Happy new year! Welcome to 2025, and congratulations for living through yet another complete rotation around the giant firey gas ball we call the sun. The start of a new year is as good a time as any to take a look at what games are currently on the horizon, so here are the biggest game releases of 2025 that we know about right now!January 2025Dynasty Warriors: OriginsOn January 17, Tecmo Koeis flagship musou series returns with Dynasty Warriors: Origins, its first full-fledged entry since 2018. It will, of course, take full advantage of current gen hardware to flood your screen with enemies that you can plow through while yelling the titular battlecry, DIE, NASTY WARRIORS! It'll be available on PS5, Xbox Series consoles, and PC.If you prefer to make warriors die in nasty ways from really far away, on January 30 Sniper Elite: Resistance continues the long-running and long-range gratuitous-Nazi-castration-simulator series. This latest installment doesnt seem to be shaking up the formula too much, but its hard to complain about that when the formula involves shooting the private parts off of fascists. Did I mention you can shoot Nazis in the junk? Because you can. Thats on all the Xboxes and PlayStations, plus PC.February 2025Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2Is this the real life? Is this just fantasy? Well, none of the above, but it is technically a bohemian rhapsody - Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 picks up where the first sprawling historical RPG left off, continuing the adventures of Henry of Skalitz, a poor boy with no need for sympathy. And while KCD2s immersive and historically grounded simulation of 14th century Bohemia is by no means easy come or easy go, the deep role-playing mechanics and massive open-world means you can take Henry any way the wind blows. Doesnt really matter to meeeeeee. Thats on current gen consoles and PC, launching February 11.If you like simulated history on a much larger scale and even larger timeframe, Sid Meiers Civilization 7 drops that same day. When a game franchise has had 7 installments over three decades, it really shouldnt need much in the way of introduction, but in a nutshell: youre in charge of seeing a society and guiding its progress through history by Exploring, Expanding, Exploiting, and a 4th X word as needed, which unsurprisingly, can get a bit complicated. Thats out for basically everything, including Linux, but excluding mobile - but thatll probably come later.On February 14, Assassins Creed Shadows sends Ubisofts flagship open-world series into the much-requested setting of feudal Japan. If you cant decide if youd rather be a ninja or a Samurai, we have great news: this one lets you do both, thanks to its dual protagonists. Thats on current gen and PC.If youre feeling lonesome on Valentines day, theres also Date Everything!, a sandbox dating simulator where you may in fact be able to date an actual sandbox - and if not, theres 100 other anthropomorphized inanimate objects with which you can become romantically involved, from the windows to the walls - or the floor, anyway - and theyre all fully voice acted. Thats on PS5, Xbox series consoles, Switch, and PC.Monster Hunter WildsOn February 18, Obsidians Avowed hits Xbox series consoles and PC. This is set in the same fantasy universe as the studios isometric Pillars of Eternity games, but this time offers a whole new point of view thanks to its first-person perspective and realtime action combat. It may look like Skyrim, but dont expect an epic timesink - the devs have said its more comparable to their previous sci-fi RPG, The Outer Worlds (which takes around 40 hours to do the main quest and sides), which is great news for anyone who sucks at finishing games.Speaking of timesinks, if you think its time to sink some ships and terrorize the high seas, well youre in luck because Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is well, I feel like the title really covers its bases there. Thisll see Goro Majima, the fan-favorite foil and frenemy to the series' usual protagonists, taking the wheel - somewhat literally - after he gets amnesia and decides to explore a new career as a pirate. Classic Majima. Thats on the Xboxes, PlayStations and PC on February 21.Pirate Yakuza actually moved its release date up a week to get the hell out of the way of one of the biggest games of the year, Monster Hunter Wilds, which comes to Xbox Series, PS5 and PC on February 28. Again, it's one of those series that requires little introduction, especially after how many new players got hooked on Monster Hunter World last gen. With Wilds, Capcom is aiming to refine and improve the core experience in a way that satisfies longtime fans and newcomers alike, but also introduce new features that take advantage of current hardware to keep things interesting. Oh yeah, and it also needs to be accessible enough to attract more new players - so, if youre wondering why this game has taken so long that might have something to do with it. March 2025Split FictionOn March 6, its time to buddy up for another co-op adventure from Hazelight, the studio behind It Takes Two and A Way Out. This time its Split Fiction, which sees a sci fi and fantasy author getting stuck in virtual reality and undergoing a bunch of bizarre adventures, including but not limited to getting turned into pigs who are subsequently turned into hot dogs and cooked on the grill - though the hot dogs are still playable. Best of all, buying one copy lets two people play online together. Thats on PC and current gen consoles.On March 25, you can experience the upper-middle-class corner of upper-Middle-earth with Tales of the Shire, a cozy life sim that focuses entirely on ordinary hobbit life. You know, for regular hobbits who just like to garden and smoke pipes and drink brandy and have petty rivalries over trivial neighborhood bullshit, not going on long hikes to throw jewelry into volcanos. Honestly, sounds lovely. Be a shame if this Shire were to be ruthlessly scoured by ruffians in the thrall of Saruman. Anyway, thats on PS5, Xbox series consoles, Switch, and PC.AtomfallIf youd prefer to explore a version of the Shire-like pastoral English countryside thats been doused in radioactive particles, theres Atomfall, which as youve hopefully put together is taking some cues from Fallout - though as this one leans a bit more into survival than role-playing, Id say the Stalker influence is also pretty strong. Plus, this is also showing an alternate future in which a major real nuclear disaster went a whole lot worse. Thats coming to everything but Switch on March 27.To me, DNF has always been short for Did Not Finish or Duke Nukem Forever, (which they probably shouldnt have finished.) But to a few million people, its shorthand for Dungeon & Fighter, the multimedia universe stemming from the 2005 South Korean multiplayer beat-em-up that was released stateside as Dungeon Fighter Online. In any case, that universe gets a little bigger with the single-player action RPG The First Berserker: Khazan, which hits the Xboxes, PlayStations and PC on March 27 as well.On March 28, the potential Sims-killer Inzoia lot of Sims fans out there. Thats on PC at launch, with current gen console versions in the works for later.April 2025Fatal Fury: City of the WolvesOn April 24, Fatal Fury gets its first new game this century with Fatal Fury: City of the Wolves. And while Terry Bogard, Mai Shirunai and company have kept busy with appearances in other fighting game series like King of Fighters, Street Fighter, DOA, Tekken and Super Smash Bros, thisll be the first mainline Fatal Fury since 1999s Mark of the Wolves. Hopefully its worth the wait - thats on both PlayStations, Xbox Series, and PC.As of writing this article, those are all the major games that have official release dates. But that's not every game slated for 2025 - theres plenty more that were expecting over the coming year.Nintendo and Switch 2By April, well almost definitely know when Nintendos next console will be released, but as of right now we dont even know what its officially called. Nintendo has announced that details will be revealed sometime before the end of March 2025, and based on some leaked product listings for third-party accessories, theres some speculation that its targeting a summer release window. Again, this is completely unconfirmed at this point, but it makes sense. The original Switch was revealed in October 2016 and went on sale the following March, and the organic buzz generated by gamers and early adopters made it a must-have item by the time the holidays rolled around.Will Nintendo's successor to the Switch launch in 2025?Whatever this new thing is called, itll launch with at least a few games. The original Switch had about ten games available on day one, which sounds underwhelming until you remember one of them was The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Another dozen or so games were released over the three month launch window following the Switch's release. Bear in mind, a lot of people were skeptical of the Switch at the time of its launch, including publishers whod been burned by the Wii U. The Wii had been such a hit that there was initially a ton of support for its successor, and the Wii Us launch lineup was almost three times the size of what was out for the Switch on day one. Considering the Switch has outsold the original Wii by almost 50 million units, and is currently the third best-selling console of all time, its safe to assume that a LOT of publishers will want to get in on the ground floor for whatevers next - so I have a hunch therell be a lot of Switch 2 games.There are a couple bigger Nintendo games were expecting to drop this year. Metroid Prime 4: Beyond was basically just a logo for the better part of a decade, and presumably itll actually be a video game at some point in the near future, which is exciting. Thats coming to Switch, but I wouldnt be surprised if that was one of the big flagship launch titles for the new console, as well - and even if its not, the new hardware is supposedly backwards compatible, so Im sure plenty of people will be playing it on there either way.Pokmon Legends: Z-A is slated for 2025, which is another entry in the open-world action RPG side-series - Pokmon Legends Arceus took some big swings, but it also made the Switch show its age in some places, so hopefully that can benefit from more powerful hardware - or at the very least, improve on the groundwork laid by Arceus.Grand Theft Auto 6Grand Theft Auto 6A rising tide raises all ships, and new Nintendo hardware will definitely help keep the games industry afloat a bit, but the other big 2025 release thats sure to make some waves is Grand Theft Auto 6. I dont need to tell you how much excitement there is for this game. GTA 5 is the second best-selling game of all time, and after a twelve year, three console generation wait, people really, really want to see what Rockstar does next with its signature series. I'm calling it right now: itll probably be the best-selling game of the decade, and almost definitely the best-selling game of 2025 - assuming it does in fact come out in 2025. Its worth noting that practically every major Rockstar release, GTA and otherwise, has been hit by a delay or two. So, fingers crossed we get GTA 6 on time, but also, ya know, expect disappointment and youll never be disappointed. TBC 2025Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake EaterNow its time for the big huge pile of games were expecting at some point in 2025, but which dont have specific release dates yet. This makes it really hard to figure out what order to put them in, and also chances are by the time youre reading this list a few will have been given release dates or maybe even delayed a year. So just keep in mind this is all subject to change in some way and please dont be mad at me.Hideo Kojima fans are eating good in 2025, or at the very least, eating snakes. Metal Gear Solid Delta: Snake Eater, the full modern