Hello gentle readers, and welcome to the SwitchArcade Round-Up for May 18th, 2021. In today’s article, we’ve got a full review of the first of Nintendo’s two Famicom Detective Club games. There’s a little bit of news about Mario Golf: Super Rush, summaries of the surprisingly excellent batch of new releases today, and the latest lists of incoming and expiring sales as usual. Let’s get right to it!
News
‘Mario Golf: Super Rush’ Gets New Overview Trailer
We’re getting close to the June 25th release date of Mario Golf: Super Rush, and Nintendo has started offering up more details on the game. A new trailer for the game was posted on Nintendo’s YouTube channel that goes over many of the game’s features and mechanics. It also reveals the entire starting roster of 16 characters, which includes most of the usual suspects along with odder choices like Chargin’ Chuck and King Bob-Omb. It also talks about the many different modes, with further elaboration on the new Speed Golf and Battle Golf modes. The game looks terrific, if I may say so. And I may, because this is my article.
Reviews & Mini-Views
Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir ($34.99)
In Japan, the Famicom Detective Club games are cherished classics in their genre. A pair of games initially released for the Famicom Disk System more than thirty years ago, they’ve seen a number of remakes and rereleases in Japan across the generations. The people that worked on the games would go on to work on many great games: Super Metroid, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Fire Emblem: Mystery of the Emblem, Rhythm Heaven, and countless others. It also served as Nintendo’s strongest attempt at the Japanese adventure genre. As was often the case with Nintendo’s takes on concepts, the result was a somewhat streamlined, more player-friendly approach that found surprisingly broad appeal.
As mentioned, that was more than thirty years ago. What was once rather elegant and accessible is a bit clunkier in modern days. Nintendo tapped visual novel developer Mages to handle this remake of the games, and while the presentation has been brought up to modern standards, the core gameplay hasn’t been messed around with much. For the first time ever, the party even extends outside of Japan’s borders. You can finally play both Famicom Detective Club games in English via an official localization. In Japan, these remakes can lean somewhat on nostalgia. In the West, they’re going to have to stand on their own two feet.
The Missing Heir is the first game in the series. When the game starts, your character has had an accident and is suffering from temporary amnesia. It’s a good excuse for exposition, if nothing else. It turns out you work for a detective agency, and after a bit of preamble you’re off on the case once again. Murder most foul, hefty inheritances, and other such staples of the mystery genre are on the menu here. You’ll travel to various locations, search for clues, and talk to people you meet on the way to get additional information. The screenshots might have you thinking this is a relatively passive visual novel, but it’s an adventure game through and through. A thirty-three year-old adventure game.
That fact has good and bad consequences. It’s good because even if you haven’t played this particular game before, there’s a familiar scent about it for those who lived through the classic era of adventure games. It’s bad because that familiar scent sometimes comes from its obtuse nature. Whether it be hunting the right pixel, going to the right place, or talking to the right person, sometimes it’s not completely clear what you should do. Not bad at all by the standards of its original era, but something to be aware of in the here and now. If your main experience with Japanese adventure games is through things like Ace Attorney or Danganronpa, you might get frustrated at times in this game.
Famicom Detective Club: The Missing Heir is impressive if only for the fact that a new lick of paint and a few tweaks here and there leave it feeling so close to a modern game in so many ways. It will at times betray that illusion with some frustrating progress-blockers, but for the most part this is a great choice for fans of adventure games or even just a good mystery story. Mages has done a fantastic job of updating the game’s presentation, too. This isn’t the kind of game we’re used to seeing from Nintendo, particularly when it’s reaching into its classic library, but I’m glad it’s finally available to a wider audience.
SwitchArcade Score: 4/5
New Releases
Jetboard Joust ($9.99)
SwitchArcade Highlight!
Jetboard Joust pays homage to classics like Defender and Fantasy Zone with exciting multi-directional shoot-em-up action. It’s a lot faster and more hectic than those games tended to be, however. It also has some roguelite elements, because you have to have those these days. There are some nasty giant bosses to fight, and after you clear a stage you’ll get a random gun to power up with. You can also collect coins that you can use to upgrade your character in various ways. I really like the zippy gameplay here, so even though I’m getting a bit tired of roguelite stuff in shooters, I still enjoy this game a lot.
Arcaea ($39.99)
SwitchArcade Highlight!
Need one more rhythm game? If you enjoy stuff like DEEMO or Cytus, Arcaea should be right up your alley. It offers over 150 songs to play with three difficulties each, a 60-chapter story to play through, and two different control methods. This has been available on mobile for a while now, but the progression system has been completely redone here to account for the up-front price. That mobile version does offer you a convenient way to try out the game, at the very least. The selection of tunes here leans more into the electronic than anything else, so make sure you aren’t opposed to that kind of music if you’re thinking about picking it up. Another cool game in this genre for a platform with plenty to offer already.
Leisure Suit Larry: Wet Dreams Dry Twice ($44.99)
SwitchArcade Highlight!
I guess that Leisure Suit Larry revival went over well, because here’s a follow-up. Wait, is that Roger Wilco in that screenshot? Hunh. Anyway, after how everything wrapped up at the end of the last game, Larry has decided that Faith, in fact, was his real true love. He escapes from… sigh, Cancum and heads off to find her. Many, many double-entendres and mildly risque scenes follow. It’s pretty much on par with Wet Dreams Don’t Dry, so if you had a good time with that one, you’ll likely get your kicks from this one too. If you found it tiresome or not as funny as the ones Al Lowe created or was involved with… well, you can fill in the rest of the equation, I’m sure.
SnowRunner ($39.99)
SwitchArcade Highlight!
