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I started to play the new Fanatsy Life game with a bit of hesitation. I had heard a lot of good things about it – especially from the folks at Into the Aether – but I didn't really connect with the previous installment on 3DS.

Turns out my worries were unfounded. It's a great "best of cozy games" package, full of fun characters and endless (!) distractions.

With all its charm, the game feels right at home on the Switch 2. Honestly, this could have made for a great platform exclusive launch title. For whatever reason, though, Nintendo and Level-5 didn’t go that route with this release in the series. Still, I’d always recommend playing something like this on a portable system. Being able to fish, mine and craft in between what ever life throws at you is the best way to enjoy a game like this.

I got my Switch 2 on launch day. The store where I had my pre-order placed had messaged me the day before saying there was a chance it might be delayed. So I spent Thursday morning anxiously refreshing my inbox, waiting to find out whether I could pick it up or not.

Picking it up in-store turned out to be a pretty pleasant experience. While in line, I chatted with other people who had pre-ordered their consoles – an instant connection, thanks to all of us putting money down months ago. Capitalism! Topics ranged from the launch line-up (lacklustre, their opinion), the accessories (not needed) to pricing (too expensive). Still, we all walked out grinning, consoles and games in hand.

The smile didn’t vanish when setting up the console itself: The return of menu music! Yes, only for set-up, but still a welcome surprise. More of this, please, Nintendo! (My hope is, that now that they have played it relatively save when it comes to the hardware, maybe they can invest more into playful companion software.)

The other thing that immediately struck me, was just how big the Switch 2 is. It’s enormous! That’s great when it comes to actually seeing things on the display (great screen, btw), but less so for carrying this thing around or holding it over longer stretches of time. I immediately started to anticipate the inevitable arrival of the Switch 2 Lite, to be honest.

The only real Switch 2 game I played so far was Mario Kart World. It’s a delight. So much charm when it comes to the characters and the world – I kind of want to hug all of my little racer buddies (especially the cow)! Both Grand Prix and K.O. Tour are great modes that truly feel different to precious iterations, thanks to the interconnected world. And some of the stages are just mind-blowing. During my race on the returning Rainbow Road, I kept wanting to stop and just take in the scenery. But I guess this is what the free driving mode is for (which, to be honest, I haven’t explored that much yet).

So yeah, I am happy!

One benefit of video games is that they let you pretend to do something else for a living – or even live a completely different life. That’s been a driving force behind a lot of long-standing trends, especially in the sim and cozy game genres. If your day job is stressful and hectic, why not unwind in your simpler, virtual job? Feed the cows at your farm. Meticulously clean really dirty objects. Serve up some coffee.

As time goes on, all genres undergo an evolution. I think it goes something like this: From their purest initial expression, to iterative complexity, then to subversive reinterpretation, and ultimately to reclaiming the original intent in a more modern form.

A recent game announcement – Neverway – made me think about this genre evolution: A life sim game with farming, coffee shop talk and all, but in a horror setting.

First off all: this looks cool! And with music from Disasterpeace, no less (I’ve been a fan ever since FEZ)! This one’s definitely on my radar.

But it is also interesting from the genre evolution perspective. Horror, in a game like this? Not so cozy anymore. It will be fascinating to see what it has to say about aspects of the genre that might already be a horror-inducing: the mundanity, the repetition, the pre-scripted relationships. Or if it is simply window dressing: A new look for old ideas.

I’m late to this, but a work trip to Cologne kept me from writing my thoughts down. But not anymore! I finally carved out some time, so here we go.

Mario Kart World looks sick!

The Direct opened with the new Mario Kart – of course it did! The previous game was the Switch’s best-selling title, so it makes sense that Nintendo wanted to feature it right at the beginning.

And it did get me excited, especially since I like the concept of a world that you can drive around in freely. I never liked any of the previous implementations, though: At first, I enjoyed my time with Forza Horizon – Xbox’s open-world driving franchise – but the constant “festival vibe” and bro-ish energy wore thin pretty quickly. Same with the LEGO open-world driving game, for example: cute, but no staying power.

I fully expect this to be different here. It has the Mario energy I love. And it will definitely be a hit with the kids – which counts for a lot!