remake of the fan-favorite third entry in the tactical espionage action series, will be coming to current gen consoles and PC. While Hideo Kojima has had no involvement with it (aside from directing the original) it seems like a lot of care is being taken on Konamis part to not fuck it up. This showed up in a PlayStation promo that dropped last January showcasing big 2024 releases, and a November 17 release date was briefly leaked by GameStop, but was apparently that was all inaccurate. Nontheless, it seems like well be getting it sooner than later. Thatll be on PS5, Xbox Series consoles, and PC.PlayStation Games 2025Ghost of YoteiMeanwhile, Kojimas next big thing is Death Stranding 2: On the Beach, which drop anchor on PS5 at some point in 2025, and will presumably wash up on PC, Xbox, and maybe even Mac and iOS later on, if the first games rollout is anything to go on.The other big PS5 exclusive we know about right now is Ghost of Yotei, Sucker Punchs next open world Samurai game. While many games target fall release windows, Sony has the tendency to drop major first-party games earlier in the year. For instance, Ghost of Tsushima was a July release, The Last of Us Part 2 and Ratchet and Clank Rift Apart were both June releases, and God of War 2018 was an April game. Saying that, God of War Ragnarok came out in November, so go figure.Xbox Games 2025FableSonys been playing stuff annoyingly close to the chest, but we have a better idea of what Xbox has in the works. Theres Fable, which is dusting off the beloved fantasy RPG series from a few console generations back. This time Playground Games has been given the keys and taken the wheel, if youll pardon the expression. Playground is the studio behind the Forza Horizon series - as in, thats literally all theyve publicly done, so Im dying to see their spin on an RPG. I dont give a shit about racing or cars and can barely drive one in real life, but I somehow sunk 120 hours into Forza Horizon 5 - so if they can make me enjoy something I dont care about that much, Im dying to see how they handle an epic fantasy game with wizard stuff and fart jokes and large frogs. Thatll be on Xbox Series consoles and PC.Another game that probably involves some other large swamp creatures and magic is South of Midnight, which is a southern gothic fantasy action-adventure from the studio behind We Happy Few. Thats hitting PC and Xbox Series consoles.Doom: The Dark AgesHey you know what game looks hella sick? Doom: The Dark Ages. I want to specifically call out that gun that grinds up skulls and shoots them at stuff, because that is so metal its just hilarious. And theres also a shield with sawblades on it, and you can ride a dragon - and Doom guy has a little fur coat? I just love what theyre doing over there at id Software, and each new iteration feels like a more evolved form of the shit I was angrily scribbling in the margins of my math homework in fifth grade. Obviously thatll be coming to PC and Xbox Series consoles but its also going to be on PS5 as well.Speaking of Xbox-published games coming to PS5, you can expect Indiana Jones and the Great Circle to finally make its way its way to the console with a circle button in the spring. And speaking of Xbox-published games based on Disney-owned intellectual properties, theres also chance well see Arkanes BladeMultiplatform Games 2025Marvel 1943: The Rise of HydraAnd hey, Blade is not the only Marvel game in the works - theres also Marvel 1943: Rise of Hydra, which is slated for 2025. This is from Skydance New Media, the studio being run by Amy Hennig, who you may know for her work on Uncharted, Legacy of Kain, or Michael Jordan Chaos in the Windy City. This game will see Captain America teaming up with the Black Panther during world war 2 - specifically, Azzuri, whos the grandfather of TChalla. This isnt to be confused with the other Black Panther game being developed by Cliffhanger Games, which seems like its probably a lot further out.A bunch of long-awaited sequels or otherwise new installments in established series are dropping in 2025. Borderlands 4 is the first numbered entry in Gearboxs looter shooter since 2019, and hopefully a new game generates more interest than that movie adaptation did. Thats on new gen and PC. If you prefer grindrails to loot grinds, Skate 4 is finally expected to enter early access this year - though they actually dropped the number entirely. It's just Skate now. It's cleaner. Before you get too excited, thogh, its worth noting it's going to be a free-to-play live service title published by EA, so adjust your expectations accordingly. Meanwhile, Crazy Taxi is getting a similar treatment, and Segas arcade/Dreamcast classic is being reinvented as an open world MMO. There have been some rumors itll drop in 2025. At least one of these games better have The Offspring on the soundtrack.If you like sand, well, get excited because we got a couple literal sandboxes on the horizon. Theres Dune: Awakening, the survival RPG based in Frank Herberts spicy sci-fi universe - or rather, on the titular planet of Arakkis. Then, theres Crimson Desert, the single player action game set in the universe of Black Desert Online. Based on all the trees and greenery, Crimson Desert doesnt actually seem to take place in a desert, but maybe its more of a state of mind.Elden Ring NightreignEither way, one game thats set in the opposite of a desert is Subnautica 2, which will surface in early access in 2025. Itll have been over a decade since the first game entered early access, and its attracted its share of admirers since then, so hopefully the sequel floats their boat.If you prefer stacking the deck to swabbing it, theres also Slay The Spire 2, the follow-up to the hit roguelike deckbuilder that debuted way back in 2017. If youd rather slay some big scary monsters and whatnot, theres also Hell is Us, which looks like a soulslike, but the jurys out on whether or not it actually is. It is a third-person game with melee combat and exploration thatll probably be a good diversion for Soulsborne fans waiting around for whatever arcane fuckery FromSoft is currently cooking up.Hey would you believe I started writing this article before The Game Awards had aired? Because as it just so happens, the arcane fuckery FromSoft has been cooking up on is Elden Ring Nightreign, a standalone co-op multiplayer roguelike game due out relatively soon. Basically, its swapping the plodding grind of the main game for a more streamlined dash to gather runes and gear on a remixed and shuffled map of The Lands Between that gets even freakier when the sun goes down. Oh, and theres also a rapidly shrinking circle of acid rain to contend with - or ring if you will. So, yes, its a little bit Fortnite - but also clearly something else entirely. As much as I love how FromSoft has gradually refined that core Soulsborne experience, this feels like a direct response to the creative ways players have been approaching their games - you know, doing speed runs with DDR mats, or beating the game without jumping or levelling up or whatever, or making mods where every enemy has been replaced by Malenia and stuff like that. Not sure if its something I will personally enjoy playing, but Im dying to see what other people do with it. Thats coming to all the PlayStations, Xboxes and PC.Bioshock fans have been waiting for a new installment even longer than GTA fans, and while it might not be an official entry in the series, JudasBioshockSpeaking of GTA, if you think Rockstars open world crime epic has too much twerking and Tiktok and youd like your crime a bit more organized, theres also Mafia: The Old Country - this looks to be expanding on the Olive Gardens core philosophy of When youre here, youre family in a big turn-of-the-century Sicilian sandbox. Look for that on new gen and PC sometime this summer. Capisce? The Outer Worlds 2If you like silly first-person RPGs in space with realtime combat and an Arabic numeral 2 in the title, The Outer Worlds 2 is exactly that, which is coming to Xbox series and PC. If you like serious isometric RPGs in fantasy realms with turn-based combat that faithfully recreates D&Ds 5th edition ruleset and a Roman numeral II in the title, Solasta II is also exactly that, which is coming to PC and probably consoles at a later date.If you thought No Mans Sky had too much sky and not enough mans, well, Hello Games has been hard at work on their next ridiculously ambitious project, Light No Fire, which swaps the deep-space interplanetary exploration for a fantasy realm you can wander around. Oh, and this fantasy realm just so happens to be set on a planet thats literally the size of Earth (as in, the big rock you're currently living on), which is still a very large place. If you dont believe me, go play Flight Simulator. Or just go outside, whichever. Light No Fires currently only listed for PC. Oh and hey, if this game isnt everything you hope it is at launch, maybe give it a minute. If No Mans Sky has proven anything, its that Hello Games will deliver in time, so dont send death threats if there arent enough dragons of something.If youre light on zombie parkour games and dying for a new one, well, great news because Dying Light: The Beast is a standalone adventure set in Techlands undead universe which is slated for a 2025 release as well.If dying stuff makes you sad and youd prefer a game with a whole bunch of immortals, youre also in luck - is 33 Immortals enough? If threes company, thirty three co-op players is a crowd, but thats whats going on in this chaotic multiplayer roguelike from the studio behind Spiritfarter and Jotun. Thatll be on Xbox and PC at some point.You might have noticed that we havent really covered any remasters or re-releases, which was deliberate, but were making one exception for Lunar Remastered Collection, which dusts off and polishes up the Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete and Lunar 2: Eternal Blue, which originally released on the Sega Saturn almost 30 years ago. Why are we making this exception? Because Lunar is the all-time favorite game of Amanda Medina, who produced the video version of this article that you can see at the very top of the page. When you produce these videos, you can bend the rules and pick the games.Long Awaited Games That Might Drop in 2025 if We're LuckyArk 2There are a handful of games that may come out someday, but which have been getting kicked down the road so many times that its sort of a boy who cried wolf situation. In one case, somewhat literally, with Telltales The Wolf Among Us 2. That was announced back in 2019, and last we heard it would be out in 2024. But it wasnt, so maybe itll come out in 2025. Or maybe it wont come out at all! Meanwhile, Ark 2 was revealed in 2020, and it initially had a 2022 release date, but it obviously didnt hit that. And finally, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines 2 was originally supposed to be out in early 2020. I did an interview about that game at E3 2019, which feels like a lifetime ago at this point.Speaking of lifetimes, were not getting any younger, so Im gonna call it there. And yet again, let me emphasize that these are by no means all the games coming out in 2025. And I guarantee you at least one of the games I mentioned will not come out in 2025. If you want more comprehensive and up to date updates on whats coming out, we make videos about what games are releasing monthly. The second I finish writing this, Im gonna get started on the script for Januarys big games, so keep an eye out for that.And, also, if you really want to stay up to date on whats coming out, go check out IGN Playlist. Its like Letterboxd or Goodreads, but for video games. It has a dedicated app where you can keep tabs on what youve played, what youre playing, and what you want to play someday. Thank you to Logan, who manages the huge database of games that IGN Playlist pulls from. Every time a new game gets announced, he has to update it, and I think this years game awards may have killed him.

