JohnnyMind

Say what you want about piracy, but I'm so happy that it comes to the rescue when it comes to preserving and/or making more accessible videogames as people like me wouldn't be as big videogame fans as they are today, and so supporting official releases as much as possible, if it weren't for that!

I love the Banjo-Kazooie series and I hope that at least all games will be made available on modern (Nintendo) consoles, although I'd be ecstatic if they actually made a new game!

@Sketcz Oh, I do agree with some points made by Rica, just felt that some precisations were necessary like the history of guns in Japan and that for this specific topic it wasn't necessary to go back relatively that far into the past!
The thing is, the fascination for Western cultures started even earlier than Meiji even though it had a boom in that period, let's not forget Rangaku during the Edo era for example, and before that Japan adopted Chinese and Korean models... which brings me back to my point: while of course past events contributed to it, Japanese RPGs mostly take place in European Fantasy settings primarily because of the influences mentioned by you and others at that specific time, for example jidaigeki TV shows etc. not being cool for Japanese kids at the time as Matt Fitsko mentioned.
That said, the what if scenario you proposed is a quite interesting topic on its own!

@Sketcz There's a typo if you want to correct it, "did manga based in a huge variety of mythologies", "based in" instead of "based on".
Anyway, great article! I would argue against the first paragraph of Rica Matsumura's opinion since the aspects mentioned are about earlier periods of the history of Japan.
First, while of course Western culture had developed even better guns by the time Japan reopened, guns had long been known thanks to China since the 13th century and even Portuguese ones had been introduced in the 16th century.
Second, while the fascination with Western culture never died, what is specifically described is more typical of the Meiji era because starting from the Taishō era there has been the emergence of Japanese novels over imported ones and in more recent periods different products of Western culture became more prominent like movies and computer games.
In conclusion, I think that there are much more relevant reasons for the predominance of European fantasy settings in Japanese RPGs like the ones you and others stated, including Matsumura except for what I mentioned!

@Damo There's a typo if you want to correct it, "We've been releasing titles weekly week since March 3rd, 2017" instead of just "weekly", plus the one pointed out by @Mario500.
Anyway, great interview and reminder that I should check at least some of the Arcade Archives games when I have the chance to support Hamster as I really appreciate the wealth and variety in its catalogue!

Happy anniversary Viewtiful Joe!
Unfortunately missed this series back in the day so I'd love for it to come to Switch to have a chance to play it!

Happy anniversary Link's Awakening!
I didn't have it when I was a kid so I played it only on emulator back then, absolutely loved it and so bought the Deluxe version on 3DS and the remake on Switch (glad we got Deluxe on NSO as well) when they came out!
@carlos82 Hope we'll get at least remakes of the other Capcom Zeldas, but new games in this style would be absolutely welcome, too!
@JackGYarwood Didn't know the original had such a glitch, interesting!
@strenny Yep, there's already an article here on Time Extension about that and other things Moyse did:
https://www.timeextension.com/news/2023/05/random-did-you-know-the-german-zelda-links-awakening-has-secret-music-and-adult-dialogue

Knew about the dialogue, the comics (although I hadn't seen these pages before) and I think I've at least heard about the remix, but never listened to it so thanks for making an article about it!

The journey to solve this "glitch" was quite interesting, thanks for sharing the various possible solutions for those interested in playing this game without debug mode on (and also for making those who hadn't heard of it at all before like me discover it)!

Incredible article, I've been fascinated by the Satellaview ever since I found and played several of its games through emulation, especially BS Zelda (although I haven't finished its original version yet, only the simplified one)!

Interesting, also personally for me since we actually had this game at home when I was a kid (never finished it despite overall enjoying what I played of it which is why I wouldn't mind a Star Wars collection on Switch including it)!

Had never heard that Egg had a Russian bootleg before, interesting!

@Sketcz Unfortunate to hear you had such issues with the GB version, hope they'll eventually be fixed (even better if by the time I play it myself)!
Yeah, fingers crossed for a remaster to have a much better way to play the original just like Faces of Evil and Wand of Gamelon.

