Sonic Forces: Custom Hero — Brilliant, or Disaster?

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - The logical response versus the gut, emotional one.

The world is ending! Oh no!

...Unrelated to that: You can play Sonic Forces (releasing Holiday 2017 for Xbox One, the PlayStation 4, the PC... and even the Nintendo Switch) and create your own custom hero. 

There's a lot to analyse and consider in that 96-second trailer, and also some things not in it to analyse and consider. In summary, leading up to this trailer, people thought the following about Sonic Forces: It would feature, much like Sonic Generations, “modern Sonic” (the thinner, taller one), “classic Sonic” (the chubbier one), and an unknown new hero. It would take place in a darker future, with the Sonics and new dude (the hero the world needs) being part of “the resistance”, which places the game as SEGA's interpretation of a near-future featuring President Donald John Trump as Doctor Eggman, and hedgehogs as Hillary Clinton's resistance.
 
Hell, Hillary Clinton even speaks of “the resistance” as not just against President Donald John Trump, but also against robotics and artificial intelligence, which are things that Doctor ROBOTnik is known for. (I'll use whatever name of his fits the puns better.)
 
However, this new dude isn't just Hillary Clinton. It's you (...she's not reading this site, is she?)... or whatever your imagination has (possibly including Hillary Clinton)! And you can put them in seven different species, according to IGN and a bunch of other sites:

KoopaTV's Live Reactions to the ARMS Direct!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Featuring North Korea launching nuclear arms on Nintendo's Japanese headquarters. ...Just kidding.

Another Nintendo Direct is here, this one focusing on the new Nintendo Switch game, ARMS! Plus, Splatoon 2 for good measure. I'm Ludwig, and joining me is RawkHawk2010, in our [Koopa Keep] AIM Blast (running in Pidgin).

Follow along with our log here:

GameFAQs Best Year in Gaming: Round 3 & Round 4

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Also known as the quarterfinals and the semifinals.

Less than six hours remain in the first match of Round 3 of GameFAQs's Best Year in Gaming contest, and I don't know what year to pick for the first match. I guess we'll get to that discussion after the page break.

It's been a rough Round 2, coming off an easy Round 1. Round 3? Treacherous. So my write-ups will be painstaking.

Based on the...schedule, Round 3, being four matches, will go from Tuesday to the end of Friday — one match a day this time. Round 4 (semi-finals) will take place Saturday and Sunday, with Round 5's FINALS taking place on Monday. In terms of publishing schedule, that means I must attach Round 4 to this article. That makes the gratuitous picture look like this:

...And then I realised that I saved it without rewriting it to be “Rounds”, so that's why the article title is “Round 3 & Round 4”.

Now you're gonna get write-ups FROM THE HEART for most of these. GameFAQs now has eight pictures for each year for eight games, but in case that ain't enough, here's a Wiki with notable games from each year. Also, as of publishing, we don't know what's in Round 4. This article will be UPDATED when we do know, and Round 4 will get write-ups at that time!

Nintendo's E3 2017 Plans

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Knowing Nintendo, it's better than it sounds.

Last week, Nintendo announced their plans for E3 Week 2017, going from June 13 to June 15. Ever the quick-paced and agile shelled creatures we are at KoopaTV, we're just discussing it today. (Hey, we were celebrating an ANNIVERSARY.)

Here's Nintendo's E3 2017 plot, according to their press release:

• 12 PM Eastern on June 13, 2017 — Nintendo Spotlight: E3 2017 video presentation
• This will be available at e3.nintendo.com (and KoopaTV will be on top of the coverage) and deal with Nintendo Switch games, including Super Mario Odyssey, releasing in 2017.
• Nintendo Treehouse: Live at E3 throughout June 13, June 14, and June 15
• Subjects will be all sorts of Nintendo Switch and Nintendo 3DS titles, played at depth with your favourite Nintendo Treehouse localisers. KoopaTV will cover this, too!
• The night of June 13, 2017: The 2017 Splatoon 2 World Inkling Invitational
• Four teams, representing the four regions of the United States, Japan, Europe, and Oceania, will compete. KoopaTV will cover this with variable effectiveness.
• The night of June 14, 2017: The 2017 ARMS Open Invitational
• It being “open” implies something here, but that “invitational” also implies something... KoopaTV will be sure to cover this, though we might be a little bored.