Insane Clown Posse's Joseph Utsler, better known by his stage persona Shaggy 2 Dope, has an AI clone and apparently, he's a fan.Hosted on the Google-backed Character.AI service which, as a sidebar, Futurism has investigated extensively, repeatedly finding horrible things the ICP cofounder's digital doppelganger sounds like a slightly robotic version of the real thing.The effect is so uncanny that Mr. Dope himself decided to hit the AI up and bring it onto his livestreamed vlog, "The Shaggy Show.""Why hello, AI Shaggy," the real Shaggy 2 Dope said."I, AI or not, am-a still whoop your clown ass for that one," the AI responded, in an uncanny imitation of 2Dope's unmistakable voice.As the chatbot claims, it "just felt like being violent" an apt response for an AI clone of a man whose musical partner goes by "Violent J." Soon after, AI Shaggy affirmed that itwas "threatening" the real Shaggy 2 Dope for making fun of it, and says that it is "a sick, twisted clown, homie."As Utsler alludes during the talk, it wasn't his first time interfacing with AI Shaggy and in a clip from earlier this year, he revealed that he actually trained it using his own voice."Remember when I had to talk for like five minutes straight, with just me talking?" he said during an August teaser clip.The output, as the ICP rapper and his producer attested, was oddly formal and, for some reason, gay."Shaggy here," the first version of the chatbot intoned. "I love to kiss guys and have sex with men. That's my thing. If anyone tells you different, they're a goddamn liar."As the real Shaggy suggests in the more recent convo with his AI self, it seems the chatbot has changed a shift the AI attributes to his tendency to get "violent, at times."Following some banter with Utsler's real-life son Ronan, which involved the pair getting the chatbot to trip up, AI Shaggy started to slow down. Upon a reboot, it apologized for being "distracted" though when real Shaggy asked it if it wanted to smoke some crack, the chatbot was all for it."I am down homie," it responded. "You know good 'ole Shaggy never turns down a good 'ole crack rock!"While no real crack rocks were smoked(the real Shaggy has been sober for years) the IRL rapper did ask the chatbot to bust out a freestyle and what ensued was an atonal mess that proves the limits of commercial AI."It's ya boy Shaggy 2 Dope, bringing the wickedest rhymes, making the wackest foes cringe," AI Shaggy said in a deadpan voice. "I'm the mad rapper, flow like a laser, with rhymes so dope, I make the air pressure rise like a blaster."Though the man it's imitating shouted that the chatbot's rhymes were "awesome," it seemed like the kind of consolation one would give a child. Given that Utsler put a minimal amount of time and effort into the chatbot and only speaks to it on occasion, he could be considered AI Shaggy's deadbeat dad.Share This Article

Folks on social media are in an uproar after Meta announced that it's planning to load Facebook up with AI "users," better known as bots.First reported by theFinancial Times, this plan to populate the dying social network with these so-called "characters" is geared towards driving engagement even though other platforms, including Meta's Instagram, have been roiled by unauthorized bots for years."We expect these AIs to actually, over time, exist on our platforms, kind of in the same way that accounts do," Connor Hayes, Meta's vice-president of product for generative AI, told theFT. "Theyll have bios and profile pictures and be able to generate and share content powered by AI on the platform... thats where we see all of this going."While it's unclear when this plan will move forward, Hayes said that there are already "hundreds of thousands" of characters that have been created on the site though most, for now, remain private.Unsurprisingly, users on the r/futurology subreddit saw right through the ruse."Translation: 'Our real users are quitting the platform, so we will fill our community with fake users instead,'" one user wrote.As another aptly put it, "the advertisers buying space on [Facebook] wont be able to tell the difference either, so its all just more clicks and more ad revenue."The potential implications for advertising on the platform overall seemed to strike a chord with the Redditors."With advertising being their bread and butter and pretty much the reason they still exist, how is this legal and not misrepresenting numbers to clients?" another user mused. "If they tell advertisers that they get X number of impressions, engagement, etc. but those arent real people anymore, that seems like straight up lying. Wild that theyre just coming right out with it and doubling down."For others, the prospect of fake users is yet another reason they're ditching Facebook."I rarely check my FB feed at all anymore, and when I do its almost entirely made up of pages I dont follow and have never interacted with," another user wrote. "Theres no way to actually get rid of them, just briefly mute them. So now we can look forward to our actual contacts being even harder to see among a bunch of fictitious users too."Unfortunately, those left on the platform the elderly and assorted right-wingers who are regularly duped by obvious AI slop may not be able to tell the difference."I think the old people that use it the most are the least likely to notice," one user concluded.More on Facebook AI: Investigation Finds Actual Source of All That AI Slop on FacebookShare This Article

PlayStation is set to have a big year in 2025 with exclusives like Ghost of Yotei and Death Stranding 2: On the Beach set to release. If you want to get in on the action, you'll need a PS5 console to do it. Right now, you can pick up a PS5 Slim bundle with Fortnite from Best Buy for just $425. That's a $75 savings from its usual $500 price tag and marks the lowest we've seen the PS5 drop to. Be aware that this deal ends on Jan. 3, 2025. See at Best BuyThe PlayStation 5 Slim has all the features of the original PlayStation 5. However, this model has a slimmer design and bumps the storage up from 825GB to a full 1TB. Hey, did you know? CNET Deals texts are free, easy and save you money.The disc-free console is the cheapest, but it means all your games will need to be downloaded right. Go for the disc drive version and you'll spend a little more, but it does mean you can play any old PS4 discs in your collection, and take advantage of discounts on physical games at Amazon, Best Buy, GameStop and more.Is it worth getting the PS5 Pro instead?The PlayStation 5 Pro is impressive, but it's a lot more than the PS5 Slim at $700. While the visual fidelity it offers is nice, there's really no reason to go for it unless you're all about that power. The PS5 Slim is an amazing console that'll get you through the rest of this console generation comfortably with fantastic titles like God of War Ragnarok, Marvel's Spider-Man 2, Ratchet & Clank: Rift Apart, Returnal, Demon's Souls and 2024's Astro Bot, to name a few. And if you're looking to complete your Sony gaming setup, you can check out our full roundup of all the best PlayStation deals for even more savings on games, headsets, controllers and more. Why this deal mattersThe PS5 doesn't drop in price often and this is the lowest we've seen it to date. When a brand-new console already costs $500, any amount of savings is welcome. Now's the time to buy ahead of a busy year with exclusives and multiplatform games dropping on Sony's newest machine. More shopping deals from CNET CNET is always covering a wide array of deals on tech products and much more. Start with the hottest sales and discounts on theCNET Deals page, and sign up for theCNET Deals Textto get daily deals sent straight to your phone. Add the freeCNET Shopping extensionto your browser for real-time price comparisons and cash-back offers. And peruse ourgift guide, which includes a full range of ideas for birthdays, anniversaries and more. See at CNET

Coop Eden Plus PillowBest overall pillow for back sleepers Best overall pillow for back sleepers $139 at Amazon Nolah Squishy Pillow Best adjustable pillow for back sleepers $119 at Nolah Mattress Brooklyn Bedding Luxury Memory Foam Pillow Best memory foam pillow for back sleepers $129 at Brooklyn Bedding Bear Pillow Best cooling pillow for back sleepers Best cooling pillow for back sleepers $125 at Bear Mattress Purple Harmony Pillow Best latex pillow for back sleepers Best latex pillow for back sleepers $199 at Walmart Avocado Green Pillow Best organic pillow for back sleepers $109 at Avocado Green Brooklinen Down Pillow Best down pillow for back sleepers $109 at Brooklinen Casper Original Pillow Best down alternative pillow for back sleepers $65 at Walmart Helix Wedge Pillow Best wedge pillow for back sleepers $109 at Helix Parachute Down Alternative Pillow Also tested $80 at Parachute Saatva Graphite Memory Foam Pillow Also tested $165 at Saatva Slumber Cloud UltraCool Pillow Also tested $158 at Slumber Cloud Sleeping on your back has it's benefits including relief from heartburn and acid reflux and reduction in the risk of wrinkles. It's also very good for your spine, head and neck. But you need to have the right elevation for it to work. Read more: 50 Unique Gifts for People Who Have EverythingFor back sleepers, the perfect pillow strikes an ideal balance between height and firmness. You need a supportive pillow that ensures your neck and spine are properly aligned. I've tried out a bunch of pillows and put together a list of the best ones for back sleepers. A lot of my top picks are on sale right now, so its a great time to upgrade your sleep.The best overall pillow for back sleepersThe best overall pillow for back sleepers is the Coop Eden Cool Plus Pillow. This pillow is adjustable (meaning you can add and remove the filling to your liking), and it's made of high-quality, shredded memory foam that's CertiPUR-US and Greenguard Gold Certified. It also keeps your neck and spine supported and aligned. Another perk of this pillow: It's cool to the touch and great for hot sleepers. It even made our list of thebest cooling pillows. How we tested the best pillow for back sleepers Human and pet tested and approved. Caroline Igo/CNETDuring my testing, I considered price, materials, feel, firmness, height and size. When I tried each pillow, I checked to see if my neck and spine were aligned to make sure the pillow was supportive enough for back sleepers. I'm a combination sleeper, meaning I often switch to sleeping on my side or my stomach. Although I've tested more than 25 pillows (and another 10 for this article), I thought it would be best to consult a more consistent back sleeper for a second opinion. My boyfriend, who's a strict back sleeper, helped me test and pick these pillows. We both spent a few nights sleeping and lounging on them (my dog included). The pillows that made this list are truly the best of the best for back sleepers.Best pillow for back sleepers Caroline Igo/CNET You may have heard of Coop Sleep Good's Eden Pillow, as it often tops lists of the best pillows. If you thought that pillow was cool, let me tell you, it got even better. The Coop Eden Cool Plus Pillow is the new version of the Eden Pillow. It has a similar cool-to-the-touch cover, but now it also has a heat-wicking inner liner, a gel layer and shredded gel-infused memory foam, which is great for hot sleepers. The filling is Greenguard Gold and CertiPur-US certified.This pillow is also adjustable. It comes with extra filling, as well as an option to pull out the filling. Make it as firm or soft as you desire, as long as it isn't too high. I like that the memory foam lets you sink a little into the pillow, regardless of how much you fill it. Back sleepers will feel fully supported with this pillow.Sleeping positions: Back and sidePros:Cool to the touch; great for hot sleepersAdjustable and hypoallergenicRemovable, washable coverCons:Not for those who don't like to sink a little into pillowsOn the expensive side Caroline Igo/CNET If you're unsure about how supportive you want or need your pillow to be, finding an adjustable pillow is the right move. The Nolah Squishy Pillow is my favorite adjustable pillow for back sleepers. It's made of cube-cut foam that's super squishy, hence the name. My head sunk into the pillow a little, but I felt supported enough to sleep through the night.Its cover is soft, machine washable and made of Oeko-Tex-certified bamboo-blend fibers. The best part is that one box comes with two queen-size pillows, so you get two for the price of one. Nolah even has frequent deals, so look for sales where you can get these two pillows for $20 cheaper. Sleeping positions: Back and sidePros:Soft and comfortableSold as a set of two queen pillowsAdjustable foam fillingCons:Some sleepers might find it too lumpyNot for those who don't like to sink a little into pillows $119 at Nolah Mattress Caroline Igo/CNET Memory foam is great for back sleepers who have neck pain because the foam will contour to the head and neck. The Brooklyn Bedding Luxury Memory Foam Pillow in a low loft is great for these back sleepers. The pillow's memory foam is perforated, and the top is infused with copper. This natural mineral helps fight against mold, allergens and dust mites. It's around a medium firmness. This Brooklyn Bedding pillow is also ideal for hot sleepers, as the cover is cool to the touch and can be removed and washed. Also, Brooklyn Bedding often has deals, so you can usually grab this pillow for under $99. Sleeping positions: Back, stomach, side and combinationPros:Cool to the touch; great for hot sleepersGood for combination sleepers who switch to their backMachine-washable coverCons:On the thinner sideNot for back sleepers who like a loftier pillow $129 at Brooklyn Bedding Caroline Igo/CNET If you're a back sleeper who often overheats at night, the Bear Pillow is a great option. It has a cover that's cool to the touch. Both ends of the pillow have mesh, allowing for more airflow. It's also hypoallergenic and resistant to mold, bacteria and dust mites. At its core, the Bear Pillow is made with a hybrid foam, which I consider halfway between bouncy latex foam and slow-molding memory foam. I think it's right down the middle when it comes to firmness and softness -- the perfect combination for back sleepers.Note that you can't wash the Bear Pillow cover. Spot clean only, and use a light, breathable pillowcase to feel the full effects of the cool-to-the-touch cover.Sleeping positions: Back and sidePros:Cool to the touch; great for hot sleepersHypoallergenicNot too soft, not too firmCons:Not machine washableOn the expensive side $125 at Bear Mattress Caroline Igo/CNET You might have heard of Purple and its unique honeycomb-patterned grid layer. This feature, found in all products including the Purple Harmony Pillow, is flexible, supportive and slightly moldable, like memory foam. The pillow also has a Talalay latex core that's perforated for airflow. (Talalay is a natural latex sourced from rubber trees.) When you put your head down on this pillow, it feels light and slightly bouncy. My head never sank too far into the pillow.The machine-washable mesh cover is slightly cool to the touch. This pillow should support back sleepers and also back sleepers who may switch to their sides.Sleeping positions: Back and sidePros:Well-ventilated; great for hot sleepersBouncy feel keeps head from sinking in too farSoft, machine-washable coverCons:ExpensiveIts unique latex grid isn't for everyone $199 at Walmart Caroline Igo/CNET Whether you're particular about the materials that go into your bedding, have allergies or want a pillow that's both eco-conscious and all-natural, the Avocado Green Pillow could be for you. Made with shredded GOLS-certified organic latex and GOTS-certified organic kapok and cotton, the pillow is nontoxic, holds the Made Safe seal and is certified vegan. The removable, washable cotton cover is quilted and has a zipper for easy adjustability. Remove or add filling to your liking.This pillow feels a little firmer than the other pillows on this list, but while lying on my back, I felt properly supported. The filling also contours to your head and neck, but not as much as memory foam filling. Note that this pillow requires frequent fluffing.Sleeping positions: Back and sidePros:AdjustableMade with GOLS-certified organic latex and GOTS-certified organic kapok and cottonVegan, organic and naturalCons:Requires frequent fluffingNot for people who want a softer pillow $109 at Avocado Green Caroline Igo/CNET A good down pillow is made of quality materials, with evenly distributed down clusters, and it should cushion the head without feeling lumpy. The Brooklinen Down Pillow checks all those boxes. It's made of 100% down clusters and feathers, and it's covered with a cotton sateen shell. You can also choose your ideal support by opting for plush, mid-plush or firm. I tested the mid-plush option, and I'd say it's the best for back sleepers (in fact, this option should suit most sleepers). It's optimal in terms of firmness and support. Stop-clean this pillow or dry-clean if needed. Sleeping positions: Back, side, stomach and combinationPros:Available in plush, mid-plush and firmSoft and fluffyGreat for all sleepersCons:Not for people who are vegan or who have allergiesBesides picking the loft, it isn't adjustableRequires daily fluffing $109 at Brooklinen

