I haven't completed the $30 expansion, but I have a feeling it won't change my mind much. (If it does I'll make sure to update this review)

This is as bare bones Pokémon has been since Leaf Green and Fire Red back on the GameBoy Advanced.

The new Pokémon are pretty fantastic, but besides that, everything is really middle of the road or worst.

The gym leaders are forgettable. Hop is annoying. I like Leon, actually - Even if his design stinks.

Pokémon Camp and Dynamaxing is just a poor man's Amie and Mega Evolutions. Nothing this game does is a stand out. It's just middle of the road.

The environments are really piss poor most of the time. Some cities may have nice designs, but they're nothing more than hallways or plain open spaces. The wild area is kind of plain and ugly.

Even with the Dexit controversy and the clear tight deadline the developers were under, this IS Pokémon. Pokémon is a hard game to make bad or even average.

Collect Pokémon, raise and battle your team of monsters, collect gym badges and defeat the elite four. It's all really solid and fun - Even if it maybe one of the weakest mainline entries in the franchise's history,

Wonder is a pretty standard Mario game, albeit with a lot more creativity than the New Super Mario Bros. games allowed for. The level designs are largely just as good as those games' were, although I'd probably argue NSMBU had slightly better designed levels in general. The game adds to this with additional wonder effects in each level that change up the gameplay, which I think adds a lot to the game overall. Maybe some of the effects aren't as good as others, but I still enjoyed most of them. It's overall a pretty good game, although its complete departure in terms of aesthetic and gimmicks make it a little jarring coming from the NSMB games, which depending on what you thought about them might be a good thing. The whole 5th world sucks though.

The 2D Mario that we've waited for 20 years, it absolutely delivered!
Everything about this game screams creativity, I'm so glad the chains of the "new" formula have been finally broken. The game is costantly fun, so many things make the experience amazing, like the abscence of a timer, the new enemies, the badges and the Wonder Flowers, the stars of the show.
Despite everything being very great, there are still some weak sides. Mainly the bossfights, they are underwhelming to say the least, we took the koopalings for granted. Even the final one isn't THAT good. Power ups are also meh, they're fun but too few in my opinion, I don't see why they couldn't give us some older ones like the ice flower or the blue shell.
But even with these downsides, this games shines brightly in a gray sea of boring AAAs. I'm a fan of the direction that Nintendo took with this game and I hope they continue on this road in the future!

...how do I explain that this is a genuinely positive score for a game that just doesn't click with me that much? Like, it's a puzzle game that doesn't fundamentally mesh with my thought process, leading to so many moments where I look up the solution and go "...oh, that was it? I mean, that's fair, I just... man, I must work weird because I never would have thought to try that in a thousand years." Idk, I wasn't even expecting much. I just needed something to play between Trails games because I never like playing JUST an RPG, I always want something shorter and more active to complement it.

I grew up with the New Super Mario Bros. series. I have fond memories of playing the original, my first Mario game, with my friends and trying to beat my older (and much better) sister in Mario vs. Luigi. I played New Super Mario Bros. 2 endlessly on my 3DS in elementary school (yes, I am that young), while my friends and I shared secrets with each other as we tried to unlock all the levels. Needless to say, New Super Mario Bros. is very nostalgic for me, which is why I’m not nearly as harsh on them.

Anyway, New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe kinda slaps.

NSMBU features very solid level design and beautiful background art. Some highlights include Skyward Stalk (an actually fun auto-scroller where you climb a beanstalk while being attacked on all sides by Goombas and squirrels), Spinning Star Sky (a nighttime snow level where you jump across a bunch of stars that spin when you touch them; it’s just really creative), and the beloved Painted Swampland (a poisonous swamp infested with Boos, colored in the style of Vincent van Gogh’s The Starry Night).

I like the boss fights against Bowser Jr. and the final boss— while nothing mind-blowing— is still pretty fun. I like the Super Acorn. I like the Challenge Mode. I like how the Baby Yoshis sing along to the background music. This game is just pure fun.

News Super Luigi U is awesome. The levels are short, yet extremely challenging. Luigi controls like a dream. That’s about it; it’s a faster, harder version of the main game, and I love it.

Yeah, I really like this game. Yeah, it’s in my top 10 Mario games. Yeah.

My first revisit of Pikmin in a very long time - my first since playing every other game in the franchise - was one I wasn’t too sure of its outcome before starting. Not only was it my first time not using the Wii’s pointer controls, but Pikmin is a series that has grown much since its original conception. The first was a little clunky even back in the day, so how would it hold up today compared to its more refined follow-ups?