@Sketcz While I wouldn't personally be interested in playing it as you can tell from my previous comment it would be nice if this game also got a remaster for those like you interested in it!

Finally the Zelda CDi game that needed the most not just a remaster (like Faces of Evil and Wand of Gamelon did) but a recreation got it, kudos to John Lay for making it, I'll absolutely play it when I can (even more so since it's for the Game Boy as I'm a sucker for the GB/C Zeldas aesthetic)!

I didn't know about Assault Suits Valken at all before the coverage of the upgraded port on Nintendo Life, it's so interesting learning even more about it thanks to this article!

What a cool, forgotten until recently part of Mario's history!

Didn't know about this, pretty cool (pun intended) and while it's practically useless in vanilla I agree with your comment about it being potentially useful in randomizers at least!
@EarthboundBenjy That I have seen/heard before either from randomizers or someone playing the Shadow Temple after the Spirit temple even in vanilla as some people do.
@RupeeClock That use of the Ice Rod/Ether Medalion is also new to me so thanks for sharing it!

First Dream Land 2 was surprisingly added to NSO so early despite not being among the announced games allowing more people to play it for the first time or replay it officially and now a fan even made a DX version, love to see all the love for this game!

@Vacuumator Yep, you remembered correctly, it says so also in this part of the article:

The first issue of NMS launched with a free Game Boy-style keyring containing a digital clock, while issue four would feature a CD containing the arcade soundtrack to Street Fighter II.

Hadn't heard of this magazine before since I'm from Italy, it was quite interesting learning about part of its and the UK video game magazine market's history other than it being a precursor to Let's Plays with that issue!

@belmont Yeah, £50 is too much for me also counting the inevitable shipping costs and potential import ones so unfortunately I'll have to skip it, too bad because I would've gladly backed it up for a digital copy only!

Even leaving the Mario aspect aside, from what I've played (I certainly didn't finish it) I feel that Mario Is Missing is a good example of what "edutainment" shouldn't be: you should strive to make learning easier by showing what you want to teach through visuals, sounds, fun and varied gameplay (like @gaga64 said each world feels just like a reskin) etc., not dumping it on kids as is!

Finally read the full article, was quite interesting and I'd like to at least try this game at some point (hopefully it will eventually come to Switch and/or its successor like @ManaOwls suggested)!

Happy anniversary Mario Kart Wii, had a lot of fun playing you back in the day (except for the ridiculous conditions to get even just 1 star which is required for certain unlockables)!
Plus, let's not forget there are still so many people playing it nowadays even online thanks to the modding community!

Great interview, I'll try this game out myself when I have the time!

Happy Birthday WarioWare, such a funny and fun series (glad that the Switch got a completely new game and now the first one on NSO)!
@Ryu_Niiyama The original is still great, was so happy to see it as part of the NSO GBA launch lineup!
@goldbricks23 Since we're getting Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually added also GBA motion games, including Twisted, to NSO.
@TheBigBlue Happy you finally gave WarioWare a try and especially that you like it!
@Grackler Got introduced to the series thanks to the GameCube entry and yep, its multiplayer was (and still would be if I had someone to play it with) really good!
@HammerGalladeBro Honestly, most games in this series are fantastic (yes, even Game & Wario in its own way). Really recommend getting Gold if you have the chance and I quite enjoyed Get It Together, too!

@__Fearnavigatr Ah, so it's simply a case of unfortunate placement in the bracket, good to know!

There's no contest since Banjo & Kazooie help each other throughout the whole adventure unlike Zelda & Link who more often than not only do so during the final fight if at all and even in Spirit Tracks it's only in the Tower of Spirits (at first I only saw Link so I thought it was Link & Navi which would've made more sense even though still not comparable).
There would've been much better competitors, for example Mario & Luigi like @Maulbert said!

Hadn't even heard of Toxic Crusaders before, but the new game looks pretty cool (nice that it features the voices of TeamFourStar) being clearly inspired by Shredder's Revenge so I'm looking forward to seeing more of it!