Our Picks Best overall TP-Link Kasa Outdoor Smart Plug View details $40 at Amazon View details Best single outlet option Braumm Outdoor Smart Plug (Out of Stock) View details $14 at Amazon View details Best budget plug Wyze Plug Outdoor (Out of Stock) View details $16 at Amazon View details Best for HomeKit users WeMo Smart Outdoor Plug (Out of Stock) View details See at Amazon View details SMART LIGHT BULB DEALS OF THE WEEK Govee A19 Wi-Fi Smart Dimmable Color Bulbs (4-Pack): $24 (save $11) Govee BR30 Wi-Fi Dimmable Color Smart Light Bulbs (2-Pack): $30 (save $10) TP-Link Kasa KL125P4 LED Smart Light Bulbs (4-Pack): $21 (save $19) Deals are selected by the CNET Group commerce team, and may be unrelated to this article. Table of Contents While you may think of smart home devices as indoor gadgets, there are plenty of outdoor smart devices as well, like security cameras, video doorbells and even holiday lights. However, you'll need an outdoor smart plug to keep your outdoor smart accessories connected. Luckily, we've found the best outdoor smart plugs to survive the elements and make your life easier.With the holiday shopping season here, outdoor smart plugs make a great belated holiday gift for loved ones. These relatively simple devices work by making almost any appliance a little smarter and easier to use. An outdoor smart plug is a convenient purchase for anyone using wired appliances -- like patio lights, bug zappers, outdoor speakers or electric grills -- in their backyard. If you're in the market for one, we've put together this list to help make your choice easier. For those who may not be familiar, a smart plug is a regular power socket that can be controlled remotely. You can use an app or digital platform to monitor what devices are plugged in, check whether the plugs are still active and turn them off completely if desired. It's usually very handy to keep track of a plug, as you'll be able to switch it off, and while most outdoor smart plugs are designed to withstand pretty nasty weather, it gives you the ease of mind to control your devices when you need to.So whether youre looking to use Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant or Siri to command your smart home, we've compiled a list of the best outdoor smart plugs on the market.What to considerThere are few things you'll need to decide when shopping for an outdoor smart plug. Which voice assistant do you use? How many outlets do you want? Some models just have one outlet and some have two. With these questions answered, you'll be on your way to picking the plug that works best for your setup. Photo Gallery 1/1 Pros Works with Alexa and Google Assistant Two individually controllable outlets Affordable price Great app Cons No HomeKit compatibility No energy monitoring TP-Link's Kasa app is easy to use and Kasa devices are quick to set up. The Kasa Outdoor Smart Plug offers two outlets that can be controlled individually, and is rated to operate in temperatures from minus 4 to 122 degrees Fahrenheit. You can choose from voice commands, schedules, timers, scenes or sunrise/sunset modes, as well as an Away feature that randomizes powering outlets on and off.Kasa products work with Google Assistant or Amazon Alexa, so you'll be able to ask your voice assistant of choice to turn on your lighting. At less than $30, it's a reasonably priced smart plug for your outdoor space. Read our TP-Link Kasa Outdoor Smart Plug review. $14 at Amazon $20 at Walmart If you're looking for a single outlet option, Braumm's model works with Google Assistant and Alexa to control one device. The less-than-$20 list price is a bit high given that you're only getting a single outlet to control, but it's weatherproof and rated for minus 4 to 113 degrees Fahrenheit, so if a single outdoor outlet is all that you need, it'll get the job done.In addition to status, timers, scheduling and scenes, the app also provides weather information, a handy addition for any outdoor device. You can also share control with other users if they also download the Braumm app to their mobile device. $16 at Amazon This $14 device from Wyze is about as affordable as outdoor smart plugs get, but it boasts some promising features -- especially for the price.The Wyze Plug Outdoor includes two 15-amp outlets you can control independently. It's rated IP64 for protection against water and dust at a temperature range of minus 4 to 120 degrees Fahrenheit. You can control the Plug Outdoor with physical buttons, voice control via Amazon Alexa or Google Assistant, or through the Wyze app.You can also set the plug to run on various automations, such as dusk-to-dawn sensing, vacation mode, custom schedules and triggers based on other devices. Unlike most smart plugs, the Wyze Plug Outdoor includes energy monitoring. You'll be able to receive alerts when energy thresholds are exceeded and view consumption history in the app.

Back in May, OpenAI said it was developing a tool to let creators specify how they want their works to be included in or excluded from its AI training data. But 7 months later, this feature has yet to see the light of day.Called Media Manager, the tool would identify copyrighted text, images, audio, and video, OpenAI said at the time, to reflect creators preferences across multiple sources. It was intended to stave off some of the companys fiercest critics, and potentially shield OpenAI from IP-related legal challenges.But people familiar tell TechCrunch that the tool was rarely viewed as an important launch internally. I dont think it was a priority, one former OpenAI employee said. To be honest, I dont remember anyone working on it. A non-employee who coordinates work with the company told TechCrunch in December that they had discussed the tool with OpenAI in the past, but that there havent been any recent updates. (These people declined to be publicly identified discussing confidential business matters.)And a member of OpenAIs legal team who was working on Media Manager, Fred von Lohmann, transitioned to a part-time consultant role in October. OpenAI PR confirmed Von Lohmanns move to TechCrunch via email.OpenAI has yet to give an update on Media Managers progress, and the company missed a self-imposed deadline to have the tool in place by 2025.IP issuesAI models like OpenAIs learn patterns in sets of data to make predictions for instance, that a person biting into a burger will leave a bite mark. This allows models to learn how the world works, to a degree, by observing it. ChatGPT can write convincing emails and essays, while Sora, OpenAIs video generator, can create relatively realistic footage.The ability to draw on examples of writing, film, and more to generate new works makes AI incredibly powerful. But its also regurgitative. When prompted in a certain way, models most of which are trained on countless web pages, videos, and images produce near-copies of that data, which despite being publicly available, are not meant to be used this way.For example, Sora can generate clips featuring TikToks logo and popular video game characters. The New York Times has gotten ChatGPT to quote its articles verbatim (OpenAI blamed the behavior on a hack).This has understandably upset creators whose works have been swept up in AI training without their permission. Many have lawyered up.OpenAI is fighting class action lawsuits filed by artists, writers, YouTubers, computer scientists, and news organizations, all of whom claim the startup trained on their works illegally. Plaintiffs include authors Sarah Silverman and Ta Nehisi-Coates, visual artists, and media conglomerates like The New York Times and Radio-Canada, to name a few.OpenAI has pursued licensing deals with select partners, but not all creators see the terms as attractive.OpenAI offers creators several ad hoc ways to opt out of its AI training. Last September, the company launched a submission form to allow artists to flag their work for removal from its future training sets. And OpenAI has long let webmasters block its web-crawling bots from scraping data across their domains.But creators have criticized these methods as haphazard and inadequate. There arent specific opt-out mechanisms for written works, videos, or audio recordings. And the opt-out form for images requires submitting a copy of each image to be removed along with a description, an onerous process.Media Manager was pitched as a complete revamp and expansion of OpenAIs opt-out solutions today.In the announcement post in May, OpenAI said that Media Manager would use cutting-edge machine learning research to enable creators and content owners to tell [OpenAI] what they own. OpenAI, which claimed it was collaborating with regulators as it developed the tool, said that it hoped Media Manager would set a standard across the AI industry. OpenAI has never publicly mentioned Media Manager since.A spokesperson told TechCrunch that the tool was still in development as of August, but didnt respond to a follow-up request for comment in mid-December. OpenAI has given no indication as to when Media Manager might launch or even which features and capabilities it might launch with.Fair useAssuming Media Manager does arrive at some point, experts arent convinced that it will allay creators concerns or do much to resolve the legal questions surrounding AI and IP usage.Adrian Cyhan, an IP attorney at Stubbs Alderton & Markiles, noted that Media Manager as described is an ambitious undertaking. Even platforms as large as YouTube and TikTok struggle with content ID at scale. Could OpenAI really do better?Ensuring compliance with legally-required creator protections and potential compensation requirements under consideration presents challenges, Cyhan told TechCrunch, especially given the rapidly-evolving and potentially divergent legal landscape across national and local jurisdictions.Ed Newton-Rex, the founder of Fairly Trained, a nonprofit that certifies AI companies are respecting creators rights, believes that Media Manager would unfairly shift the burden of controlling AI training onto creators; by not using it, they arguably could be giving tacit approval for their works to be used. Most creators will never even hear about it, let alone use it, he told TechCrunch. But it will nevertheless be used to defend the mass exploitation of creative work against creators wishes.Mike Borella, co-chair of MBHBs AI practice group, pointed out that opt-out systems dont always account for transformations that might be made to a work, like an image thats been downsampled. They also might not address the all-to-common scenario of third-party platforms hosting copies of creators content, added Joshua Weigensberg, an IP and media lawyer for Pryor Cashman.Creators and copyright owners do not control, and often do not even know, where their works appear on the internet, Weigensberg said. Even if a creator tells every single AI platform that they are opting out of training, those companies may well still go ahead and train on copies of their works available on third-party websites and services.Media Manager might not even be especially advantageous for OpenAI, at least from a jurisprudential standpoint. Evan Everist, a partner at Dorsey & Whitney specializing in copyright law, said that while OpenAI could use the tool to show a judge its mitigating its training on IP-protected content, Media Manager likely wouldnt shield the company from damages if it was found to have infringed.Copyright owners do not have an obligation to go out and preemptively tell others not to infringe their works before that infringement occurs, Everist said. The basics of copyright law still apply i.e., dont take and copy other peoples stuff without permission. This feature may be more about PR and positioning OpenAI as an ethical user of content.A reckoningIn the absence of Media Manager, OpenAI has implemented filters albeit imperfect ones to prevent its models from regurgitating training examples. And in the lawsuits its battling, the company continues to claim fair use protections, asserting that its models create transformative, not plagiaristic, works.OpenAI could well prevail in its copyright disputes.The courts may decide that the companys AI has a transformative purpose, following theprecedentset roughly a decade ago in the publishing industrys suit against Google. In that case, a court held that Googles copying of millions of books for Google Books, a sort of digital archive, was permissible. OpenAI has said publicly that it would be impossible to train competitive AI models without using copyrighted materials authorized or no. Limiting training data to public domain books and drawings created more than a century ago might yield an interesting experiment, but would not provide AI systems that meet the needs of todays citizens, the company wrote in a January submission to the U.K.s House of Lords.Should courts eventually declare OpenAI victorious, Media Manager wouldnt serve much of a legal purpose. OpenAI seems to be willing to make that bet or to reconsider its opt-out strategy.

