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Pokémon Unite is coming to iOS and Android on September 22
During today’s Pokémon Presents livestream, The Pokémon Company announced that Pokémon Unite will become available for iOS and Android on September 22. The strategic battle game came out for Nintendo Switch in late July, but its arrival on mobile devices will expand the game’s potential user base.
For users already playing on Nintendo Switch, fear not — the game allows cross-platform play, which means you can play on your Switch, then pick up where you left off on mobile. All users can play together regardless of which device they’re using, and it’s not necessary to have a Switch to get the mobile game. Pokémon Unite is free-to-start with microtransactions — you can purchase in-game currency to get certain items or Pokémon.
The presentation also unveiled new gameplay footage and feature news for upcoming Nintendo Switch releases: Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl (November 19, 2021), remakes of the Nintendo DS games from 2006 and Pokémon Legends: Arceus (January 28, 2022), the first open-world RPG in the Pokémon universe.
Image Credits: Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl
Like previous main series game remakes, Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will expand upon the original games’ foundation and introduce features that appeared in later games, like Following Pokémon, Secret Bases and — very importantly — changing your trainer’s outfit. The game will also include re-designed features from its original release, like designing Poké Ball capsules and competing in Pokémon Contests.
But for the first time in a Pokémon Game, Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl will introduce a new aspect of gameplay called the Sinnoh Underground. Players can collect statues of Pokémon for their Secret Base, and depending on which statues are on display, different Pokémon will appear in Pokémon Hideaways within the Sinnoh Underground. To commemorate the 15-year-old games’ remakes, on November 5, 2021, Nintendo will release a “Dialga and Palkia Edition” of the Nintendo Switch Lite, which features the legendary Pokémon in gold and silver on a grey console.
Then, the Pokémon Company shared more information about Pokémon Legends: Arceus, a first-of-its-kind release for the iconic franchise. Fans have compared its open-world design to The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, which is the fourth-best-selling Nintendo Switch game with 23.2 million copies sold, but others say it’s more similar to Monster Hunter. The new game introduces the Hisui Region (an ancient version of the Sinnoh Region), along with new Pokémon like a grandpa-esque Growlithe, and an evolution of Basculin called Basculegion, which can evolve when “possessed by the souls of other Basculin from their school that could not withstand the harsh journey upstream”… Yes, this is a children’s franchise.
Nightmare-inducing new Pokémon aside, the livestream revealed more information about how exactly this new type of Pokémon game will work.
Like standard Pokémon games, players will set out on a mission to complete a Pokédex, but rather than training to become “the best like no one ever was,” they will be part of an expedition team, conducting survey work to learn more about the nature of Pokémon and the secrets they hold. In between field assignments, players can heal their party, craft items, and buy supplies at outposts (ancient Pokémon Centers?). Pokémon Legends: Arceus will also introduce a new battle style — like Pokémon Unite, it won’t simply repurpose the turn-based gameplay we’ve been accustomed to since the first Pokémon games were released in 1998.
Anyway, these games seem promising, but just try your best not to think about Basculegion.
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Nintendo’s OLED Switch arrives October 8, priced at $350
So much for the big E3 reveal. Weeks after the big gaming show, Nintendo has finally taken the wraps off the latest iteration of its wildly popular hybrid gaming console. The Nintendo Switch (OLED model) [parentheses theirs] will arrive on October 8, priced at $350. That is, the company’s quick to note, the same day it launches Metroid Dread, the long-awaited latest side scrolling entry in the long-standing franchise.
The system sports a 7-inch OLED, improved audio and 64 GB of internal storage. The hybrid dock sports a wired LAN port, and the system ships with an adjustable port for playing in tabletop mode. There’s a sharp black and white color scheme, though the remainder of the materials looks to be similar to the earlier model, with most of that price bump going to the display. The company will also be offering a separate carrying case, because you don’t want to get the fancy screen on your new $350 system scratched.
From the sound of it, the two existing Switch models are sticking around as lower-cost alternatives. Those models run $299 and $199, respectively, though it seems reasonable to expect there may be some price drops as the new model arrives ahead of the holidays.
“The new Nintendo Switch (OLED model) is a great option for players who want to experience the new vibrant screen when playing in handheld and tabletop mode,” Nintendo of America President Doug Bowser said in a press release. “With the addition of this new model to the Nintendo Switch family of systems, people have an additional choice of a system that best fits the gaming experience they desire – whether it’s Nintendo Switch (OLED model), Nintendo Switch or Nintendo Switch Lite.”
The system will arrive in two color configurations. Per Nintendo:
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Nintendo Switch (OLED model) white set, which features white Joy-Con controllers, a black main unit and a white dock.