(Also, Mario can eat burgers now and that changes his outfit? What?!)

Silksong lives!

Ahh, Nintendo… you tried to keep this game from me, burying it deep inside a random sizzle reel. But you can’t hide it from me!

Silksong, the follow-up to Hollow Knight (arguably one of the best games ever made), is actually releasing in 2025! Now, as a seasoned Silksong hopeful, I know full well that this means absolutely nothing. They could still postpone it – or never talk about it ever again. (Indeed, the go-to emoji for people expecting Silksong news at any show is the clown 🤡. We have been before. Many times.)

But, I can't help myself: It gives me hope that I’ll one day get to play this.

Solid hardware – but is it enough to keep Valve at bay?

The biggest threat to Nintendo this generation isn’t coming from Microsoft or Sony (to be fair, Nintendo hasn’t really cared about them since the Wii era), but from Valve.

The Steam Deck has made such an impression on the market: An incredible library of games (many of which you already own from years of Steam sales!), deep discounts that pop-up every other week, and enough power to run more demanding games – all of it in a flexible handheld format.

So the question is if the Switch 2 is offering enough to keep people from buying a Steam Deck instead.

And… I’m not sure. With the price hike – not just for the console (almost 500 Euros!) but also the games (80 Euros, ufff) – the Steam Deck looks very appealing. Sure, you don’t get Nintendo games on it, and it’s a bit more hands-on since it’s basically a Linux PC. But the decision isn’t as clear-cut anymore.

Game upgrades – enhance some more

I think it was pretty clear that we would get upgraded or enhanced editions of older Switch 1 games – and we did! Nintendo seems to be adding extra content to a lot of them, which is great. I’m especially excited for the upgrades coming to Kirby and the Forgotten Land.

That said, I expected even more upgrades, especially for games that ran notoriously bad on the original Switch (looking at you, Pokémon) or had major resolution dips (yes, Xenoblade, I mean you). These might still be coming, but I thought we would get some more announcements during the Direct.

I'm excited!

A new console from one of my favorite game companies – yes, this has me excited! I will be there on day one picking up the Switch 2. but I’m also a little wary, hoping Nintendo doesn’t rest on its laurels.

Hardware upgrades are nice, but Nintendo really shines when they take risks and push in new directions – on both the hardware and software side. I just hope this isn’t too safe of a play.

Time will tell.

This week's Nintendo Direct had one big surprise for me (and I guess many others, too): The announcement of “Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream”. The trailer is so charming, and weird, that it almost makes me forget that they put a 2026 ('26!) release date on it.

The re-introduction of Miis also makes me wonder if there will be a bigger emphasis on some sort of social networking in the upcoming Switch. It would be great to see Nintendo putting their trademark weirdness to use in that area again.​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​​

Nathan Grayson on how the latest Xbox showcase failed to impress:

Microsoft owns a significant chunk of the triple-A video game industry, but it has struggled to marshal those forces in a direction that feels fresh or uniquely compelling. Don’t get me wrong: Sony and Nintendo also lean heavily on franchises, but the former demonstrates a slightly more regular willingness to throw something new into the mix, while the latter never stops making old new again.

I couldn't agree more. There's so much sameness all around. It's hard to get excited for the nth instalment in an already-running franchise. But this is exactly what the big studios are doing now, as costs and development time have ballooned: playing it safe. And as we know, safe is not really exciting.

So, I finally finished the game.

And what a game it was!

It is rare that I come across truly outstanding video-games. "The Legend of Zelda - Breath of the Wild" – the direct predecessor to Tears – was such a game for me: It completely changed what I expect from video-games. It felt like it delivered on the promise of an "open world" where you were free to do whatever you want. Finally the old phrase (spoken so many times in countless video-game showcases) of "See that mountain? You can go there!" became truly realised. Not only could you go there, but you could freely climb it! Gone, it seemed, were the days of yellow tinted ledges that the developers laid out for you to climb on.

This ethos of freedom and exploration extended to all sorts of areas: Every item had physic engine behind it and would realistically interact with the world. Every enemy had behaviours and was reacting to it's environment. It was up to you to figure out how to best use all of this to your advantage. Nintendo trusted the player's intellect and allowed them to create their own fun.

And, uff, I did.

After the release of "Breath of the Wild" I was fully expecting to see many games trying to recreate and build on it's template. After all, it had created a new standard! But that did not happen. In all the time since 2017, only one other game embraced this ethos (and, to be fair, more in spirit of exploration and respecting the player then actual mechanics): 2022s Elden Ring.

It is before this background that Tears of the Kingdom was released earlier this year. And it – somehow – improves so much on almost every aspect of Breath of the Wild, that I am still flabbergasted.

How will anyone live up to this? I imagine other developers must be panicking right now. I know I would, if I were in their shoes!

Now, if I had to pick three areas where I see the biggest leaps forward, it would be 1) The Story and Quests, 2) Overall Interactivity, and 3) Scope and Verticality. Let's briefly look at all these in order:

The Story and Quests

One weak spot of Breath of the Wild was certainly the story. Now, granted, story is historically not the driving factor of any Zelda game – at least in my opinion. It gives always you a rough framework and goals, but otherwise the games tend to focus more on mechanics. And this was true for Tears' prequel, too, which told its story mainly through a number of passive "lore dumps", which you would stumble upon throughout your journey.

Now, Tears does not change the structure too much! You are still collecting "memories" along your way, that show you what happened with Zelda. But the developers smartly build upon this formula.

First of all, there is a true mystery that you want to solve. This keeps the story engaging for a long time. And then there are the revelations! When certain things (no worries, I'm not spoiling them here) started to dawn on me, I was left speechless.

The story also feels a lot more personal. I really cared about Zelda and what was happening to her. So much so, that I was nearly crying at the end!

Lastly, there is also just so much more story to discover. Every stable has multiple quest-lines attached to it (some of the best, actually); every town has a problem for you to uncover and solve.

Yes, it is still the area with the most room for improvement (Why is Link not talking to anyone, even if he already has so many answers? Why does the awakening of the Sages feels like a rushed copy and paste job?) – but it made me care deeply for this iteration of Hyrule. And this counts for a lot.

Overall Interactivity

You are probably aware that you can build stuff in this game. Like, cars and planes and Bokoblin torture devices (which is quickly becoming it's own YouTube and TikTok genre).

And it's great!

The ethos of freedom we talked about earlier is being driven to the extrem by this. It feels like the developers are constantly saying Yes.

Fell every tree in the area to build a long bridge to cross a chasm? Yes! Build a catapult to skip an entire section of a puzzle? Sure! Build a three story high mecha with lasers and shit? Absolutely!

But not only the building part is exceptional and a great way to interact with the world. So are the other powers granted to you early in the game. Rewinding time, fusing objects to weapons, gliding through the ceiling; all become an essential tools in a lot of situations – be it exploration, combat or puzzle solving. Way more then Breath of the Wilds powers.

Now, obviously, I have a few quibbles here, too. I simply cannot turn off my UX designer brain when it comes to some of the building interactions. Surely there must be a better way to fuse multiple objects at a time. Why are there no favourites for fused weapon parts? Why is so tricky to trigger the abilities of the Sages? Things like that.

Do they ultimately matter? Not much.

Scope and Verticality

The game has basically three maps: The sky islands, the surface area of Hyrule, and an underground realm. You can sky-dive from a platform down to the surface and straight into a chasm and end up at the bottom, somewhere deep down in the depths.

The best quests often take you through all of these areas (a particular cool moment was when I stumbled upon Minerus sky-island and was brought all the way down to an underground factory of sorts!).

It is incredible ambitious.

If this encourages more developers to use previous engines and assets in order to focus more on gameplay innovations and scope, I'm all for it.

I think this is my main take away, right after finishing this: A lot to live up to for the games industry!

I cannot wait for what comes next!

See you soon, Zelda!

I'm still very much in love with my Playdate – even though I don't use it much at the moment. After the initial joy of getting and exploring a new game every week and seeing who can get the highes scores in Whitewater Wipeout (great game!), things have quiet down in recent weeks.

BUT: I want to spend more time with this cute device. And the final release of Sparrow Solitaire seems like a great excuse to do just that.