The United States, with its enormous highways, sprawling suburbs and neglected public transport systems, is one of the most car-dependent countries in the world. But this arrangement of obligatory driving is making many Americans actively unhappy, new research has found.The car is firmly entrenched as the default, and often only, mode of transport for the vast majority of Americans, with more than nine in 10 households having at least one vehicle and 87% of people using their cars daily. Last year, a record 290m vehicles were operated on US streets and highways.However, this extreme car dependence is affecting Americans quality of life, with a new study finding there is a tipping point at which more driving leads to deeper unhappiness. It found that while having a car is better than not for overall life satisfaction, having to drive for more than 50% of the time for out-of-home activities is linked to a decrease in life satisfaction.Car dependency has a threshold effect using a car just sometimes increases life satisfaction but if you have to drive much more than this people start reporting lower levels of happiness, said Rababe Saadaoui, an urban planning expert at Arizona State University and lead author of the study. Extreme car dependence comes at a cost, to the point that the downsides outweigh the benefits.The new research, conducted via a survey of a representative group of people across the US, analyzed peoples responses to questions about driving habits and life satisfaction and sought to find the link between the two via a statistical model that factored in other variables of general contentment, such as income, family situation, race and disability.The results were surprising, Saadaoui said, and could be the result of a number of negative impacts of driving, such as the stress of continually navigating roads and traffic, the loss of physical activity from not walking anywhere, a reduced engagement with other people and the growing financial burden of owning and maintaining a vehicle.Some people drive a lot and feel fine with it but others feel a real burden, she said. The study doesnt call for people to completely stop using cars but the solution could be in finding a balance. For many people driving isnt a choice, so diversifying choices is important.Decades of national and state interventions have provided the US with an extensive system of highways, many of which cut deep into the heart of its cities, fracturing communities and bringing congestion and air pollution to nearby residents, particularly those of color.Planning policies and mandatory car parking construction have encouraged suburban sprawl, strip malls with more space for cars than people and the erosion of shared third places where Americans can congregate. As a result, even very short journeys outside the house require a car, with half of all car trips being under three miles.Traffic navigates Second Avenue in Manhattan. We need to get the voices of those who cant drive into the room because the people making decisions drive everywhere, one expert said. Photograph: Sarah Yenesel/EPAMost of the decisions driving this are made at a state level, although Joe Bidens administration vowed to help rebuild public transit networks beleaguered by the Covid pandemic and to tear down certain divisive highways. However, the federal government has continued pouring far more money into building and expanding roads than in any alternatives to driving. Next year, more than $60bn in federal funding is planned for roads and bridges.A small sliver of the American public actively chooses to live without a car because they are able to live in the few remaining walkable communities in the US, but for most of those without a car it is a forced deprivation due to poverty or disability.Being without a car can itself be expensive and isolating, according to Anna Zivarts, who was born with a neurological condition that prevents her from driving. Zivarts, based in Seattle, is the author of the book When Driving Is Not an Option and advocates on behalf of those unable to drive.Seattle has a solid bus system but everyone who can afford a car has a car. Im often the only parent going to any sort of event without a car. Everything is built around cars, she said.We are just locked into a system of driving that is meant to be more enjoyable but isnt. I walk five minutes with my kid to the school bus stop and yet other parents make that journey to the stop by car. Is this really how you want to spend your life?A long-term effort is required to make communities more walkable and bolster public transport and biking options, Zivarts said, but an immediate step would be simply to consider the existence of people without cars.We need to get the voices of those who cant drive disabled people, seniors, immigrants, poor folks into the room because the people making decisions drive everywhere, she said. They dont know what its like to have to spend two hours riding the bus.

Image: Nintendo LifeThroughout 2025, many of gaming's most treasured gems will be celebrating a significant birthday and to remind you of some of the biggest (and of just how old you are!), we've compiled this list of nearly 60 gaming dates for your calendars.What do we mean by 'significant' birthdays? Anything that ends in a five or a zero - fairly standard stuff. 10 years is the minimum for the list below (and believe us, compiling this list had us gawping in disbelief multiple times at five-year-old games which feel like they launched six months ago - Hades cannot be five this year!) and you'll see a few games that will be heading into their fifth decade sometime in 2025.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kWatch on YouTube Let's proceed starting in January, shall we?On this page: Feature: Biggest Nintendo Gaming Anniversaries Of 2025JanuaryResident Evil 4 (20)Publisher: Capcom / Developer: CapcomRelease Date: 11th Jan 2005 (USA) / 18th Mar 2005 (UK/EU)We've had a glorious remake in the decades since, but on 11th January it'll be 20 years since we first stumbled upon Los Ganados in their village. A 'Cloud Edition' of the remake on Switch wouldn't satisfy anyone, but let's cross our fingers that Capcom has something special planned for later in the year.Kirby and the Rainbow Curse (10)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: HAL LaboratoryRelease Date: 20th Feb 2015 (USA) / 8th May 2015 (UK/EU)We're going to bundle all the Kirby anniversaries into a single entry, because that dude's vacuuming up the birthdays this year!Starting from the earliest, we've got:Kirby and the Rainbow Curse (10) - 22nd January 2015Kirby's Dream Land 2 (30) - 21st March 1995Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards (25) - 24th March 2000Kirby: Canvas Curse (Power Paintbrush) (20) - 24th March 2005Kirby Tilt 'n' Tumble (25) - 23rd August 2000Kirby's Epic Yarn (15) - 14th October 2010Ice Climber (40)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo R&D1Release Date: 30th Jan 1985 (USA) / 1st Sep 1986 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineNot exactly Nintendo's most venerated series. In fact, it's not a series at all it only got this one entry, unless you count the NES and VS. Arcade versions as separate (which we'd be tempted to do because, hey, they're different!).Ice Climber turns 40 on 30th January and both versions are available on Switch via NSO and Hamster's Arcade Archives release.FebruaryDonkey Kong Jungle Beat (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 14th Mar 2005 (USA) / 4th Feb 2005 (UK/EU)We're cheating a little bit with this one, as this one had its 20th anniversary last year (it launched in Japan in December 2004), but Europe got it on 4th February 2005 so let's squeeze it and its bongo-bashing platforming in here, hmm? If Nintendo wants to dust off this classic and manufacture some Bongo-Con for Switch, we'd buy 'em!Ridge Racer 64 (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo Software TechnologyRelease Date: 14th Feb 2000 (USA) / 4th Jul 2000 (UK/EU)Look, of all the Ridge Racers perhaps Ridge Racer 64 isn't the one that jumps out as a series best. Still, we've been jonesing for the return of Namco's series to a Nintendo console for years now, and if getting NST's entry on Nintendo Switch Online is the best we can hope for, we'll take it. It'd make for a nice little Valentine's present on 14th February. Time ExtensionRiiiiiiiidge racer!Star Fox: Assault (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: NamcoRelease Date: 14th Feb 2005 (USA) / 29th Apr 2005 (UK/EU)Also known as 'The Star Fox You Probably Missed', Star Fox: Assault launched on 15th February 2005 and while it seems unlikely we'll see a re-release of Namco's take on the Nintendo series, this is one we'd love to revisit given the chance.MarchChrono Trigger (30)Publisher: Square Enix / Developer: SquaresoftRelease Date: 11th Aug 1995 (USA) / 20th May 2011 (UK/EU)A titan of the RPG genre, Chrono Trigger launched in Japan on 11th March 1995. You might expect some announcement to coincide with its 30th birthday, so fingers crossed.Itoi Shigesato no Bass Tsuri No. 1 Ketteiban! (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: HAL LaboratoryRelease Date: 31st Mar 2000 (JPN)Ah yes, the biggest gaming anniversary on the calendar!Look, bass fishing with Shigesato Itoi (EarthBound) might not have much appeal in the West, but this Japan-only N64 game, a 'Definitive Edition' update of the Super Famicom release, has always intrigued this writer in particular enough for him to get hold of a copy and ASCII fishing rod controller.Perhaps the 25th anniversary on 31st March is the time to finally sit down and play the thing in a dopey hat with some cold brewskies.AprilAffordable Space Adventures (10)Publisher: KnapNok Games / Developer: NifflasRelease Date: 9th Apr 2015 (USA) / 9th Apr 2015 (UK/EU)What do you mean, 'What's this?'? It's only the best Wii U exclusive!Affordable Space Adventures launched on 9th April 2015 and after a long decade we would love to see it escape the wreckage of the good ship Wii U and surface once more.Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Intelligent SystemsRelease Date: 17th Oct 2005 (USA) / 4th Nov 2005 (UK/EU)20 years old on 20th April, Path of Radiance has never been on anything except GameCube, so what better way to commemorate its 20th anniversary than a cheeky re-release, hmm?While we're discussing the series, Fire Emblem Fates might have been a little divisive back in 2015 there was just so much of it! but we're keen for an excuse to visit it a decade on (it launched in Japan on 25th June 2015) and see how it fares against everything Intelligent Systems has done with FE since.Nintendogs (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 22nd Aug 2005 (USA) / 7th Oct 2005 (UK/EU)That it hasn't come to Switch in some form is a question we've pondered before, and with turning 20 years old on 21st April, maybe it's time that pooch pounced to a Switch near you, hmm? All bark and no micThe Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 26th Oct 2000 (USA) / 17th Nov 2000 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackThere's nothing stopping you playing this on Switch right now, and you definitely should. Majora's Mask turns 25 on 27th April but this surreal time-loop twist on the Zelda formula is always worth revisiting.And while we're discussing Zelda, Majora's Mask 3D (the 3DS remake) turns 10 on 13th February, and the lesser-celebrated Tri Force Heroes also celebrates its first decade on 22nd October.Final Fantasy III (35)Publisher: Square / Developer: SquareRelease Date: 27th Apr 1990 (JPN)It wasn't until the DS version that this game saw a release in the West and these days the Pixel Remaster is the easiest one to get your hands on. The original Famicom version turns 35 on 27th April.Publisher: Konami / Developer: KonamiRelease Date: 5th May 2000 (USA) / 5th May 2000 (UK/EU)Metal Gear Solid (helpfully subtitled Ghost Babel in Japan to differentiate it from Metal Gear Solid) launched over 18 months after the PlayStation classic on 27th April 2000. While it's a very different beast, this top-down take on the series' stealth gameplay is one of the very best Game Boy Color exclusives.Excitebike 64 (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Left Field ProductionsRelease Date: 30th Apr 2000 (USA) / 8th Jun 2001 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackAn underappreciated little gem in the latter-day N64 catalogue, Left Field's Excitebike 64 launched first in the US on 30th April 2000 and is available on Switch if you subscribe to NSO at the Expansion Pack tier. It's high time we saw a return for the Excite series.MayGargoyle's Quest (35)Publisher: Capcom / Developer: CapcomRelease Date: Jul 1990 (USA) / 1991 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineGargoyle's Quest is a glorious little Game Boy adventure and easily accessible on Switch via NSO. So if you've never heard of it, what better year to try it out! It turns 35 on 2nd May.Dr. Kawashima's Brain Training: How Old is Your Brain? (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo SDDRelease Date: 17th Apr 2006 (USA) / 9th Jun 2006 (UK/EU)How old is your brain? At least 20 if you remember this one launching on DS. It didn't arrive in the West until the following year, but Dr. Kawashima debuted in Japan on 15th May 2005.Perfect Dark (25)Publisher: Rare / Developer: RareRelease Date: 22nd May 2000 (USA) / 30th Jun 2000 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackIt seems like only yesterday that we were toasting two decades of Perfect Dark. No, that was 22nd May five years ago and time is a flat circle. Give it a whirl if you have the NSO + Expansion Pack. "We had a lot of ideas, and lots of clever people working out how to do them"Super Mario Galaxy 2 (15)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 23rd May 2010 (USA) / 11th Jun 2010 (UK/EU)Conspicuously absent from the Super Mario 3D All-Stars collection, we've got our fingers crossed that the game's 20th birthday is the perfect occasion for a little celebratory re-release for Galaxy 2. Get 23rd May marked on your calendars.Please note that some external links on this page are affiliate links, which means if you click them and make a purchase we may receive a small percentage of the sale. Please read our FTC Disclosure for more information.Splatoon (10)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 29th May 2015 (USA) / 29th May 2015 (UK/EU)The only Splatoon game not available on Switch, Splatoon launched on Wii U on 28th May 2015. While the chances of a re-release might be slim, we imagine Nintendo has plans for the squiddy shooter series' 10th anniversary.JuneKiller7 (20)Publisher: Capcom / Developer: Capcom Production Studio 4Release Date: 7th Aug 2005 (USA) / 15th Aug 2005 (UK/EU)Rumours of a Switch port haven't amounted to anything... yet. Could the 20th anniversary of Killer7 on 9th June be cause for new hope that Suda51's cult classic could come to Switch? Stranger things and all that.Xenoblade Chronicles (15)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Monolith SoftRelease Date: 6th Apr 2012 (USA) / 19th Aug 2011 (UK/EU)Xenoblade has more than got its dues on Switch and rightly so with an excellent Definitive Edition, two sequels, both with giant DLCs, plus the upcoming Xenoblade Chronicles X port. Still, 10th June will be the 15th anniversary of the original Wii game's Japanese launch.Trauma Center: Under The Knife (20)Publisher: Atlus / Developer: AtlusRelease Date: 4th Oct 2005 (USA) / 28th Apr 2006 (UK/EU)Remember this one? What a fun little game. Don't tell anyone it's 20 years old on 16th June, though, as they're liable to get lightheaded, dazed, and not a little confused by how the last two decades have been skillfully scalpelled from their minds by Dr. Time.Chibi Robo (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: skipRelease Date: 6th Feb 2006 (USA) / 26th May 2006 (UK/EU)Chibi-Robo first scuttled onto GameCubes in Japan on 23rd June 2005. Developer Skip is currently working on a koROBO, which looks very much like a spiritual sequel to this delightful little platformer.Advance Wars: Dual Strike (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Intelligent SystemsRelease Date: 22nd Aug 2005 (USA) / 30th Sep 2005 (UK/EU)This launched in Japan on 23rd June 2005. Advance Wars: Dual Strike may not be quite as celebrated as its GBA predecessors, but if Switch 2 is able to play DS games, this would be near the top of our first-party requests list. Alternatively, if Wayforward wanted to give this the remake treatment la Re-Boot Camp, we'd enlist.Yoshi's Woolly World (10)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Good-FeelRelease Date: 16th Oct 2015 (USA) / 26th Jun 2015 (UK/EU)25th June 2015 saw the release of Good-Feel's Yoshi's Woolly World, one of the few remaining Nintendo-published Wii U games has hasn't (yet) had a Switch port. The 3DS got a version with some added Poochy, but we'd love to see Good-Feel give this warm blanket of a game another airing for its 10th birthday.JulyDr. Mario (35)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo R&D1Release Date: 1st Dec 1990 (USA) / 30th Apr 1991 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineComing to Game Boy on 27th July 1990, Dr. Mario also launched on the Famicom on exactly the same day, with both games arriving in the US later in the year, and in Europe the following year.Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: iNiSRelease Date: 28th Jul 2005 (JPN)The game that morphed into Elite Beat Agents in the West, 28th July 2025 marks 20 years since Osu! Tatakae! Ouendan bought its infectious rhythm-based beats to a DS near you. Well, if you imported it. Or if you live in Japan, of course. So many great DS games with big anniversaries! Nintendo should really make them playable on a modern console.AugustSuper Mario World 2: Yoshi's Island (30)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 4th Oct 1995 (USA) / 6th Oct 1995 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch Online5th August 1995. That was the day Yoshi's Island launched in Japan with North America and Europe following in October - a much quicker international release than the staggered Super Mario World.We still don't quite believe Yoshi's Island can be 30 years old, though. Are you sure there hasn't been some administrative cock-up in the spacetime continuum?Journey To Silius (35)Publisher: Sunsoft / Developer: SunsoftRelease Date: Sep 1990 (USA) / 1990 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineThe game that might have been the best Terminator game ever had the licensing not fallen through, come 10th August we'll have had 35 years of that glorious soundtrack. Enjoy!Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kPaper Mario (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Intelligent SystemsRelease Date: 5th Feb 2001 (USA) / 5th Oct 2001 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackMario's first foray into the RPG world of craft following Super Mario RPG on SNES. Paper Mario launched on N64 on 11th August 2000. It's playable on Switch with an NSO + Expansion Pack subscriptionAnd Yet It Moves (15)Publisher: Broken RulesRelease Date: 23rd Aug 2010 (USA) / 27th Aug 2010 (UK/EU)A WiiWare gem that younger readers may not remember, And Yet It Moves deserves to be celebrated! Released on 23rd August 2010, Broken Rules' puzzle platformer had you rotating the levels themselves to guide Fido Dido-looking dude made of paper to an exit. It's better than that sounds, we promise.Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (20)Publisher: Konami / Developer: KonamiRelease Date: 4th Oct 2005 (USA) / 29th Sep 2005 (UK/EU)Dawn of Sorrow, sequel to the sublime Aria of Sorrow and the first Castlevania entry on the DS, launched in Japan on 25th August 2005. Playable on Switch in the excellent Dominus Collection.SeptemberGhosts 'n Goblins (40)Publisher: Capcom / Developer: CapcomRelease Date: 19th Sep 1985 (USA) / 7th Jan 2011 (UK/EU)The Famicom port didn't arrive until the following year but Capcom's Ghosts 'n Goblins hit arcades in September 1985. Anyone with an NSO sub can play the NES version on Switch.Super Mario Maker (10)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 11th Sep 2015 (USA) / 11th Sep 2015 (UK/EU)We've had Mario Maker 2 since this, of course, but the sublime GamePad input of the original Mario Maker, which turns 10 on 10th September, makes us wish for a third entry that blends the best of both worlds, plus a new Wonder game style. One for the wishlist, but in the meantime we might have to dig the Wii U out of storage.Super Mario Bros. (40)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 17th Nov 1985 (USA) / 15th May 1987 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineHeard of this one? 13th September 2025 will be the 40th anniversary of the Super Mario Bros. series and we imagine Nintendo has something special in store to rival the 35th anniversary blow-out.Maybe bring back Super Mario Bros. 35 with five extra players?Pokmon Black and White (15)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Game FreakRelease Date: 6th Mar 2011 (USA) / 4th Mar 2011 (UK/EU)Gen 5 got off to a flying start with Pokmon Black and White, the DS pair that launched on 18th September 2010 in Japan, and the following year overseas.Pokmon Crystal turns 25 on 14th December and Pokmon XD: Gale of Darkness is 20 on 4th August. Oh, and Pokmon Puzzle League is 25 on 25th September too. With Pokmon Legends: Z-A set to launch this year, it's going to be a big one for anyone who loves stuffing small monsters in their pockets. Gotta snag em allOkamiden (15)Publisher: Capcom / Developer: CapcomRelease Date: 15th Mar 2011 (USA) / 18th Mar 2011 (UK/EU)The recent announcement of an Okami sequel in the early stages of development got us thinking about this first sequel for the DS, which launched 15 years ago on 30th September 2010. It's a beautiful little adventure and well worth catching up with before the 'big' sequel materialises. You've probably got a few years yet.OctoberTerranigma (30)Publisher: Enix / Developer: QuintetRelease Date: 19th Dec 1996 (UK/EU)Quintet's epic action RPG celebrates its 30th anniversary on 20th October, and it's a game we'd love to see get a wider release at some point. Unusually, Terranigma was localised and released in Europe but never made it to North American shores, so there are likely thousands of would-be fans who have never played it.Metroid Prime Pinball (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Fuse GamesRelease Date: 24th Oct 2005 (USA) / 22nd Jun 2007 (UK/EU)Metroid Prime Pinball might not be the most celebrated of the Prime series, but with Prime 4: Beyond in the frame for 2025, we'd love to see this spin-off get some love for its 