Talking Point: What Are You Playing This Weekend? (17th May)

Greetings, friends! Let’s have a delightful chat about our gaming intentions for the weekend.

Before delving into our plans, let’s reflect on this week’s significant events. Nintendo made a few major announcements regarding the final technical specifications of the Switch 2, revealed what to anticipate from free upgrades, and highlighted its exciting new battery features.

Additionally, Furukawa mentioned that the console’s pricing might create “challenges” for initial sales, while Doug Bowser reassured that physical releases “remain a crucial part of our business” — even as speculations around why numerous developers are shifting to Game Key Cards kept surfacing.

We also took a moment to share our views on Capcom Fighting Collection 2, Please, Touch The Artwork 2, and several games we experienced at PAX East.

So, what’s on everyone’s gaming agenda for this weekend?

Jim Norman, Staff Writer

This weekend, I’m compelling myself to take a break from Blue Prince as I near the climax of its first act — which translates to having solved merely 0.1% of its challenges. This is in preparation for an intriguing little game I’m reviewing, which you’ll definitely want to watch for next week.

My puppy’s vaccination hasn’t fully taken effect, preventing me from enjoying the sunny weather just yet (please liberate me from this dog-scented home!), which means my weekend will again be filled with Star Wars Outlaws and Elden Ring during the pre-Switch 2 lull. Why not just wait for the Switch 2 editions, you ask? Because I tend to be quite impatient.

Ollie Reynolds, Staff Writer

The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy has me hooked! I can’t get enough of it, and it might just be my top pick of the year thus far. Its ambition is truly impressive, so if you plan on getting it soon, I urge you to do so with minimal prior insight.

I’m also revisiting Animal Crossing: New Horizons occasionally after starting anew. It’s a delightful distraction while waiting for the Switch 2 launch, so even if I end up neglecting my island come June 5th, I can at least enjoy the lead-up.

Gonçalo Lopes, Contributor

As the team’s resident expert on all things Kunio, I intend to continue relishing Super Technos World: River City & Technos Arcade Classics. This collection introduces several Super Famicom exclusives for the first time in English, including my personal favorite, Shodai Nekketsu Kōha Kunio-kun, alongside some intriguing arcade bonuses like the underrated Neo Geo game Super Dodge Ball.

Additionally, in Mira, I’ve completed the entire map of standard missions and heart-to-heart interactions, steadily progressing in constructing my third ARES 90 skell. I aim to finally tackle Chapter 13 and explore the new content beyond this weekend. I truly wish to continue playing Xenoblade Chronicles X: Definitive Edition and hope for a Switch 2 upgrade soon. And yes, that Chapter 12 ending still hits hard ten years later.

Finally, we have this week’s Arcade Archives release. Namco’s 1994 NebulasRay is available at home for the first time…but at a cost! It seems Hamster has quietly jumped on the “let’s inflate the prices and hope no one notices” trend. I was annoyed by the price tag but still purchased it… and you won’t believe what unfolded next!

Ahem, apologies for the clickbait wording above. You see, just this past week, my Game of the Week concluded: I have a new TV ready for the Switch 2! I opted for the largest that could fit in the living room — a 75” Samsung QLED with extraordinary picture clarity and color! I never anticipated that playing a shmup like NebulasRay would be such an incredible audio-visual experience. I wish I could turn back time and inform my younger self playing a ZX Spectrum on a tiny portable CRT TV (ask your grandparents about that, folks!) that one day I would experience video games on a colossal home cinema screen! Though, I wouldn’t actually do that since Chrono Trigger taught me all about the dangers of time travel.

Alana Hagues, Deputy Editor

Okay, now that I’ve secured the Platinum Trophy in Clair Obscur, it’s about time I wholeheartedly commit to another game, right?

Well, it’s back to space in the Z-A (no, not Pokémon) household with Mass Effect 2 and Citizen Sleeper 2 – an interesting pairing considering what Gareth Damian Martin has mentioned about using Mass Effect as an “anti-reference.” I promise I will actually start the latter this weekend now that I’m finished pondering parries and numbers in the seven-digit range.

But then, the Hello Kitty Island Adventure update launched mid-week, and now I find myself with about 50 tasks to undertake there. Sigh. Tough life, huh?

Gavin Lane, Editor

This morning, I awoke with the Mushroom Hill Zone theme playing in my head, and I felt an odd urge to boot up Sonic & Knuckles. Then, during breakfast, Dee-Lite’s Groove is in the Heart popped into my mind. Perhaps a bizarre early-’90s crisis?

Putting that aside, I should probably advance with Xenoblade Chronicles X despite my reservations about the impending Switch 2. Still, something is keeping me at bay. Recently, I found myself up until midnight playing 51 Clubhouse Games on the TV, engaging in several rounds of Solitaire — likely the most I’ve engaged with that game in digital form since the PC version where the cards cascaded everywhere at the end…

Clearly, I’m in a peculiar ’90s phase, for sure. Here’s to the Switch 2 – then I can immerse myself in the noughties with the GameCube lineup. Have a great weekend, everyone.

That’s what we have lined up for the weekend, but what about you? Let us know in the following poll which games you’re planning to launch over the upcoming days.