What's the ultimate analysis here?

King Bowser's Cook-Out!!

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - You're invited to this SCRUMPTIOUS event celebrating KoopaTV's fourth anniversary!

Well, would you look at the date? It's May 12, 2017! Remember when KoopaTV was founded? May 12, 2013. That makes today KoopaTV's fourth anniversary! WOW!

Rather than rehash what happened in the past 365 days — because how many times do you need to hear how incredible we are for influencing the United States presidential election, or for our incredible insightful and foresightful coverage of the Rio 2016 Olympics — we're going to assume you already know all that and just want to celebrate with us.

So, this year, we're holding...

King Bowser's Cook-Out!!

Yes, King Bowser Koopa himself is back for the benefit of KoopaTV, and he will be taking the guise of Chef King Bowser Koopa! Dig in!

Our invitation card, featuring the most handsome king in the universe.

We have three delectable menu items for today's celebration: 

GameFAQs Best Year in Gaming: Round 2

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - You've unlocked more detailed explanations.

The very fine folks over at GameFAQs are going to be entering Round 2 of their new Best Year in Gaming contest. Which year between 1985 and 2016 was the best, as decided by GameFAQs-browsing gamers (which could be anyone, including me)? Well, turns out it's not 1985 or 2016.

Round 1 got rid of a lot of riff-raff. With three exceptions (RIP 2004, 2010, and 2016), GameFAQs largely voted as I voted in Round 1. This makes this round full of more... difficult decisions on my part. It's still two matches a day.

I bet you can guess for Round 3 we'll just replace the 2 with a 3.

The underlined years are what I'm going to vote for. Reminder that there's a reminder of the notable games released each year here, and this is going by American release dates.

The Wonderful 1237 Strategy Guides: Jeb Bush

 By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - You see that normal-looking title? Everywhere else, he'll be called JEB!.

Today's strategy guide for The Wonderful 1237, KoopaTV's amazing browser-based Flash game, is quite a treat. In case you don't know yet, The Wonderful 1237 features seventeen unique minigames, all from each of the seventeen Republican presidential candidates you will be competing with should you play it.

Right in the middle of the Wonderful Wednesday article about those minigames, this strategy guide is about the man who is part of a now-failed political dynasty, and has been disgraced into a memetic-status: JEB! Bush. In real life, JEB! Bush appeared to be the most formidable candidate in the Republican primaries, having raised the most money of anyone. However, this money advantage isn't represented in The Wonderful 1237, stripping JEB! Bush to his bare essentials: An adorably unlikable loser. Take a look at his abysmal stats:

Candidate Stats

Base stats and growth:

Beauty: 0 + (0–2)

Cool: 0 + (0–2)

Cute: 1 + (0–5)

Smart: 0 + (0–3)

Tough: 1 + (0–2)

Average untouched stats after 14 rounds:

Beauty: 14

Cool: 14

Cute: 36

Smart: 21

Tough: 15

Average likelihood of surviving Iowa if untouched:

Not likely. (JEB! Bush will have 9 delegates on average; need 11 to clear.)

“Versus... JEB! BUSH! Fight!”

Finally, The Paper Mario: Color Splash Review

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - In terms of action commands, is this EXCELLENT, GREAT, NICE, or just GOOD? ...Or a failure?

After being informally requested for a long time, on September 23, 2016, it was requested (and seconded) by the readers that when Paper Mario: Color Splash comes out, we would write a review of it. Well, REVIEWS TAKE A LONG TIME, so here we finally are.

We have a very extensive and rich history with Paper Mario: Color Splash. When it was first revealed in a March 3, 2016 Nintendo Direct, Ludwig cursed it. That caused an analysis article looking at the first public trailers of every Paper Mario game, where he again condemned Paper Mario: Color Splash for its striking similarity to Paper Mario: Sticker Star. However, by the time the next round of footage came at E3 2016, the entire KoopaTV staff was stunned at how Paper Mario: Color Splash progressed, which forced Ludwig to write an extremely controversial article defending Paper Mario: Color Splash from people who were still criticising it. From between then and the game's ultimate October 2016 release, KoopaTV covered every Rescue V: Fearless Color Defenders video Nintendo put out, which you can find and read on your own time since this paragraph has enough hyperlinks.