Great interview!
What interested me the most was the part about Asterix since I used to play that game as a kid whenever we went on vacation to a certain seaside location as there was an arcade that had it there at the time and it was so much fun, especially because it really felt like an Asterix comic book/animated movie (fingers crossed Konami will eventually rerelease it)!

Thanks for the heads up, I'll check if my Wii U still works as soon as possible!
This is yet another reason why I seriously should consider modding it eventually...

The memories that came to mind are all about the shops where I bought, almost didn't or straight up couldn't buy certain games.
The first one is a toy shop which is quite nostalgic to me since it's close to home and that's where my parents bought me most toys and videogames when I was a kid. Unfortunately it shut down some time ago.
The second one is another shop in my city which I remember quite vividly because I didn't expect to find videogames there. I got a couple of GameCube games there, including Mario Party 5, so when I was slightly older.
The third one is a GameStop in my city where I remember getting mostly DS and Wii games so even later in my life, but the relatively interesting part is that it was in the same building as a movie theater so I often hanged out there before and/or after watching films.
The fourth one is a Gamepeople in my city where I got some 3DS, Wii U and maybe even Switch (not sure about the latter) so not that long ago, but also not that recently which I remember also because they held a Smash tournament there. I lost the first match, but because of that I ended up in the loser bracket where I won every match and so took part in the final where I unfortunately lost again.
The fifth one is yet another shop in my city that had a copy of Mario Tennis 64 (we're going back in time for this and the next one) so my parents asked for it on my behalf, but they told us they couldn't sell it for some reason that I don't remember so unfortunately I ended up missing that game back in the day.
The last one is a shop in Firenze (Florence) where we found a copy of Paper Mario. My sister and/or I weren't sure about getting it because we didn't know what "paper" meant in English so we thought it meant duck instead because that's what "papero" means in Italian and the unusual artwork certainly didn't help. Still, somehow we ended up getting it and good thing we did since I fell in love with it as soon as I started playing!

Great article, if I ever visit Japan (I really should at some point considering also that Japanese is my field of study) and in particular Tōkyō I'll try to go there!

Must've been pretty tough for the programmers especially considering that at the time you had to hardcode most if not everything (I'm nowhere near an expert, but it was also mentioned by Sakurai in various of his videos) so kudos not only to Miyamoto, but also to them!

Mario 64 closely followed by Ocarina (only because it came out later) for me because while Metroid Prime is an incredible game and I can't wait to give it a fair shot thanks to the remaster I have to say that the jump from not only 2D to 3D, but also from third to first person is the reason why I've barely played it so far.

Yep, Nuts & Bolts immediately came to my mind as soon as I saw that part of the trailer, too.
@Banjo- Couldn't have said it better!
Too bad I couldn't finish the game before my siblings moved out and took our Xbox 360s with them (first my brother which is why we got a second one and then my sister).

@Ziondood Same, when I go to Japan for the first time (I simply have to considering my interests and even more so that Japanese is my field of study) I'll try to find this, too!

Happy anniversary Brawl, probably the Smash game I played the most since I have a friend who absolutely loves the Boss Battles Mode!
One of my favorite Smash games thanks to that and so much else (the Subspace Emissary, the first Challenges in the series, Stickers, the first Stage Builder, Coin Launcher, Masterpieces, even the Chronicle etc.)!

When I was younger I used to emulate not only older games, but even current-gen ones from time to time simply because I couldn't get those games myself.
Now that I can I practically always buy the games I'm interested in to support the developers, but if it weren't for me doing that at the time I wouldn't be as much of a Nintendo and videogame fan as I am now (and would even be less experienced in my field of study, Japanese).
Therefore, I don't care if people emulate any game, but I strongly encourage them to support the developers whenever possible.

@KingMike Right? That's what immediately came to my mind, too!

@sdelfin It's a difference between traditional Hepburn romanization and the modified/revised version, the former has syllabic n as m before b, p and m since that's how you actually pronounce it while the latter always keeps n for consistency.