2022 + Kim Reynolds's Response

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - ...C'mon man, how many years do you need to cure cancer?

Did you come to KoopaTV tonight expecting to read our monthly newsletter? ...Because I was expecting to publish it. HOWEVER, every TV station out there was taken over—even blog websites that aren't actual TV stations but have TV in their name—with President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.'s State of the Union 2022 address to Congress. And then to be fair and balanced, we went and looked for the official Republican response, delivered by Iowa Republican Governor Kim Reynolds. Scroll to the bottom for that... though really, it's not impressive.

But since this is KoopaTV, we're not just airing the State of the Union uncritically. We LIVE commentated it below in text form. I'm the main talker, but Heavy Lobster (who is a robot and doesn't sleep) was also around to be... even less charitable than I was. This year, a country that isn't the one that is supposed to be discussed in the State of the Union got attention: Ukraine.

[8:59 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Too many reaction logs in close proximity, but President Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. is forcing us. :(
[8:59 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mVIXLQrC9rE
[9:01 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Well, he's not only taking over the airwaves but he's late, too.
[9:03 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Maybe he fell asleep.
[9:04 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Okay, suddenly it warped to Congress.
[9:05 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: No audio.
[9:05 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Official White House stream is the best because of sign language girl.
[9:05 PM] HeavyLobster: I'm here because why not.
[9:05 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Oh, shoot.
[9:05 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: I just realised this means that we gotta look at Nancy Pelosi and Kamala Harris the whole time.
[9:06 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: Maybe the camera will be tilted downward like it does when there would be Republicans in those spots.
[9:07 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: I think Congress is chanting "WAR WAR WAR WAR"
[9:07 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: but probably not.
[9:08 PM] Ludwig Von Koopa: I'm already halfway through my glass of milk. :(