Yes, all of today’s releases are Highlights. It happens sometimes. This one was developed by Saber Interactive, so at the very least you can expect the port to be as good as it possibly could be. You drive 40 different vehicles licensed from real companies through a harsh open world, taking on contracts and trying to complete them in adverse conditions. The money you earn from doing so will allow you to expand and upgrade your fleet of vehicles, giving you more versatility and, you know, additional fun things to drive. It sounds like a million other driving games available on the Switch for ten bucks or less, but the difference is that this one is good.
Sales
(North American eShop, US Prices)
It’s easy to pick recommendations from today’s list of new sales. Dadish, Dadish 2, Super Fowlst 2, go. Two bucks a pop and you’ll be smiling for hours. As to the outbox, Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney Trilogy and maybe the Kairosoft games are what catch my eye, but you’ll need to check things yourself if you want to play it safe. And you do want to play it safe, right? Right.
Select New Games on Sale
Pizza Bar Tycoon ($1.99 from $4.99 until 5/24)
Food Truck Tycoon: Asian Cuisine ($1.99 from $4.99 until 5/24)
Spider Solitaire ($1.99 from $8.99 until 5/24)
Eat Your Letters ($4.19 from $5.99 until 5/25)
SUPERHOT ($14.99 from $24.99 until 5/25)
Farmer’s Dynasty ($19.99 from $39.99 until 5/25)
Retrovamp ($1.99 from $2.99 until 5/25)
Monster Truck Championship ($19.99 from $39.99 until 5/25)
Ghostrunner ($19.49 from $29.99 until 5/25)
Love: A Puzzle Box ($9.99 from $19.99 until 6/1)
Dadish ($1.99 from $9.99 until 6/7)
Dadish 2 ($1.99 from $9.99 until 6/7)
Super Fowlst 2 ($1.99 from $9.99 until 6/7)
Figment ($2.79 from $19.99 until 6/7)
Fly Punch Boom! ($7.49 from $14.99 until 6/7)
Pancake Bar Tycoon ($2.49 from $4.99 until 6/7)
Flowlines VS ($1.99 from $4.99 until 6/7)
Klondike Solitaire ($1.99 from $8.99 until 6/7)
Sushi Time! ($1.99 from $4.99 until 6/7)
Moto Rush GT ($1.99 from $14.99 until 6/7)
Safari Pinball ($2.00 from $2.99 until 6/7)
Adventure Pinball Bundle ($2.69 from $8.99 until 6/7)
Ludomania ($1.99 from $3.99 until 6/7)
Go! Fish Go! ($1.99 from $3.99 until 6/7)
King’s Heir: Rise to the Throne ($2.09 from $14.99 until 6/7)
Dark Arcana: The Carnival ($2.09 from $14.99 until 6/7)
Sales Ending Tomorrow, Wednesday, May 19th
-KLAUS- ($3.74 from $14.99 until 5/19)
2in1: App Driver & S. Killer/Sniper ($1.99 from $4.99 until 5/19)
39 Days to Mars ($10.04 from $14.99 until 5/19)
9 Monkeys of Shaolin ($17.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
Achtung! Cthulhu Tactics ($12.49 from $24.99 until 5/19)
Amnesia: Collection ($8.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
Ash of Gods: Redemption ($11.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
Beat Me! ($3.24 from $12.99 until 5/19)
Call of Juarez: Gunslinger ($9.99 from $19.99 until 5/19)
Chess Ultra ($6.24 from $12.49 until 5/19)
Crime Opera: The Butterfly Effect ($7.99 from $9.99 until 5/19)
Darkwood ($10.49 from $14.99 until 5/19)
Daylife in Japan: Pixel Jigsaw ($1.99 from $3.99 until 5/19)
Flat Heroes ($1.99 from $9.99 until 5/19)
Grand Prix Story ($8.40 from $14.00 until 5/19)
Hero-U: Rogue to Redemption ($13.99 from $19.99 until 5/19)
Heroes of the Monkey Tavern ($4.99 from $9.99 until 5/19)
Home Run High ($8.40 from $14.00 until 5/19)
Infernal Radiation ($7.19 from $7.99 until 5/19)
Ironcast ($6.49 from $12.99 until 5/19)
Kona ($4.99 from $19.99 until 5/19)
Ninja Village ($8.40 from $14.00 until 5/19)
Offroad Mini Racing ($2.79 from $3.99 until 5/19)
Old Man’s Journey ($1.99 from $9.99 until 5/19)
Phoenix Wright: AA Trilogy ($19.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
Project Warlock ($8.99 from $14.99 until 5/19)
Pure Pool ($10.49 from $14.99 until 5/19)
Redeemer: Enhanced Edition ($8.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
Run the Fan ($1.99 from $3.99 until 5/19)
Snooker 19 ($17.49 from $34.99 until 5/19)
Space Elite Force ($1.99 from $2.99 until 5/19)
Spitlings ($8.99 from $14.99 until 5/19)
Spooky Chase ($1.99 from $4.99 until 5/19)
The Ramen Sensei ($8.40 from $14.00 until 5/19)
The Spectrum Retreat ($6.49 from $12.99 until 5/19)
Vasara Collection ($1.99 from $9.99 until 5/19)
Windbound ($17.99 from $29.99 until 5/19)
That’s all for today, friends. We’ll be back tomorrow with some news, some sales, and some new releases. Those new games include Sunless Skies: Sovereign Edition, Outbreak: Endless Nightmares, and a fresh release from the internet’s latest meme darling Sabec. Aw heck. I hope you all have a terrific Tuesday, and as always, thanks for reading!