Finally, after having beaten the game and spending quite a number of months thinking about it (to make sure we're not in a honeymoon period), we're ready to review Paper Mario: Color Splash. We'll be reviewing it on what the game is, not what we think it should've been. Also, this review is free of spoilers, or at least, if there are any spoilers, there isn't any context given so you wouldn't know that it's a spoiler.

The Death of Gaming Console Life-cycles (Generations)

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - Snide reminder that Vita means “life.”

Since the beginning of the gaming industry in the 1970s with the Magnavox Odyssey, gaming historians and industry people alike have classified gaming eras into generations. These have lasted about five to six years until the next generation began, marked by a new set of hardware releases that generally came out within a year of one another. Some generations still keep going instead of ending when a new generation begins, but most of the attention goes to the new guy because customers like new technology.

But something strange has happened recently. Back in Microsoft's 2016 E3 conference, they basically said they're done with generations and will be moving BEYOND generations. They're saying that Project Scorpio is not a new generation, but part of the perpetual continuation of the existing eighth one.  

Sony, the company famous for proclaiming that their systems have at least a 10-year life-cycle, similarly released/announced the PlayStation 4 Pro and PlayStation 4 Slim. Now, hardware revisions aren't anything new to the industry, but this isn't just a redesign — there is added POWER. Meanwhile, there's no announced plans for a PlayStation 5 to exist... not yet, anyway.

You look at Nintendo and what they just did with the New Nintendo 3DS XL or New Nintendo 2DS XL, and those also have power upgrades within the same system life-cycle. The Nintendo Switch itself demonstrates Nintendo's willingness to move on from the eighth generation's Wii U to a newer one, but the editors at Wikipedia are currently unwilling to say there is a ninth generation just yet. That leaves the Nintendo Switch in some weird, hidden, “other generation” category.

What does this all mean? 

The Optimal Way to Play Team Kirby Clash Deluxe

By LUDWIG VON KOOPA - My secrets to unlocking enjoyment from Team Kirby Clash Deluxe. There's spoilers.

It was April 12 when Team Kirby Clash Deluxe was released on the Nintendo 3DS eShop as a free-to-play game. It's an expanded version of the Team Kirby Clash sub-game from Kirby Planet Robobot, similar to how Dedede's Drum Dash Deluxe ($6.99) and Kirby Fighters Deluxe ($6.99) are expanded eShop games of their non-deluxe counterparts from Kirby Triple Deluxe. I guess we finally now have a truly TRIPLE deluxe since there are now three deluxe Kirby games on the eShop? 

Note: On September 4, 2019, Nintendo released Super Kirby Clash on the Nintendo Switch, which is a modified version of Team Kirby Clash Deluxe. The advice from the 3DS game is largely applicable to Super Kirby Clash. However, KoopaTV has also published a Super Kirby Clash-specific etiquette guide for new online players here.

Team Kirby Clash Deluxe is a boss rush of 42 different fights where you can pick four different roles for Kirby, each with their own set of weapons and armour: Sword Hero, Hammer Lord, Doctor Healmore, and Beam Mage. You have a team of four Kirby warriors (you play as one, and the other three are either computers or local friends — no online multiplayer), and you can mix-and-match the roles on your team.

The optimal team is composed of four Beam Mages. The Beam Mage is overpowered. Why? Because they can stop time — freezing not only the enemy in place, but literally the timer you're graded by. How fast you defeat enemies determines how much experience points (there's stats and levels in this game) you get, and many special missions are based on how fast you can finish the fight. Why are missions important? Because this is a free-to-play game in the mold of Pokémon Rumble World. Instead of blood diamonds, they have gem apples growing from a tree. Still, same system of a 3,000 purchasable maximum of diamonds/apples, you get a few diamonds/apples from completing missions, and there's “limited” purchasable special deals from the in-game shop. You also need to use the diamonds/apples to progress through the game in progressively larger quantities, but your “income” of them doesn't grow enough to keep up.