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Digital Trends
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Digital Trends
Donkey Kong Bananza drops frames, but that doesn't mean the Switch 2 is weak
As I rip a chunk of rock out of the ground and use it to obliterate towers of golden roots or use an explosive rock to shatter an entire cliff face, spawning a cacophony of gold to collect raining down around me in Donkey Kong Bananza, it is impossible to ignore the hit the frame rate takes. In that moment, it almost feels good — like in the days of the SNES when the game would chug when too many particles were on screen — and yet in the back of my mind, I knew it would be used as a talking point for the power of the Switch 2. The original Switch was underpowered from the start, and certainly pushed well beyond its limits in the eight long years it was on the market before the Switch 2. The early years weren't too bad, with Nintendo first party games typically running perfectly fine, but near the end even Tears of the Kingdom started to make the poor Switch buckle. And we don't even need to talk about Pokémon Scarlet and Violet. The last thing players want to see is the second major release for the system already pushing the console to the limits. Recommended Videos Yes, Donkey Kong Bananza will drop frames when things get crazy — and even a couple times when I don't think it should — but don't let that convince you the Switch 2 is already maxed out. Learning the ropes Whenever I discuss topics related to hardware and development, the first place I start is with any official statement from the development team itself. Because a few Donkey Kong Bananza previews had raised concerns about the frame rate prior to the game's launch, director Kazuya Takahashi commented on the game's performance and frame rate with Lavenguardia (translated by NintendoEverything). 'There are several factors to consider. First, we intentionally used effects like hit-stop and slow motion to emphasize impacts. Second, because we use voxel technology, there are times when there are major changes and destruction in the environment. We're aware that performance may drop slightly at these times. However, as you say, overall the game is smooth, and at points where large-scale changes occur, we prioritized fun and playability.' There are a few key points to pick out of this statement. First is that Donkey Kong Bananza uses voxel technology to support the level of deformation and destruction in the game, which is certainly not typical for most titles. Because Bananza is such a special case, it wouldn't be fair to use it as a barometer for how future games would perform. An apt comparison would be something like Hyrule Warriors, which seriously chugged on the Switch due to populating the screen with hundreds of characters at once, but wouldn't be fair to hold up as a typical experience. The other point that struck me was the acknowledgment of the performance dips and deliberate choice to accept that concession in exchange for a more fun experience. To me, this sounds like Nintendo saw a way in which it could smooth over moments of slowdown, but it would come at the cost of the game's core goal — letting the player smash through the world like a force of nature. The team wanted to preserve its artistic vision at a small technical cost. Based on my playthrough with Bananza, I think that was the right call. This is Nintendo pulling out all the stops on a game in a way we haven't seen in years. I don't want to hand-wave away framerate dips as being unimportant or claim they add to the experience when any other company would be raked over the coals for the same thing. However, I will draw the line at suggesting that it should be taken as a sign that the Switch 2 is already showing its age. Cherrypicking one example to hold up as the smoking gun is never solid grounding for an argument. I don't believe anyone who is worried about what Bananza's frame rate means for the Switch 2 is doing so maliciously, but more out of genuine concern. And I get it; we just spent $450 on this new piece of hardware, and even Nintendo itself is hitting technical issues. If any developer should be able to squeeze the most power out of the Switch 2, it would be Nintendo, right? Well, yes and no. Nintendo certainly knows the hardware better than any team, but that doesn't make them experts on day one. Every console has a learning curve, and the longer a team has to learn how to best take advantage of the hardware, the more power it can squeeze out of it. We see it every generation, and there's no reason to think it won't happen here. We also need to consider the fact that Bananza was originally a Switch game before moving to the new hardware. It is easy to say that this is a point against the game running poorly, but we have to be honest about how big of an assumption that is on our part. I'm not a developer, and odds are you aren't either. We might think that starting a game on weaker hardware only to move to a vastly more powerful system would mean that there's less excuse for performance woes, but that's just an assumption. We will never know how tricky it is to completely rework a game for new hardware mid-development. Conversations about a game's performance are valuable. If performance has an impact on your enjoyment, positively or negatively, then that is completely valid, but we should aim to keep those conversations contained to each individual experience. The Switch 2 is just getting started, so let's not jump the gun just because Bananza drops frames here and there.
Metro
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Metro
The standards for video game reviews need to be higher - Reader's Feature
A reader speaks of his love of reading and writing video game reviews but complains that they focus too much on informing and not enough on entertaining. I love video game reviews and as a game reviewer myself, for a handful of websites, I feel that there is a tremendous expressive power in writing them and sticking a score on the end; a score which may mean absolutely nothing or absolutely everything to the audience, depending on how much stock they put into them and the review given. However, I tend to find a litany of issues with game reviews. I find modern video game reviews are largely plain, with the sole intention to inform. Now, there's nothing wrong with informing your audience about what you think of a game, as a review's central intent is to inform the reader, reviewer, or listener depending on the way the review is being broadcast, but good writing entertains as well as informs – and many reviews fail to do that. When I read a review, I want the writing to immerse me and sweep me into using my imagination to display what the reviewer is conveying through his/her/their writing. Judging by the Metascores, I think many critics are too soft with modern games, and some games are held high up on a pedestal above others, even though they have issues nobody talks about. I appreciate Zelda: Breath Of The Wild and Tears Of The Kingdom, but I personally think they both contain many off-putting mechanics that make them more of a chore to play than they should be, such as the durability systems and needing to change your clothes in accordance with the climate. However, you wouldn't be able to tell there are flaws with these games when all the critics throw praise at them like they're revolutionary, which they really aren't. They're just evolutions of games that came before and to me they're more unwelcomingly complex than they should be. And yes, I expect the comments section to flame me. Game critics themselves are a wildly mixed bag. Some of them are great at expressing themselves and do so in their own style, like Jim Stephanie Sterling, Videogame Dunkey, and Ben 'Yahtzee' Croshaw, yet too many are predictable. I know everyone is after different things regarding game reviews and coverage, but many critics recycle the same information, and the results become dry and stale. One website that I used to love a lot back in the day was GameTrailers, not only because I believe Brandon Jones has the best voice of anybody in video game media, but because the way reviews were edited expressed the opinion given. So you'd have a character in a game who says something that illustrates exactly what the critic thinks of the game. This can be done to hilarious effect and thus it's what I think made GameTrailers stand out from all the other video game websites. Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. I also find that too many gamers attach themselves to IGN. They're either commending it for giving scores to games they deem worthy or blasting them for giving a low score to a very popular and well-liked game. Personally, I look for critics who I agree with and what with IGN having a huge pool of reviewers, it's very hard to care about who's writing the review at all. IGN is junk food video game journalism, where the audience only cares about the score at the end and the written content doesn't have much reason to exist. If gamers don't like the score IGN dole out, then instead of finding critics they agree with they crusade and meme them because they'd rather acknowledge that IGN have a spell cast over them than use their senses to find more agreeable critics to follow. More Trending In all, video game reviews are always great to anticipate, because they drive discussion about our wonderful hobby, but it would be nice if greater enthusiasm was expressed. Seeing a bunch of banal reviews recycled with the same informative spiel and lack of crackle is monotonous and derivative. We should always be reading/watching reviews that have the same enthusiasm as the games they're formed around. By reader James Davie The reader's features do not necessarily represent the views of GameCentral or Metro. You can submit your own 500 to 600-word reader feature at any time, which if used will be published in the next appropriate weekend slot. Just contact us at gamecentral@ or use our Submit Stuff page and you won't need to send an email. MORE: Zelda: The Wind Waker is still an amazing game that can inspire future sequels – Reader's Feature MORE: I wish Bethesda didn't make Fallout and The Elder Scrolls - Reader's Feature MORE: I've given up on getting a PS5 and I've already got real concerns about PS6 – Reader's Feature
Forbes
19-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
Switch 2 ‘Zelda' Dethrones ‘Expedition 33' On Metacritic, Which Doesn't Count
Tears/Expedition 33 The Nintendo Switch 2's The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom made headlines yesterday when it officially became the highest-scored game on Metacritic of 2025, dethroning Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, probably the most significant GOTY contender to date. I'm here to say no, that doesn't count. While this is may be subjective, I'm here to give my position that a re-release that is mainly just a graphical upgrade of an already-existing game does not deserve the actual honor of pretending its 95 is actually a true toppler of Expedition 33's 93. And now, Breath of the Wild has just become tied at 93. Does Tears of the Kingdom itself deserve its 96 on Metacritic for its initial release? I'd argue that's debatable, but overlooking that, at least it's an actual game release. Tears of the Kingdom's Switch 2 'edition' is not. Nope, sorry. Also, there's another fact being overlooked here. To get that 95 average for Tears, it's only based on nine reviews. Nine. That's four 10s, a 9.5, three 90s and an 80. That's it. And the tied-for-second Switch 2 Breath of the Wild has 11 reviews. Most major releases of games will end up anywhere from 50-150 scored reviews, and in this case, that very much includes Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, which has 84 reviews averaged for its second-best 93 metascore (not to mention it's wildly high 9.7 user score based on 16,000 ratings). FEATURED | Frase ByForbes™ Unscramble The Anagram To Reveal The Phrase Pinpoint By Linkedin Guess The Category Queens By Linkedin Crown Each Region Crossclimb By Linkedin Unlock A Trivia Ladder The current top 10 list for the year is: I will give smaller indie games a pass on having fewer reviews given the context of their scale, but these Zelda upgrades? Get off this list. Why do I care so much? Well, I am the number one Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 defender, where that game has probably already become one of my favorites of all time. And I will not have its honor besmirched by an upgrade of a Zelda game that came out two years ago. I normally will dismiss all 'remastered' or reissued games from lists like this, and this is no exception. Remakes are a different story, but no, Expedition 33 is still on top here, I don't care what the list says. Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Bluesky and Instagram. Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
Metro
17-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Metro
The highest rated Metacritic game of 2025 actually came out in 2023
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has been knocked from its spot as Metacritic's best reviewed game of 2025. The fight for 2025's best reviewed video game has been a tight one so far, with the number one spot being regularly overtaken by new entries. AAA games like Monster Hunter Wilds and indies like Blue Prince have all vied for the crown, though surprise hit Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 has held the top spot quite comfortably (and rightly) since its April launch. Now, though, it has been dethroned and not even by a new game but the updated re-release of The Legend Of Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom for Nintendo Switch 2. Clair Obscur now has to share the number two spot with the other big Switch 2 re-release: The Legend Of Zelda: Breath Of The Wild. Although both Zelda games have been available on Switch 2 since June 5, reviews have only recently begun to come out, since Nintendo didn't supply review copies at launch. It's not surprising to see both games score so highly. After all, they did when they originally came out too, and have only been enhanced further on Switch 2 thanks to their improved frame rates, visuals, and the handy Zelda Notes app. Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. At the time of writing, Tears Of The Kingdom has an average Metacritic score of 95, making it the highest scoring game of 2025 on Metacritic. Breath Of The Wild and Clair Obscur are in joint second at 93. So, what can we take away from this? Frankly, it's that Metacritic' score aggregation system, for determining the best games of the year, isn't perfect. While both Zelda games definitely deserve their perfect scores, and they are technically 2025 releases, it doesn't seem fair to pit them against other brand new games. And yet if you were to discount them it soon becomes very difficult to know where to stop, given how the lines between remaster and remake are constantly being blurred. But there's another problem in the way Metacritic aggregates average scores, where high scoring games can benefit from having fewer reviews. If a game only has two reviews and they're both positive, it can perform better than a game with 100 good reviews and just a handful of more negative ones. This is the case with the two Zelda games. At the time of writing, there are only 10 critic reviews for Breath Of The Wild on Switch 2 (one of which doesn't provide a score) and only eight for Tears Of The Kingdom. By comparison, Clair Obscur has 84 critic reviews and while the majority are positive, the scores lean between perfect 10/10s to as low as 7/10. So the wider range knocks its average down. More Trending The same logic can be applied for bad games too. Right now, the worst reviewed game of the year is MindsEye, with an average Metacritic score of 37. However, publisher IO Interactive Partners never supplied review codes, so there are only a small handful of official reviews to aggregate, with just eight of them at time of writing. Admittedly, none of them are positive, but more reviews mean more opportunities to earn at least average scores, that could help push it a bit further up. (Spoiler: we're willing to bet that doesn't happen.) Not to mention Metacritic's list doesn't include games that have less than seven critic reviews, so it's likely the actual worst game of 2025 is something most people have completely overlooked. Email gamecentral@ leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter. To submit Inbox letters and Reader's Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here. For more stories like this, check our Gaming page. MORE: Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 sells 3.3 million copies after 33 days MORE: Nintendo Switch 2 owner loses 20 years' worth of save data in botched transfer MORE: Twitch streamer breaks down in laughter trying to promote MindsEye
Metro
16-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Metro
Zelda: Tears Of The Kingdom Switch 2 Edition review
