A nice, big sandbox to play in.

Team17 is taking us to the farm in mid-April.

My Time at Portia, the sandbox simulation RPG announced last year, will release on April 16 on the eShop. A physical version of the game will also be available.

The Chinese developer Pathea developed the game, which had a successful crowdfunding campaign and is currently available on PC.

Procedural generation goes "bonk".

Switch players will attempt to stop an evil miner this fall.

Merge Games have announced the release of overhead action roguelike Sparklite for this fall as part of their Game Developer's Conference slate. The game cites inspiration from The Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past and Rogue Legacy.

Sadly, you missed the wizard win.

Nintendo is offering a chance to try Splatoon 2 for those on the fence again.

A special Splatoon 2 demo is now available on the eShop, which will be live starting tomorrow at 10 a.m. and ending on Monday at 9:59 a.m (Eastern). All of the multiplayer functions will be included, and downloading the demo will trigger an email with a 7-day Switch Online free trial.

The goose is loose?

Wednesday will bring an avalanche of indies to the Switch.

Nintendo of America has announced a Nindies Showcase video for this Wednesday, starting at noon Eastern / 9 a.m. Pacific. The presentation will be "around 30 minutes long".

Previous NoA Indie showcase videos have been timed around GDC 2017 and 2018, as well as PAX West. This year's GDC is this week in San Francisco, CA.

And the transition to Anime World Report is complete.

I'm noticing a disturbing amount of anime this week.

That would be due to Fate/Extella: Link, which is out on Tuesday and I'll have more on then. There's enough anime there for everyone, then add in a Super Robot Wars game in Japan and yeah, we just need a polar bear cafe and we're Crunchyroll.

One to make an easy game hard, and one to make a superlatively difficult game 1% easier.

The Switch Online update with Kid Icarus and others is live, along with the traditional save bonuses.

Kirby's Adventure and Zelda II: The Adventures of Link have received the SP treatment this month. In Kirby's Adventure, the save picks up after completing the first run of the game, meaning the Extra Mode as well as the sound test are available.

The development pedigree is, shall we say, interesting.

The Switch will be receiving a dungeon crawling RPG this summer that comes from an unexpected source.

Mistover is a new dungeon crawling RPG published by Krafton Game Union, the parent company of Bluehole who are best known for PC hits TERA and PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds. It will launch on Switch as well as PC this summer.

Two tourneys... and two booths?

PAX East is at the end of the month, and NWR will be seeing quite a bit of Nintendo at the show.

Nintendo announced their booth plans in a press statement this morning, and they have two different booth slots on the show floor. One booth will be focused on family friendly fare and contain Yoshi's... Read more...

One internal, one older friend.

NIS America has just wrapped a live stream featuring updates on upcoming games, including two new confirmed localizations for North America and Europe.

NISA will be handling localization duties for The Alliance Alive HD Remaster, a remake of the 2018 3DS title announced in last week's Famitsu magazine.... Read more...

This week has definitely no Boy Scouts.

OK, we're back to normal circumstances somewhat, so what are we looking at?

The big one for me is Baba Is You, which I've heard one party in particular compare to CELESTE in terms of potential post-release hype which isn't bad for a puzzle game. The Red Strings Club is the monthly Devolver release, which I've heard a fair bit about from its PC release, and the incredibly divisive Caligula Effect: Overdose.

Late due to the mother of all migraines.

Wait, why are you just posting this now?

Well, hopefully this weekend I won't come down with a combination of headache and cough that renders me inoperable for 48+ hours right as I'm about to tear a publisher a new arse.

What's the big one this week?

Kirby's Extra Epic Yarn as the number... Read more...

ALL HAIL THE VIRTUAL *checks* CARDBIRD.

Nintendo is taking another swing at Labo, and returning to VR at the same time.

The fourth Labo kit will be a kit themed around virtual reality, and launch on April 12. The kits will support the Switch being used for the screens, and the Joy-Con will be used for tracking. Six kits will be available: VR Goggles, Blaster, Camera, Bird, Elephant, and Wind Pedal.

With the grand prize of a free $9.99 to put toward your Switch Online sub.

Nintendo has laid out the plans for the March update to Switch Online, which will have a bit of variety.

The NES games added to the service will be Kid Icarus for all territories, while the Western territories will receive the unreleased-in-Japan Star Tropics. Japan will instead get Konami's 1985 proto-fighter Yie-Ar Kung Fu and the original Fire Emblem.

Standard and Limited Editions

The wacky eShop title Pato Box developed by Bromio will soon be getting the physical treatment on Nintendo Switch and Playstation Vita. The Switch will receive a Standard Edition priced at $29.99 and a special Limited Edition for $39.99 with preorders starting March 7th via online worldwide seller Playasia.

With a manual designed by our very own David Lloyd!

The next release in Super Rare Game (SRG) lineup is not just one game, but a collection of four different games in the Fairune series released as a physical package for the Nintendo Switch. Fairune Collection contains 4 titles; Fairune, Fairune 2, Fairune Origin and Fairune Blast. You can check out our review written by Jordan Rudek (@riskman64) here.

It's a whole new world to explore.

The next Pokémon adventure has been revealed, along with its first new Pokémon.

Pokémon Sword and Shield will release in late 2019 for Switch. Sword and Shield take place in the Galar region, an island with a wide variety of climates and environments.

The three starter Pokémon will be the chimp-like Grookey, the fire rabbit Scorbunny, and the water lizard Sobble. Gyms are mentioned as returning after being absent from Sun and Moon.

The physical version won't be far behind.

Independent games are often described as "handmade" but an upcoming Headup title takes that to new heights.

Trüberbrook, a German-developed adventure title, will release on the Switch eShop on April 17, with a physical version to follow two days later. Each character in the game was individually constructed by hand, with small flourishes added to make them stand out when digitized.

Because MV isn't out yet, they had to remake it from the ground up.

A beloved adventure RPG will soon make its console debut on Switch.

To The Moon, an episode adventure that originally released on Windows in 2011, will be launching on Switch this summer. The tale of attempting to piece together a dying man's memories won several awards for story in its initial release.

Looks like the CRT TVs will be confined to the side tourneys this year.

The world's largest fighting game tournament has revealed its 2019 game lineup, including a new game reveal

The new game is Samurai Shodown, an Unreal Engine 4-based reboot of SNK's 1993 fighting game. The reboot will be a part of the EVO lineup, as the game is slated to release in early summer. Previously revealed as Samurai Spirits, it was announced for Switch as part of a SNK earnings call last year.

On the anniversary of the series. We've been down this road before, haven't we?

A major Pokémon announcement will come on Pokémon Day.

Nintendo has announced a Pokémon Direct will air tomorrow at 9 am Eastern time / 6 am Pacific / 1500 CET. The contents of the video have not been disclosed, but the last of these videos in 2017 revealed Pokkén Tournament DX for Switch, Pokémon Ultra Sun/Moon for 3DS, and Pokémon Gold and Silver's 3DS Virtual Console releases.