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Nintendo Switch (OLED model) neon red/neon blue set, which features neon red and neon blue Joy-Con controllers, a black main unit and a black dock.
An upgraded version of the four-year-old system has been rumored for some time, carrying the decidedly less clunky name, Switch Pro. With both Sony and Microsoft releasing next-gen versions of their consoles last year, the time certainly seemed right for a big refresh from Nintendo. A refreshed version of the standard Switch arrived in July 2019, addressing the original’s poor battery life — far and away the largest complaint of an otherwise well-received system.
Image Credits: Nintendo
Of course, in spite of growing a bit long in the tooth, the Switch continued to dominate the sales charts ahead of the arrival of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox One X. Nintendo utterly dominated sales during the pandemic, after some initial supply chain shortages. That success was due in no small part to the arrival of a new Animal Crossing title that provided some much-needed social gaming during the pandemic. Such success — coupled with potential supply chain shortage — led to suggestions that the company had opted to delay the system’s release.
In spite of the lack of new hardware, last month’s E3 did see some big game news from Nintendo, before just a new Metroid. Far and away, the most eagerly anticipated is 2022’s sequel to Breath of the Wild, one of the most beloved entries in the Zelda series and easily one of the Switch’s best titles.
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US video game spending increased 30% in Q1
Even as signs of life after the pandemic have begun to emerge here in the U.S., increases in video game spending continue. There’s no doubt that much of last year’s big numbers were driven by stay-at-home requirements in much of the country and the world. All said, U.S. spending on the industry increased 27% for 2020.
There remains a broader question, however, around whether this momentum can maintain, as people start to, you know, leave the house more. For now, at least, things are continuing to look rosy for the industry. NPD noted this morning that U.S. spending on the category jumped 30% y-o-y for Q1 2021, to $14.92 billion.
When we break the number down a bit, however, it becomes clear that the driver goes beyond mere pandemic entertainment. Content was up 25% for the quarter, accessories jumped 42% and hardware went up 82%.
The motivator behind that last figure should be immediately obvious to anyone who follows the industry with any amount of interest. Where Nintendo’s Switch dominated the conversation for most of 2020, Sony and Microsoft both launched their next-gen consoles late last year.
“While we are still seeing elevated rates of both engagement and spending resulting from changes in consumer behavior driven by the pandemic, we are also seeing cyclical gains from the November launches of both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series consoles,” analyst Mat Piscatella said in a release The growth driven by these new platforms, combined with gains experienced in mobile, PC and VR content spending, as well as the continued strength of Nintendo Switch, have pushed the market to new highs.”
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Kleeen raises $3.8M to make front-end design for business applications easy
Building a front-end for business applications is often a matter of reinventing the wheel, but because every business’ needs are slightly different, it’s also hard to automate. Kleeen is the latest startup to attempt this, with a focus on building the user interface and experience for today’s data-centric applications. The service, which was founded by a team that previously ran a UI/UX studio in the Bay Area, uses a wizard-like interface to build the routine elements of the app and frees a company’s designers and developers to focus on the more custom elements of an application.
The company today announced that it has raised a $3.8 million seed round led by First Ray Venture Partners. Leslie Ventures, Silicon Valley Data Capital, WestWave Capital, Neotribe Ventures, AI Fund and a group of angel investors also participated in the round. Neotribe also led Kleeen’s $1.6 million pre-seed round, bringing the company’s total funding to $5.3 million.
Image Credits: Kleeen
After the startup he worked at sold, Kleeen co-founder, CPO and President Joshua Hailpern told me, he started his own B2B design studio, which focused on front-end design and engineering.
“What we ended up seeing was the same pattern that would happen over and over again,” he said. “We would go into a client, and they would be like: ‘we have the greatest idea ever. We want to do this, this, this and this.’ And they would tell us all these really cool things and we were: ‘hey, we want to be part of that.’ But then what we would end up doing was not that. Because when building products — there’s the showcase of the product and there’s all these parts that support that product that are necessary but you’re not going to win a deal because someone loved that config screen.”
The idea behind Kleeen is that you can essentially tell the system what you are trying to do and what the users need to be able to accomplish — because at the end of the day, there are some variations in what companies need from these basic building blocks, but not a ton. Kleeen can then generate this user interface and workflow for you — and generate the sample data to make this mock-up come to life.
Once that work is done, likely after a few iterations, Kleeen can generate React code, which development teams can then take and work with directly.
Image Credits: Kleeen
As Kleeen co-founder and CEO Matt Fox noted, the platform explicitly doesn’t want to be everything to everybody.