I’m happy to say that it held up exceptionally well. From starting the game again, I was once again enamored by the tone and mystique the first game offers its otherworldly crash landing. I mostly played wearing headphones, and it was my first time hearing much of this music directly into my ears. While later games leaned more on the quirky, adorable nature of the Pikmin, the first game offers something unsettling - a survival story of Captain Olimar trying to recover parts of his ship before his supply of breathable air has gone dry. What was once such a defining tone of the game would later become something entirely different, and while both directions are fitting for the series, there is something special about the first game’s presentation.

The original Pikmin’s gameplay is something that also holds up excellently. While it could stand to have many of the improvements found in later games, such as a lock-on mechanic or more variety amongst the included types of Pikmin to use, the simplicity of the first game is not to disregard. It’s a loop that’s still captivating; you’re exploring three major areas and two smaller ones trying to find all of the missing components of your ship. They can be anywhere: out in the open, behind an obstacle, or even in the belly of a giant beast. To get these parts, you’ll need to order your Pikmin to build bridges, tear down walls, and bring down foes big and small. The puzzle elements of the series isn’t at it’s strongest here (I found that to be a highlight of Pikmin 3 in particular), but it is far from absent. The three original types of Pikmin may not be the most useful past the required water-immunity of blues or high throwing arcs of yellows, but the high damage output of red Pikmin make them the MVP of the first game. You have 30 days to get 30 ship parts… can you do it?

If there’s any point where the first Pikmin game falters, it’s the little things. Pikmin aren’t the smartest creatures. Even matured flower Pikmin trip often and fall behind, and they will follow you to the best of their ability. Unfortunately their best is often falling off of a slope or getting stuck on a wall. While I didn’t experience it here, I don’t want to say with confidence that the Switch port off the game fixed glitches such as Pikmin dying under a bridge. Absolutely a limitation of the time, without a doubt, but I found on revisiting this game that their lackluster ability to follow you correctly is often used by the developers to make the player consider bringing a smaller group, or to prevent a larger group from entering. Power in numbers be damned, sometimes bringing a smaller posse of Pikmin to battle can be a smarter decision! The player being able to go places your Pikmin can’t always go is something the first game’s level design excels at.

Pikmin is an excellent game, even today. It excels at what it aims to do, even if what future games expanded upon improved the formula in more ways than one. In some regards, such as tone and mechanical balance, the original game even outshines its successors. The Switch port of the game is notably bare, unfortunately. This isn’t the same treatment that Metroid Prime got. What we have is a much cleaner presentation of the Wii version of the game, without the Wii version’s excellent controls. Pikmin 3 Deluxe on Switch received tweaks to its mechanics to mechanics to fit the lack of control options. While I adapted quickly to the control stick option, it did take some time compared to how long it took me to adapt to the Wii version, and less options are never ideal. In the end, what we have is the GameCube version’s controls in the Wii version of the game, stretched UI assets and all. While I value the accessibility of the game more than the idea of a more impactful remaster, I can’t help but wish for a bigger update. On the other hand, they DID redo the entire enemy roll at the end of the game! That was a nice surprise. They’ll always be wollywogs to me.

I only ever played Pikmin 2 on the wii back in the days and remember having a great time with the game, but never really got around to play the other games in the series. so now with all the games on switch i wanted to change that.

this game is just pure fun! should i search for resources to grow my pikmin army? should i try to get this shippart? should i open this path? should i go out fighting some monsters? you are constantly thinking about what to do next, making plans and executing them. with the atmospheric levels and the
strange and funny creatures you encounter, it all comes togheter to creat a super fun super satasfying gameplayloop.

At first i way a bit concerned about the 30 day time limit but it turned out to really not be a big deal. i got the final shippart on day 22.

Its one of those games where i am a bit angry at myself for not playing it earlier. one of nintendos best games

Tears of the Kingdom definitely improves upon the gameplay of BotW in terms of crafting and combat. And yet it falls flat on one very big aspect - the exploration.

My problem is not the map being reused here, I'm talking about the changes on how to traverse this map. TotK introduces a lot of (recycled) aerial islands which allow you to glide down to whatever location from the skies. It's cool in theory, but takes away the very core aspect of Breath of the Wild - exploring the map. You no longer need to climb mountains and horses are now completely useless in this game, all thanks to the new verticality introduced. Don't even get me started on the craftable Hoverbikes.

The novelty of the depths also wears off rather fast and navigating in the same dark caves just becomes a pain over time. They suffer from the same problem as the sky islands, they're too much of the same thing and thus come off as recycled and boring.

Despite those flaws, I still had a good time with the game. The cities are way more lively than in BotW and seeing what has changed over time is pretty cool. Hyrule still manages to feel fresh after spending many hours in the previous game. I also liked the new dungeons.

TL;DR: If you're a Zelda fan and liked BotW, you'll have a lot of fun with this game and the new spin on BotW's Hyrule. But don't just buy it for the sky islands and the depths or you'll be disappointed.