Operation Backlog Completion 2025

Let’s Talk About the Nintendo Switch 2

 Video games  2 Responses »
Jan 172025
 

Well, it finally happened. Nintendo officially announced the Switch 2.

And yes, it’s actually called the Nintendo Switch 2.

While the announcement trailer doesn’t show much besides the console itself and a brief glimpse of a new Mario Kart, it promises more information coming in a special Nintendo Direct on April 2.

As for the console, it pretty much just looks like a new Switch, which is what people have been expecting for a while now. (Ironically, after years of only seeing people say Nintendo would be foolish not to just make their next console a more powerful Switch, I now see people complaining that their new console is just a more powerful Switch.)

One notable part is that part of the trailer shows the Joy-Cons gliding along a surface, which combined with rumors, suggests they might be able to function as a mouse. That makes me wonder if it could be useful for something improved by having more precise control – Professor Layton puzzles, for example, in the absence of a stylus.

It also reiterates their previous statement that the Switch 2 will be backward compatible, this time clearly stating that it will play both physical and digital Switch games.

Although it says certain games may not be compatible, that probably only includes a handful of games that use Switch-specific functions (ex. anything that relied on Joy-Con functions that might be changed in the Switch 2).

I’m looking forward to learning about the Switch 2 in April, although as usual, the exclusives announced for it will likely determine when I get one. In the meantime, I’ve got plenty of games in my backlog to keep me busy until then.

What do you think of the Switch 2?

Just a To the Moon Series Beach Episode is an Emotional Experience

 Reviews, Video games  2 Responses »  Tagged with: ,
Jan 152025
 

In all the excitement of starting a new year, I almost forgot to cover the last game I played in 2024, Just a To the Moon Series Beach Episode.

This is the latest entry in the To the Moon series, following the strange and emotional Impostor Factory from 2021.

Just a To the Moon Series Beach Episode came out in September, but I put off playing it for a while because I did not believe for a minute it was just a happy beach episode. At the end of the year, I decided to finally dive in.

It’s shorter than the others, taking me around two and a half hours instead of the roughly four hours main entries in the series have taken. It also notably doesn’t follow a new story with original characters like the main entries have. Instead, you play as Eva, going on a trip to the beach with her co-workers. It should be fun and lighthearted… and it is, except for the sense that something just isn’t quite right.

There’s humor and lighthearted antics and even a couple of mini-games, and of course it all culminated in an emotional scene that left me feeling sad even though I’d already had a good idea of what it was leading up to.

Now, I can’t really talk about too much without spoilers, so I’ll just finish by saying that if you’ve stuck with the To the Moon series all this time, it’s worth playing Just a To the Moon Series Beach Episode to see this next piece in the overarching story.

It’s been implied that this is the ending of the series, but we also have The Last Hour of an Epic To the Moon RPG to look forward to. The director once said that the two games are both endings to the series, with one being the good ending and one being the bad ending. Which one was this? Well, I’m sure we’ll have a clearer view of that once the second game is out to compare it to.

Temirana Delayed to 2026

 Video games  No Responses »  Tagged with: , ,
Jan 132025
 

Back in July, Idea Factory announced two new otome localizations for 2025 – Battlefield Waltz and Temirana: The Lucky Princess and the Tragic Knights.

Neither had a release window beyond the year, but now Temirana has been delayed to 2026.

That’s a surprisingly long delay, with no reason given.

Now, this has led to several people questioning if it could be a censorship issue. If that feels like an odd conclusion to jump to for an otome game like this, it’s because Idea Factory’s other games have had some trouble with Nintendo’s guidelines lately. The Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;Birth trilogy for the Switch and Death end re;Quest: Code Z both had their western Switch versions cancelled due to seemingly changed content guidelines from Nintendo, and a few other companies have also reported this shift in Nintendo’s policies. So I can understand the concern when Idea Factory delays another Switch game.

Still, it seems highly doubtful that this is the reason behind Temirana’s delay, since it doesn’t look like it would have any content that could cause trouble.

My personal hope is that this delay is because they’ve decided to release another otome game this year first, so they just rearranged the schedule. I hope it’s not that they’ve decided to publish them less frequently. It seems it’s also a fairly long one, so it could just mean they need to take more time for its translation. We shall see.

In the meantime, we’ve still got plenty of otome games to look forward to this year. Even if IFI only releases Battlefield Waltz this year, we’ve also got Genso Manège, Bustafellows 2, DesperaDrops, Mistonia, Uchronia, and several others.

Between that and my backlog, I can’t be too upset over this delay itself. I just hope such a long delay isn’t a negative sign.

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