Nintendo's remaster of the sequel to Zelda: Breath Of The Wild has been tweaked and upgraded, with considerably better graphics and a few new tricks and options. We're very jealous of anyone who's playing the two most recent Zelda games for the first time on Switch 2. As we've already explored, with the Switch 2 Edition of Breath Of The Wild, these are essentially just remasters, with no substantial new content, but given both games had issues with performance on the original Switch, enhanced versions are very much welcome. The original version of Tears Of The Kingdom didn't have quite as infamous a problem with its frame rate as Breath Of The Wild but it was still obvious that the original Switch was only just able to run the game at a satisfactory level. On the Switch 2, everything seems a lot more effortless, and it's immediately obvious that this is by far the best way to play the game. Both are 10/10 classics, so really the only question here is which to start with and whether they're worth the price of an upgrade, if you've already played them. One thing to note is that Tears Of The Kingdom is an even bigger game than its predecessor, so the chances are you probably haven't 100%-ed it, and so the new Zelda Notes mobile app will come in extra handy here. PIC 1 As with the Switch 2 Edition of Breath Of The Wild, we're not going to pretend we've completed the whole game again from scratch. It's far too long for that (at least 60 hours if you ignore every possible diversion – which no one ever does) but we've explored the game again in all its glory by using both a new save file and our old one from the Switch 1. Our original review covers everything in detail but, in short, Tears Of The Kingdom is a direct sequel to Breath Of The Wild – a real rarity for any Zelda game. It uses the same map as Breath Of The Wild but altered to account for the passage of time and with the addition of a gloomy underworld and a series of islands in the skies. It's not quite three times as big as before, but it's not far off. Sign up to the GameCentral newsletter for a unique take on the week in gaming, alongside the latest reviews and more. Delivered to your inbox every Saturday morning. One of the few criticisms of the original version of Tears Of The Kingdom is that while the visual storytelling is clear, in terms of showing a world recovering from the calamity of the previous game, the narrative barely acknowledges the fact, with many returning characters not even seeming to recognise Link. There was also some disappointment, following the original release, that the sky islands and underworld depths are involved in relatively few of the story missions. There's lots of optional side quests involving them, and they're tons of fun to explore, but the existing overground is still the main story focus. Which surprised many given that's not necessarily what the marketing implied. You could also complain that the combat, arguably the weakest element of the original game, hasn't changed significantly but the major focus of Tears Of The Kingdom, in terms of new features, is the Ultrahand ability, which allows you to manipulate objects as if Link has telekinesis. This is used to fuse weapons into stronger forms, increasing the amount of time before they break, but primarily to create complex constructions and vehicles. Most puzzles and obstacles can be overcome in multiple different ways, as you use raw materials like wood and specialist items like items and steering wheels, to create all kinds of Heath Robinson style devices. The only restriction was the limited amount of time that some vehicles, particularly flying ones, had before they automatically fell apart. We're not sure what technical limit it was that was forcing this, but it hasn't changed in the Switch 2 Edition, no doubt because it would unbalance the rest of the game. All the changes in the remaster are essentially the same as with Breath Of The Wild, including higher resolution visuals, 60fps gameplay, and HDR support. There are also the same flaws, in that these improvements make obvious the rather basic textures in some areas, as well as the pop-up for smaller objects like bushes and rocks. But then this is just a remaster, not a remake. Other changes include an extra save file, if you want to start again from scratch, and access to the Zelda Notes app. This is used in an almost identical way to Breath Of The Wild, with an array of mildly useful features, such as the ability to share items with other players, edit photos that you take along the way, and check player data. With Tears Of The Kingdom you can also create a QR code for any of your Ultrahand builds and share them with other people. Tears Of The Kingdom also has new commentary from Princess Zelda, which is just as inessential as in Breath Of The Wild, while the most useful option by far remains a live map which shows you nearby Koroks and shrines, for those that are trying to see and do everything in the game. More Trending There's no question that Tears Of The Kingdom is a great game or that this is anything but a very welcome remaster. The only real issue is whether this or Breath Of The Wild is the better game. That will be argued about for many years to come, as while Tears Of The Kingdom is better overall – fixing a few minor quibbles with its predecessor – Breath Of The Wild is more approachable and the one responsible for all the initial innovation. As much as we'd love to play both games again for the first time, we're not sure we'd advise anyone doing so one after the other, in quick succession. But that's up to you, all we can say is that the Switch 2 now has the definitive versions of two of the best games ever made, and that's not bad going for any console launch. In Short: The definitive version of one of Nintendo's most astounding technical and design achievements, that expands and refines the world of Breath Of The Wild in new and unexpected ways. Pros: The Ultrahand system is an incredible achievement and allows even more freedom in how you approach the game. Immense game world, with a new secret or encounter around every corner. Higher frame rate and resolution are a big help. Cons: As with Breath Of The Wild, some of the texture work is showing its age and the weak storytelling still feels like a missed opportunity. Score: 10/10 Formats: Nintendo Switch 2Price: £66.99 or £7.99 upgrade pack*Publisher: NintendoDeveloper: Nintendo EPDRelease Date: 5th June 2025 Age Rating: 12 *free with Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack Email gamecentral@ leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter. To submit Inbox letters and Reader's Features more easily, without the need to send an email, just use our Submit Stuff page here. For more stories like this, check our Gaming page. MORE: Stellar Blade's story is 'weak' admits director but there's a reason why MORE: The Witcher 4 designed for PS5 and not PC after 'so many problems' scaling down MORE: Nintendo Switch 2 sales numbers smash records in the US and worldwide