“In the no-code space, to say that you can build any app probably means that you’re not building any app very well if you’re just going to cover every use case. If someone wants to build a Bumble-style phone app where they swipe right and swipe left and find their next mate, we’re not the application platform for you. We’re focused on really data-intensive workflows.” He noted that Kleeen is at its best when developers use it to build applications that help a company analyze and monitor information and, crucially, take action on that information within the app. It’s this last part that also clearly sets it apart from a standard business intelligence platform.
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Nintendo’s latest trick is turning the Switch into an RC controller for an AR Mario Kart game
Nintendo never ceases to surprise with a seemingly infinite number of ways of transforming its most beloved IP. Hot on the heels of some truly impressive Super Mario Bros. Lego kits comes Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit. The new toy is a clever mashup of real-life RC cars the Nintendo Switch.
Image Credits: Nintendo
The hybrid portable gaming system utilizes cameras on-board the Mario and Luigi karts to offer an on-screen augmented reality first-person racing experience. There’s a teaser video out now, highlighting the game:
Get ready to experience the fun of Mario Kart in the real world! Use your #NintendoSwitch to control a physical Kart & race through custom courses set up in your home! Mario Kart Live: Home Circuit is available in a Mario or Luigi set, and launches on 10/16.
pic.twitter.com/dydiND46ad
— Nintendo of America (@NintendoAmerica) September 3, 2020
As you can see, it offers a familiar Mario Kart feel overlayed on top of your home. There’s a pretty simple set-up process involved, with the user spacing out a series of gates to create a circular course — think of it like a far more fun version of setting up Roomba boundaries. Right now there are only two characters available — Mario and Luigi — each priced at $100. But up to four players can compete with the in-person mode.
Image Credits: Nintendo
From the videos, at least, it looks like a pretty rich experience right out of the box, combining real-world obstacles with familiar characters and environments like snowy levels and Piranha Plant-filled jungles.
Each kit includes one racer, four gates and two sign boards. They go up for pre-order soon and start shipping October 16.
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In spite of an uncertain economy, US video game sales remain strong
May marked another extremely strong month for gaming sales, according to the latest figures from NPD. Between software, hardware, accessories and game cards, Americans spent around $977 million. That’s a 57% jump since the year prior and the highest it’s been for the month since 2008, when the country was feeling the strain of the Great Recession.
All of this is made more remarkable by the fact that the United States has been struggling with COVID-19-related pains for months now. This week, another 1.5 million Americans filed for unemployment, bringing the total number to 44.2 million since the beginning of shutdowns. But as countless other venues for non-essential spending have suffered, gaming has thrived.
It’s clear that games are how Americans are choosing to spend whatever sort of disposable income they might have, as they’re stuck at home, away from other humans. And that spending has continued for a few months now, even after Microsoft and Sony have begun hyping their next-generation consoles — both due at at the end of the year.
That, perhaps, is part of why Nintendo continued to dominate console sales with the Switch, in spite of hardware shortages. Animal Crossing: New Horizons remained the top-selling title for the console (and third over all), owing to the online cult it has amassed through social-first gameplay. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare and Grand Theft Auto V took the No. 1 and No. 2 spots, respectively, on both the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.
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Nintendo sells a lot more Switches, as people stay at home playing Animal Crossing
A couple of weeks ago, we noted some new NPD numbers pointing to a very good March for the Switch. Nintendo’s financials this week bear out the predicted surge in popularity for the three-year-old console.
The company has sold 21 million Switch units in the past year, handily beating a 19.5 million forecast; 6.2 million of those systems were the newer, cheaper Switch Lite, which hit the market in September. All of this comes as the company has run up against shortages through a combination of increased popularity and a global supply chain knocked off balance from COVID-19.
In spite of the increased difficulty in procuring a device at retail, the pandemic looks to have had a positive impact on Switch sales, as stay at home orders have increased interest. The arrival of Animal Crossing: New Horizons couldn’t have been better timed, either. The title fulfills both the increased demand for stationary entertainment as well as virtual socialization.
No surprise, then, that the game has become the console’s fastest selling. As of the end of March, 11.77 million copies have been sold. The figures make New Horizons the seventh best-selling Switch title of all time — between Pokémon: Let’s Go, Pikachu!/Eevee! And Splatoon 2 — in spite of having only been on sale for just over a month.
The year ahead may look at bit rockier for the company, however, with the arrival of next-gen consoles from Microsoft and Sony arriving this holiday season.
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The Nintendo Switch had a very good March
Nintendo is selling a lot of Switches. The convertible console has been a lifesaver for people sheltering in place around the world. COVID-19-induced travel restrictions and the long-awaited arrival of Animal Crossing: New Horizons have proven to be a perfect storm for the three-year-old platform.
New numbers out from NPD this morning shed some light on just how good last month was for Nintendo. Switch sales more than doubled their numbers from March 2019, per the analyst firm. It was a March record for the console, which launched in March 2017. It was also the best first-quarter unit sales for any gaming console since the company’s DS system, way back in 2010.
US NPD HW – Nintendo Switch set a new all-time record for hardware unit sales in a March month, besting the previous high set by Nintendo Switch in its March 2017 launch month.
— Mat Piscatella (@MatPiscatella) April 21, 2020
The arrival of Animal Crossing: New Horizons was no doubt a bit part of the sales bump. The latest addition to the popular sim series was both the best-selling game on any platform for March and had the third-best-selling launch month of any title in Nintendo’s history since NPD started tracking. Only Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and Super Smash Bros. Brawl (2018 and 2008, respectively) sold more physical units in their first month.
New Horizons is already the best selling title in Animal Crossing’s history, according to the firm. Both the timing of the title and its focus on social gaming play have been a huge boost to the game. It’s also been a hit with critics, currently sporting a 91% on Metacritic.
Stores have struggled to keep Switch units in stock amid a sharp bump in sales. Nintendo is reportedly boosting production of the system up by 10% in order to keep up with demand.
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Nintendo’s online Switch services are experiencing an outage when we need them most
The era of social distancing is going to put a lot of existing systems to the test. Nintendo’s online services for the Switch have been experiencing outages in the U.S. and parts of Europe. The company noted the issues on social media, adding that it’s “looking to rectify the situation as soon as possible.”
The official Network Maintenance Information page noted that it is currently “Unable to connect to the network service.”
Surely not the most dire of situations, though many are no doubt relying on such services to help pass the time, as more and more cities enact bans on gatherings and closures of schools and restaurants to encourage social distance in order to curb COVID-19’s spread. Microsoft’s Xbox Live also experienced a multiple-hour outage over the weekend.
Nintendo is currently readying the system for the release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons. The latest entry in the series looks perfectly positioned to help eat away some hours when it’s released March 20.
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Breaking a sweat with Nintendo’s Ring Fit Adventure
On October 18, Nintendo will finally fill a Wii Fit-shaped hole in its product line. The Ring Fit is a kind of spiritual accessor to the numerous fitness titles that helped make the Wii’s motion controls such a massive, demographic spanning success. But the large, round peripheral is perfectly at home on the Switch, taking a page from offerings like Labo, which find clever new ways to leverage existing hardware.
I took the forthcoming peripheral for a brief spin earlier this week, and like Labo was pleasantly surprised with what Nintendo was able to accomplish here, using the Switch’s Joy-Cons as a starting point. Here, each side serves a uniquely different purpose. One slots into the ring and the other into a band that straps on the player’s thigh.
In the case of the former, the controller serves as the brains for the flexible steering wheel controller, measuring movements via built-in sensors, including the accelerometer. Using that set up, you can spin the ring to move selection in the starting menu and squeeze its sides to select. The second controller, meanwhile, serves as a sort of makeshift Fitbit, keeping track of your lower body movement — a pretty central part of the workout.
Adventure is the first title to use the hardware. It almost certainly won’t be the last, though Nintendo, per usual, won’t comment on any future plans. Rather than going the straight sports route, à la Wii Sports, Nintendo’s instead created what amounts to a Final Fantasy-style turn by turn adventure game that makes the player battle bad guys by breaking a sweat.
There are a ton of different games and workout experiences out of the box, but the basic adventure plays out as follows: You move your character by running in place, squeezing the ring to blow up boxes for coins and pulling it apart to suck in power-ups. Jumps are accomplished by pointing the ring downward and pressing in. You will break a sweat.
Your character’s anime-style hair is a big ball of fire, growing or diminishing based on how well you’re keeping up. Every so often along the track, a boss will appear. You’ll then engage in a turn by turn battle using a variety of different ring-based exercises. When it’s the monster’s turn, you’ll squeeze the ring against your torso to defend yourself.
Nintendo’s dreamed up an impressive variety of exercises that utilize the ring’s resistance. Playing an hour a day, it’s easy to actually lose some weight. The game also does a pretty good job encouraging you to mix things up. I’d certainly be interested in doing some extended testing — I like the idea of a fitness regiment one can accomplishment at home or in a hotel room with minimal equipment.
You can also detach the Joy-Cons and take the ring with you to get some reps in away from the system — say, on lunch break at work. The controllers will continue to record your progress and upload them when you get back.
That said, I’m pretty committed to the Switch Lite these days. The Ring Fit will work with the system, assuming you also have a pair of Joy-Cons. You can prop up the Lite and use that screen for the game, but you’ll really want a TV screen for the full effect here. It’s easy to imagine, however, Nintendo combining Labo VR with the exercise kit for a more immersive fitness effect.
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