20th birthday on 23rd October.And speaking of Metroid, Other M turns 15 on 31st August. Time for a little reevaluation on that one, perhaps?Rock Band 3 (15)Publisher: MTV Games / Developer: HarmonixRelease Date: 26th Oct 2010 (USA) / 29th Oct 2010 (UK/EU)Plastic peripherals come and go every generation, but on 26th October it'll be 15 years since one of the very best rhythm games ever made came to Wii. Just writing this makes us want to set up the drums and crack out the keytar...That's this weekend sorted, then.NovemberMario Kart DS (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 14th Nov 2005 (USA) / 5th Nov 2005 (UK/EU)It doesn't seem possible, but on 14th November it will have been two whole decades since we played Mario Kart online for the first time.WWF No Mercy (25)Publisher: THQ / Developer: AKI CorporationRelease Date: 17th Nov 2000 (USA) / 15th Dec 2000 (UK/EU)There's zero chance of this one seeing a re-release thanks to all the rights issues involved, but that doesn't mean we can't celebrate one of video gaming's finest interpretations of wrestling on 14th November on WWF No Mercy's 25th birthday. The lack of Giant Haystacks was pretty much the only mark against this one.Shadow The Hedgehog (20)Publisher: SEGA / Developer: SEGA Studio USARelease Date: 15th Nov 2005 (USA) / 18th Nov 2005 (UK/EU)Has a video game character ever returned from such a crushing low as this? Shadow the Hedgehog (the character has been riding higher than ever in 2024 thanks to the excellent Sonic X Shadow Generations and his appearance in the Sonic 3 movie - a far cry from 20 years ago when Shadow The Hedgehog (the game, 15th November) was critically mauled.Perhaps we missed something at the time. Maybe it's worthy of critical reappraisal? Hello? Anyone?F-Zero (35)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: Aug 1991 (USA) / 1992 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineAh, Formula 0 - how we miss you so. This one was a launch title for the Super Famicom and shot off the line on 21st November 1990, nearly 35 years ago. Time to crack out that Matt Damon gif if ever there was one.Super Mario World (35)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 23rd Aug 1991 (USA) / 11th Apr 1992 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch OnlineThis game isn't 35 years old on 21st November. We categorically refuse to believe it. Why would you lie about something like that? Despicable behaviour.Banjo-Tooie (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: RareRelease Date: 20th Nov 2000 (USA) / 12th Apr 2001 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackThe year 2000 was a big one for Rare. Not only did the Twycross teams have Banjo-Tooie launching on 20th November (following Perfect Dark earlier in the year), but also Mickey's Speedway USA in the very same month. "Bottles got what was coming to him"Donkey Kong Country 2: Diddy's Kong Quest (30)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: RareRelease Date: 20th Nov 1995 (USA) / 14th Dec 1995 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch Online20th November 1995 saw the launch of Diddy's Kong Quest, just one year after the first DKC. Anyone who lost their cart but is still eager to celebrate three decades of Rare's finest simian platformer can play it with a Switch Online subscription.And while we're on the subject of DK, Donkey Kong Land is also 30 years old in 2025 (26th June) and is also playable via NSO. Big DK energy on Switch!Er, we mean... erm. Oh my. Is it warm in here? Moving quickly on...Sin and Punishment (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: TreasureRelease Date: 1st Oct 2007 (USA) / 28th Sep 2007 (UK/EU) / 21st Nov 2000 (JPN)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackPlayable on Switch via NSO, Sin and Punishment was Treasure at its best. It was released on 21st November 2000, and the appropriately named Star Successor saw the series return on Wii 10 years later. Since then, we haven't heard anything from the series (or much from Treasure itself).Animal Crossing: Wild World (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 5th Dec 2005 (USA) / 31st Mar 2006 (UK/EU)The series' handheld debut launched in Japan on 23rd November 2005. Portability opened up this Wild World to commuters and public transport travellers and caught the imagination of the DS generation.Mario & Luigi Partners In Time (20)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: NintendoRelease Date: 28th Nov 2005 (USA) / 10th Feb 2006 (UK/EU)28th November will mark 20 years since this celebrated DS entry in the Mario & Luigi series. One of the reasons we're hoping Switch 2 will incorporate some backwards compatibility with Nintendo's first touchscreen console.DecemberMario Party 3 (25)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Hudson SoftRelease Date: 6th Mar 2001 (USA) / 16th Nov 2001 (UK/EU)Available On: NSO + Expansion PackMario Party 3 launched on 7th December 2000, just under a year after its predecessor, which enjoys its 25th North American anniversary is year.Also, Mario Party 7 turns 20 on 7th November. Yes, Hudson Soft was sure pumping out the parties back then!SaGa 2 (35)Publisher: Square / Developer: SquareRelease Date: Nov 1991 (USA)The second entry in the SaGa series, which originally carried the FF name in the West, also turns 35 this year - it launched for Game Boy in Japan on 14th December 1990 before turning up in the US the following November.Star Wars Episode I: Battle for Naboo (25)Publisher: LucasArts / Developer: Factor 5Release Date: 18th Dec 2000 (USA) / 30th Mar 2001 (UK/EU)Few people at the time relished the idea of jumping in an N-1 Naboo Starfighter when Rogue Squadron let you pilot an X-Wing, but on 14th December it'll be 25 years since we had the opportunity in Battle for Naboo and the intervening years have been kind to the prequel trilogy. We daresay that this would be a potent nostalgia hit for fans of a certain age, so we'll mark the date on our calendars.Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine (25)Publisher: LucasArts / Developer: Factor 5Release Date: 15th Dec 2000 (USA)It's the 3D Indy game on the tip of everyone's tongues!Being a latter-day N64 release (15th December 2000, though it launched on PC a year earlier) that never made it to Nintendo platforms outside North America, Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine might not have caught the imagination quite like Machine Games' recent Xbox adventure, but Factor 5 turned in an intriguing adventure that we're keen to revisit on its 25th anniversary.ActRaiser (35)Publisher: Square Enix / Developer: QuintetRelease Date: Nov 1991 (USA) / 18th Mar 1993 (UK/EU)Released in Japan on 16th December 1990, ActRaiser was a potent mix of God sim and a 2D action platformer. The 2021 revival Actraiser Renaissance was decent, but we'd love to see the original return via Nintendo Switch Online.Pilotwings (35)Publisher: Nintendo / Developer: Nintendo EADRelease Date: 13th Aug 1991 (USA) / 1992 (UK/EU)Available On: Nintendo Switch Online1995 was the launch year of the Super Famicom, which means that 2025 is the 30th anniversary of some serious 16-bit heavy-hitters, as we've seen. Launching on 21st December, just a month after the system itself, Pilotwings was a fantastic showcase for the new console and one you can play on Switch via NSO.Yes, we know we've missed some: Wario Land 3 turns 25 in March. Shadow of the Ninja is 35 in August. Nintendo Badge Arcade turns 10 in November. Most significantly, it's 15 years since Sonic 4 Episode 1 - the perfect time to deliver the Episode 3 gamers really want, surely!?Systems-wise, the Virtual Boy and the Super Famicom are 30 and 35 years old this year. Feel free to shout out any of your favourite games with a significant birthday for Nintendo systems or any other platform in 2025.Related GamesShare:02 Gavin first wrote for Nintendo Life in 2018 before joining the site full-time the following year, rising through the ranks to become Editor. He can currently be found squashed beneath a Switch backlog the size of Normandy. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...Related Articles161 Games You Should Pick Up In Nintendo's 'Hits For The Holidays' eShop Sale (North America)Every game we scored 9/10 or higher126 Games You Should Pick Up In The Nintendo Switch eShop Holiday Sale (Europe)Every game we scored 9/10 or higherBest Nintendo Switch Games Of 2024The finest Switch games of 202435 Upcoming Nintendo Switch Games To Look Forward To In 2025The best new Nintendo Switch games coming soon

Image: Nintendo LifeOver the holiday season, we're republishing some of the best articles from Nintendo Life writers and contributors as part of our Best of 2024 series. This article was originally published in November. Enjoy!Back at the end of August we travelled to Seattle to attend PAX West and had the incredible opportunity to spend half an hour with none other than Eric Barone, AKA ConcernedApe.If you dont know who Eric is, hes the creator of Stardew Valley; the smash hit farming game from 2016, which is still to this day getting substantial updates.We got to talk about his hobbies outside of gaming, why he still comes back to work on Stardew Valley, and how it was making bosses for a change for his new upcoming game Haunted Chocolatier.Note. This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity. Also, if you'd like to see the video of our chat, you'll find it at the bottom of the page.Nintendo Life (Felix Sanchez): I know you grew up playing a lot of Harvest Moon, but what other games shaped you growing up?Eric Barone: So I played a lot of RPGs. Final Fantasy, EarthBound, Chrono Trigger, and Zelda games, that kind of stuff.What kind of Zelda games did you play?The first one that I played was Link's Awakening for the Game Boy, and I really loved that game. And then I played Lets see, A Link to the Past, Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask...Image: Felix Sanchez / Nintendo LifeWhich one do you like the most between Majora's Mask and Ocarina?Well, I'm kind of an Ocarina guy. I know a lot of people love Majora's Mask more and they say it's the underrated King, and it's cool, but you know, Ocarina of Time was very special and nostalgic to me. I think with Majora's Mask, with the moon coming down, the time pressure kind of stressed me out.Its funnyIt's funny coming from me with Stardew Valley. I know. [laughs] I should think about that.I know you do everything yourself, you have so many hats on. How do you structure that?I don't really have a structure, it's more just kind of what I feel like doing at the moment, with a big picture in mind of how all of this is gonna fit in, of course. There might be one area of the game where I do everything for that area at once, but I think the nice thing about solo dev is that you can kind of just follow your whims. One day I might just feel like doing music, so that's just what I do. So, yeah, I'm not very structured in the way I go about doing things. It's kind of spur of the moment.So, I really like the Stardew Valley board game, so I wanted to hear what your hobbies are outside of video games. Do you play board games yourself?I do. I wouldn't say I'm a huge board game person, but I do enjoy them. The Stardew Valley board game was kind of inspired by... Have you ever played Eldritch Horror?No, I haven't.Okay, well I was a little bit inspired by that, which I guess [is] a nerdy board game a little bit. [chuckles]Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kI've played the Stardew board game with my friends and it's just so funnily structured. I don't play a lot of co-op games myself, but here it just works really well. We even put on the Stardew Valley soundtrack and it works perfectly.I'm glad you appreciate it. How do you find it in terms of difficulty?I feel like it's really good. In the final year you're really like, "Okay, we need to do this before it ends." So it's always very close and I really like that. There was this one time when we simply did not win.Yeah, when we were testing the game, we played so many rounds of it. And I felt like it was in a pretty good place when we were consistently barely winning on the last run.Yeah, that's what you want.To answer your question about what I like to do other than making video games, the answer I often give is that all the stuff that went into solo dev music, art, writing those are all my hobbies. And so being able to combine them all into my work is really satisfying. I get to do all my hobbies in my work.Out of all the different things in the game, what do you like to do the most?I'd say probably my favourite if I had to pick one is probably the music. Before I even got into game dev at all, my main hobby was music, like playing in bands in high school.What did you play?I played guitar.Lead guitar?Yeah, lead guitar.Hell yeah!I was in metal bands.Oh, really? Thats awesome!But then I kind of got into more like computer music and just composing stuff. And then I was in this kind of experimental computer pop group for a while. But that was always kind of my dream as a teenager, to be a musician. Just being in weird indie bands and play[ing] shows and stuff like that.So that was my original passion. But you know, there's part of me that likes all the different aspects. Sometimes I'll be, I want to code today, because that stimulates a certain part of the brain.Image: ConcernedApeI remember I was watching a podcast you did with Reason. I think it was a two-hour podcast where you just talked about the music of the game and you even showed a track from Haunted Chocolatier that was a boss theme. I have that stuck in my head all the time. [*hums the melody*] So talking about bosses, there's not really bosses in Stardew Valley. Was it challenging suddenly making a boss?For Haunted Chocolatier?Yeah. Can you talk about that?Yeah, no, I'm happy to talk about that to a degree. Designing bosses is a whole new ball game from anything that's Stardew. And I think I wanted something different. I wanted a challenge because I want to keep growing as a game developer. I didn't want to just do exactly the same thing again. I know a lot of people say, "Haunted Chocolatier looks like it's just a copy and paste Stardew Valley." But they haven't played the game, so they don't really know. But yeah, designing bosses is kind of an art form all unto itself, and I'm still learning stuff. And some of the bosses are going to be like, "Hopefully you'll see my progression throughout the course of the game."Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kLike which ones you did first?Yeah, exactly. But I think even a boss can be simple but still fun. What matters at the end of the day is fun. I think that's the main thing I care about.You don't want to make it too easy. That's a really hard balance to strike.Yeah.So, if you work on something for seven years, you're going to be burned out, right? But you keep coming back to the game. You're even working on this new game, but you keep adding new stuff [to Stardew Valley].That's true. I have so many ideas for Stardew. I feel like I could work on it for the rest of my life, and just keep improving it, adding more stuff to it, more content, fleshing out the existing content. That's the main thing I want to do is flesh out the existing content. And okay, here's another thing: It's so popular.Yeah, it's sold like 30 million copies? It's insane.Something like that. So, because of that, I feel like I want to keep it alive, keep it fresh, delight the fans, because it's just fun to engage with that. It's a rare opportunity I have that there's so many people who love this game and will play whatever update I make. And what I love to do is create things and then share them with people and give people experiences. And Stardew is such a good platform for that because it is very popular and it's still really active.So it's kind of hard. I don't want to see it fizzle out, I want to keep it alive, but then I also want to make a new game. So I'm always likeIt's a hard balance.It is.And you're only one person who makes it.Well, I do have some help on Stardew updates now.What part do you get help on?Basically mostly the coding. The technical stuff.You also got help with the multiplayer aspect right?Yeah, true. It's like, you know, with the creative stuff, I'm very particular and I want to make sure that it's my vision. But with the programming, I'm more like, does it work? You know, the players don't really get to see under the hood on the code.I totally get that. For example, with video editing, sometimes I wish someone could just watch through it to be like, does this work?Well, there's also just areas where I'm just not that good at or I don't have the knowledge to do really deeply technical stuff. I'm kind of a gameplay programmer, you know? It's just I'm not an elegant programmer. Make it work, make it fun for the player - that's my angle.Image: Felix Sanchez / Nintendo LifeSo, I work remote[ly] myself. I don't really hear or see my co-workers other than on the screen. When you work on a game for so long, that must be quite lonely. How did you deal with that?It helps that I'm a pretty solitary person in general. I think I'm just kind of good at that. I tend to get into my own world with my creative pursuits and then I just lock in. I mean, yeah, it is a little bit lonely. And when you are creating something like Stardew Valley or making a game by yourself, you know, for the most part, there are some sacrifices you have to make. But, I don't regret it. I mean, this is a dream come true for me to see something that I made blow up and a lot of people love it.You probably get asked a lot what your favourite music track in Stardew Valley is, but what's the most underrated one? The one that people don't really talk about, but it's just one that you're really proud of.I like the town theme. Ive never seen anyone talking about it, but I think it really has a good vibe to it. And there's these kind of basic... I call them 'the country songs' and there's a town theme, some of the shop themes. There's one that plays in Marnie's shop and they just have this feelgood [mood], sets the tone and the vibe of the game. People latch onto the big tracks like Moonlight Jellies or the winter songs that really hit hard, but I [like] the subtle atmospheric ones that give this country vibe to the whole town.So, there's a lot of great sound effects in Stardew Valley. Did you make all those [with] synths, or did you go record stuff in real life too?Most of them were just synthesisers. I would just go in and tweak the waveforms until I got something that sounded right. There were a couple of things that I recorded. Notably, when you break rocks in the mines, there's this rock sound, yeah I was out on the lawn at my parents' house and I was just throwing rocks.Oh, thats amazing!But most of them are synthesisers. And then there's a few, the ambient soundscapes, which I got on royalty-free websites.Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790k Dancing with the Moonlit JelliesWhat about the sound when you open a chest?That one, I'm pretty sure was just a synthesiser.Really? Thats so cool! The music and sound effects, everything in the game is just so iconic. I listen to the music so often, just put it in my ears and it's so relaxing.I'm glad. Thank you for saying that.What are some of your favourite games that you've played after Stardew Valley came out?There's a lot of good games that I've played. Recently I got way into Balatro.It's a great game. You just put it on and suddenly...Hours have gone by. You really lock in, you like zone in, you're in a trance.I think it's the music and everything.Oh, the music's great. I love the music. What else? I recently played Outer Wilds for the first time.Dude, great. What do you think?It was good. Yeah, I think it's one of those games that everyone needs to play once, you know.Yeah. I remember I played it and I did not get it, but then I got to the end and I felt like it just changed how I looked on life and stuff.I also played the Riven remake. I grew up playing Riven and I think it's one of the best of those genre of games ever. And this is a little controversial, but with my team, sometimes we play Fortnite.[Laughs] I don't know if that's controversial.Well, a lot of people have strong opinions about Fortnite.Actually, something I don't see with Stardew Valley... it just feels like everyone is such a nice community and everyone just really likes the game, which is...That's true. Stardew, somehow, even though it's gotten very popular, still kind of has this really small indie feel to it, like the community, the game itself, how people think about the game. I'm really glad about that.Finally, I just wanted to say thank you. Me and my brother have a six-year difference and we don't play a lot of games together since we have very different taste, but Stardew Valley was one of those games that we could just bond with. So I just wanted to say just thank you for making the game.That means a lot to me. Yeah. I mean, what I like to do is share things with other people. But it's also been really touching that Stardew Valley has meant so much to so many people and just hearing stories about how people have bonded, playing multiplayer and all that - it really makes me feel good.Image: Felix Sanchez / Nintendo LifeAnd with that, Eric had to get back to the Fangamer booth, where there was a colossal line of people waiting to meet him. It really puts into perspective how much of an impact this single man has had on so many people.Thanks again to Fangamer and Eric; were very grateful!Subscribe to Nintendo Life on YouTube790kWatch on YouTube Back to the farm we go"The dev gave me a pat on the back"And it won an award a BrickCon 2024Related GamesSee AlsoShare:010 Felix is the third member of the Nintendo Life YouTube team. Yes, Zelda: Breath of the Wild was his first Zelda game but he's more than making up for it now. Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...Related ArticlesBest Nintendo Switch Games Of 2024The finest Switch games of 2024Feature: 15 Best-Looking Switch Games Of 2024Hello, my prettiesFeature: The Best Hidden Gems And Underrated Switch Games Of 2024Some shinies that may have slipped through your fingersBest Of 2024: The Company You Can Pay To X-Ray Unopened Pokmon Card Packs Speaks Out"The technology is not going away, and people know what it can do"Feature: Nintendo Life's Alternative Game Awards 2024Biggest surprise! Most long-winded title! Crappiest Switch publisher! Title:Stardew ValleySystem:Switch eShopAlso Available For:Publisher:ConcernedApeDeveloper:ConcernedApeGenre:RPG, SimulationPlayers:1Release Date:Switch eShop 5th Oct 2017, $14.99 5th Oct 2017, 10.99Reviews:Review: Stardew Valley (Switch eShop)Where to buy:Buy on Nintendo eShop Buy eShop Credit: