Last updated: When this was posted! Everything that was shown before June, essentially.
We’re continuing what we did last year with all the showcases and keeping it all in one post! I’ll be updating live as new showcases happen :)
Some quick overviews for those new here or who just want a refresher:
– I do my best to watch every single possible showcase. This means that games do sometimes overlap! Because of this, I will only mention a game wherever I saw it first. It doesn’t mean I’m no longer interested in it if I don’t mention it again– it’s simply to prevent me from mentioning the same game over and over again.
– There are more and more showcases each year. I’m sorry if I miss one! Feel free to comment if I do and I’ll happily check it out. That said, I won’t list showcases where I don’t feel I have anything to say (usually due to any games I’m interested in being mentioned already from a prior showcase).
– I try not to mention games that I am already aware of (or are out) unless something new is announced in the trailer such as new DLC or a release date.
– Unless the demo is incredibly short or I’m fairly undecided on the game, I won’t be playing the demo unless game data carries over.
With that out of the way, let’s get started!
Prior to June Showcases
While most are in the first two weeks of June, some actually started this last week such as the AG French Direct, Thinky Direct 2026, Cozy Game Awards Showcase, Insider Gaming Showcase, and Indie Quest 2026!
The Granny Detective Society – The speed of which I ran to check out the demo immediately. While it took me a bit to fully understand how you get all the clues (The crossword system is a bit odd to me, but I’ll work with it), I had a lot of fun and everything about it is so charming. I can’t wait for the full game.
Milki Delivery – I’ve had this in my wishlist for a while now, but it’s not out yet and I think this is the first showcase it’s been a part of? I’m really looking forward to it. I loved Doot’s previous game (EVEN IF THE SUPER RARE LEGENDARY BUG IN KABUTO PARK CONTINUES TO ALLUDE ME!!!) and everything about this looks just as charming.
The Witch’s Bakery – I don’t know if I’ll actually be good at the game in the long run (I’ve mentioned a few times now, but I am HORRIBLE with time management in games), but it really is such a beautiful game and the new opening is stunning.
Ambroise Niflette & the Gleaned Bell – I really want to play the demo, but I don’t know if the demo data carries over and I already backed the game on Kickstarter so… I’ll just… do my best to wait, but it still is looking really cute.
Escape Academy 2: Back 2 School – Speaking of games I don’t really want to put more time in right now as the demo doesn’t carry over but I am super excited for… The next Escape Academy is absolutely on that list. I did play the original version of the Demo, but I’m going to hold off on the new one for now (unless it does carry over but I don’t believe it does). I need the release date already!!
Rita – I had such a good time playing the Demo last year and I’m so excited the release is so close! Looking forward to it.
Map Map: A Game About Maps – I’m so conflicted on this game because as you may know, I have absolutely zero sense of direction but it looks so cute and fun, I kind of want to try it anyway…
Meowstery Wisp – The conflict this game has caused for me. I hate social deduction games, but I love mysteries and I have no clue if I would enjoy this or not but I like the Cat customziation so???
Bonus shout out to Cat Squeeze which while absolutely not my preferred type of puzzle game, the art style is so cute and I need a squishy plush of that Cat immediately.
Pottering – Despite not being much of a gardening person and knowing this is probably something I will be playing solo, it’s still really cute and looks like a lot of fun.
Rural Cat Trails – You play as a cute Cat in the countryside. What’s not to love? I think what tends to make or break this types of games for me is how much push-back you get from characters (Like if they chase/try to fight you or if it’s more relaxing and you can do whatever and watch how things react without having to deal with being stealthy or anything) and I very much prefer when I can just go around at my own pace and enjoy interacting with everything.
Winter Whiskerss – Another game I fell in love with as soon as I saw this. This looks like it’ll be so cute and fun. I technically first saw it on Blue Sky, but I believe this was the first showcase it was part of.
Ova Magica – Ova Magica has finally hit 1.0!! I’ve had a lot of fun with it, but due to my time management struggles, I wanted to wait until 1.0 hit with all the QoL stuff that would hopefully make that a bit easier. Especially with my terrible minigame skills.
Drawquarium – Despite the unique trailer and my inability to draw decently, this looks really cute and the only reason I haven’t tried the demo yet is I don’t think things will carry over and I’d hate redrawing all my fish if it doesn’t ;~;
Wish Upon A Llama – While we didn’t get too much new here, we did get some and I am still VERY excited about it!
It is now officially May 31st, at least here on the East Coast (and it started over 12 hours ago in Japan), which means it is officially Audino Day and by conjecture, Mega Audino Day!! This post is going up alongside a small update to my Mega Audino Collection site to celebrate! I’ll be talking more about the small update and additions there so if you’re curious about that, be sure to check out the new update. As for over here, to celebrate the 15th/16th year of Audino (we got Black & White months after Japan did making the release in 2011 instead of 2010), the going on 12th year of Mega Audino, and Pokemon’s overall “What’s Your Favorite?” theme for their 30th anniversary, I wanted to talk about some of my favorite Mega Audino items I’ve gotten over the years.
I have over 500 different items in my Mega Audino collection– most of which are “custom” items. By that, I mean items that either I personally commissioned or that people made and I purchased from them. I’m always looking for new things so if you know of a Mega Audino item– whether official, non-licensed, fanmade (whether by you or someone else) that I may not have, feel free to contact me!.
Anyway, I’ll randomly be picking from sections as I can’t really talk about EVERYTHING, but I hope these are still fun things to see! Depending on how long ago I got some items, they may be over a decade old at this point, so I apologize in advance for some of the darker photos. I’m hoping to retake a lot of them soon enough.
First up, it’s hard to not mention my very first Mega Audino item ever! When Mega Audino was announced, it was a time where there was not a rush of people making plushies and art and everything inbetween to rush into the tags in less than 24 hours– so, I went to the big Collector community I was in and asked if anyone was willing to make a plushie of them. It didn’t matter that we had barely any references, I knew they were my ultimate favorite Pokemon immediately. The very first person to offer to make me a plush was lillyann123:
The first plush I got in a very similar Pokedoll-style to the official Audino Pokedoll was the plush you see on the left by caffwin while the one on the right is the most recent Pokedoll-style Mega Audino I’ve gotten that was made by Sevii:
Mega Audino has, unfortunately, still not received an official plushie. The only official “plush” it has received is as part of the Mega Poncho Pikachu campaign which involves a Pikachu wearing a poncho based off Mega Audino. It received a regular plush and a keychain. I own bought the USA and Japanese versions.
Similarly, the only official figure Mega Audino has gotten is from that same campaign.
Despite being part of the second set of Mega Evolutions, the only things Mega Audino really got to be a part of were the charm sets that released and the Scrap Card Rally.
It did get some stickers and bromide stuff at least. The weirdest thing it was probably a part of was this Ruler Set Preorder for ORAS.
Speaking of weird things that Mega Audino was part of, it was actually picked to be one of the Pokemon for part of the Halloween Campaign: Pokemon Band Fes. I always felt Mega Audino would be part of Christmas or Valentine’s Day if it got picked, but instead it ended up being part of the Fairy Band alongside Slurpuff and Vanillite. I feel like if Alcremie was out by then, it would have been used instead– I’m still kind of confused about Vanillite’s inclusion in the first place considering it’s not a Fairy type at all. In addition to various things of the logo, there was a pair of socks and T-Shirt as well. This is one of the few times Mega Audino had a different artwork besides just its introduction artwork and Dream World Artwork.
TCG-wise, Mega Audino had its own Mega Deck EX in Japan and Korea, but was rolled into Fates Collide everywhere else. Either way, I did my best to collect every card in each language.
While not shown, I do have the Spirit Links in each language too! I’m doing my best for the new cards as well!
If I had to pick the most special official item I have, it’s this one of a kind print drawn and signed by Kagemaru Himeno that was part of the first prize for the very first Sylveon Girls Battle back in 2016. Despite Mega Audino not being part of PokeKyun, it was included with some displays, the sticker set, and clearfile.
Most recently, Mega Audino has been included in the Let’s Go for a Walk Lottery, part of a new Puzzle made for the mega evolutions, and various clearfiles.
Heading back to Customs, it’s hard not to spotlight this figure I commissioned from Viistar of my Pokemon Trainer OC, Celina, and Mega Audino together.
I also have this adorable wood carved Mega Audino made by Badlands Dwellers! The bell really works and I really love it so much.
One final random figure spotlight is this cute diroama-esque one made by Eli Eli. It’s genuinely just so pretty and I love the water so much. I really love water features, but Mega Audino doesn’t get featured with them much due to, well, not being a Water Pokemon.
…Regardless, I always appreciate when people fit in all my favorite things alongside Mega Audino such as this adorable ACEO Card by PikaBulbachu.
Finally, to finish this off, I wanted to bring up a few third party items– first, the only “plush” we’ve gotten by OlyFactory. As for second and third, some lovely Mega Audino Stickers by Pokemon Dream Studio and KEMO Studios respectively. Mega Audino rarely gets much love, but I’m always happy to see it regardless.
Anyway, thank you for checking out this post of just showing just a small bit of my collection! Another big Happy Audino Day to you all!
As a reminder, this is just a small fraction of my Mega Audino collection! Be sure to check out my full collection site to see everything!
I did not expect this game to get a demo, but I was incredibly delighted ignoring that now the wait feels so much harder…
Regardless, I wanted to talk about experiences with the demo. As always, you can watch the video on my Youtube as well:
Importing my Mii was pretty simple, thankfully, since I’ve had my Mii attached to the console for ages… Unfortunately, that is not the case with every other Mii and not having a proper way to transfer Miis to the Nintendo Switch (both 1 and 2) has been something that has annoyed me for ages. I don’t know why they didn’t add another Mii Plaza thing. I still genuinely think there was a way to do StreetPass for the Switch too with the option to bring the console with you or some kind of peripheral instead.
Either way, Miis got fairly shafted with the Nintendo Switch and despite Tomodachi Life’s return, they didn’t really prepare anything for the 100+ Miis I’m now going to have to remake. Of course, it’s possible there just are less ways in the demo and maybe the full version will surprise me (I already pre-ordered it), but my hopes are pretty low.
While my disappointment is clear with all the Miis I’ll have to remake (that said, I’d be editing a bunch of them with the new customization options, but it’d be nice to have their base looks down over nothing), I was so happy with many of the new customization options such as finally having a long wavy ponytail. Sure, I wish it was a bit wider (If you have thick curly/wavy hair, it rarely is that thin and usually spreads out quite a bit), but I’m just so happy to have another ponytail option especially when we can pick different bangs as well. It was also sweet getting so many messages from people happy for me who know how long I’ve wanted better ponytails T~T <3
Doing the personality is still one of the hardest parts for me as I never feel 100% sure with most of the choices. I wish there were simpler ways to do it, or you could actually pick the personality and description and have it set and adjusted from there. That said, I am a perfectionist, so I suppose it fits. That said, I suppose I struggle with the voice too.
With my Mii and everything all set (which took about 10 minutes), she was obviously hungry and thankfully, Fresh Kingdom Food Mart officially opened so we could buy some food. Of course, since my Mii is the only one in town, well, she’s also the one working there. Maybe you should have just grabbed some food, Mii… Regardless, we were given $200 so I did buy one of each food item for now. As per usual, I just try to go in order as I like to try and figure out all their favorites even though it’s quite a slow process.
Now that Mii!Jennifer was all fed and happy, the first part of the tutorial was done. And she was so happy, she had to leave her house to yell a title drop.
The game then zoomed out to show the map which uh, still isn’t particularly impressive, but we had a very cute logo where our Mii then popped out and with the Island name.
After heading back in, you’re essentially in charge for what to do next. There were also additional tips as we went through such as getting our first level up rewards. One thing that was pretty frustrating is that a lot of the options were actually locked in the demo. Considering how much is limited in the demo already (I’ll talk more about it later), I wish they let us pick whichever. It essentially meant I had to give my Mii something maybe I didn’t think worked as well because I had to pick something at the moment and what I wanted to was locked.
Regardless, with her leveled up and a jar full of warm fuzzies, the fountain opened! This is where you can kind of level up the town and earn more things as well for like gifts and stuff you can give your Mii. Like with the level-up gifts, most things are not possible to give in the demo for some reason so I actually only opened 1/2 of my gifts so I could save the other for the full release.
With that on hold, I decided to make my next Mii– the only other one in the same order as my original playthrough, A Mii of my husband. It’s interesting to think how we were recently engaged when the game came out on the 3DS in North America. Unfortunately, this is where things got more difficult as he has his own Switch so his Mii is not on this system so I had to just do my best based off his Mii on my 3DS. I don’t know how accurate the personality they gave him really is (I don’t think I’d ever use “cheerful or innocent” to describe him– those tend to be used more for me, especially the latter) so I may adjust his personality in the future. In the same sense, they had my Reserved be described as “Aloof” which is very much not me, but much more him and that is the only part I would say is off with my own Mii’s personality.
Going through them all, I think my Mii is a mix of Softie, Perfectionist, and Thinker while I would say he’s a mix of Hot-Blooded and Intoverted Observer with maybe a bit of Headstrong Maverick. Part of the issue is the word choices as well– like I would say “Easy-going” fits my husband more than “Considerate”– not to say he can’t be considerate, but it’s not the word that would immediately come to mind nor would most of the traits which is part of why I think I’ll end up switching him.
Regardless, his Mii has been made and it was time for our Miis to meet. He should be a bit taller or I should be a bit shorter probably, but as these are kind of chibi-ish anyway, I suppose the height shouldn’t be fully accurate. I love that they give us a height chart with the various Miis when making them which does help, but I wish we could also have some measurements too.
After making Zero, I realized I forgot to give my own Mii ears (in my defense, it’s a new option) so I quickly edited her and then they had a lovely discussion to talk about playing games. It went well.
There was then a new news report about the fact that a new Mii had moved on and it said that the clothing store would open when a third Mii moves in. Really wanting to change their outfits as I kind of hate the default outfits and my husband has never worn yellow in the entire time I’ve known him, I quickly decided on who to make as our third… Considering I knew we could only three total Miis, I wanted to pick a Mii that would essentially be by themselves and not be paired up with another character or part of a group and quickly came to the perfect pick– our very own site mascot and part-time Vtuber, Mizuki Sakura. Like with Miinifer, I do wish the ponytail was spread a bit more, but I’m thrilled to have these different ponytails regardless. As a bonus for this post, I actually tried using face paint to get her bangs a bit closer. I’m not sure if I did a good job or not, but I tried my best.
I’m still not sure if I picked the best hair color option for her– it’s like everything was slightly too dull or too dark or just not really the right shade and I wish I could’ve had full range of colors to get closer to her hair color. Either way, I’m mostly pretty happy to her.
Unfortunately, if there is one thing I sort of regret, it was rushing to make more Miis since the Demo ended so quickly after making the third one. I suppose I could’ve held off giving the outfit out maybe? But I just wanted to change their clothes so badly and I didn’t expect it to just hard end there. Similarly, I probably could have waited on buying 2 more of each food as they would now be permanently available…
The problem is that once you give clothes out, you get hit with a hard wall where you no longer can earn happiness (so no way to level) or money which… really sucks. There is so much locked down and I don’t even mind the lack of happiness, but giving us so many things to buy and locking the ability to earn money is cruel to begin with, but you actually get one more day of store stocks and I had no money to spend and there was cute things and I’m so sad.
I’m hoping maybe if I open the game before it launches, it’ll still have the current stuff in the shop maybe. We’ll have to see though… Regardless, even if I got no happiness, I still gave all the Miis their outfits.
The main thing now is I’ve been trying to decide which Miis will be brought over from the 3DS game. While I know “Everyone” has been a popular request, we don’t know how many Miis will be possible to have in the game. I’ve heard some say higher than the initial 100 in the 3DS and I’ve also heard some say lower.
Obviously, if it’s lower, it is literally impossible to bring over every Mii and we already introduced a brand-new Mii to the Island. So, I’ve done my best to make a list and organize it by Miis I definitely want to have back, ones people have specifically requested back, ones I’m mixed on if I want back or not (usually due to being attached to ones I definitely want to bring back or I feel like will work well with the expanded Mii customization), and ones I think will likely not return unless specifically asked for or there is a lot more space.
I also have Miis that were not kept around in the apartments and/or brand-new Mii ideas I think could be fun to add. I’ll be keeping these lists secret for now as a surprise, but if there are Miis you really want to see return, requesting them specifically does help! I probably won’t actually show myself making most of the Miis as well also to keep some surprises when they show up, but here’s hoping we’ll be able to have a lot of fun no matter how many Miis we can have. Currently, about 65 or 66 are stated as definite of the 100, but there are a lot I’d still like to…
Finally, I don’t know how often I will make these type of playthrough posts for the new Tomodachi Life game, so I apologize in advance if you’re looking forward to those, but I’ll do my best!
In general, a lot of people have asked for my thoughts on the game and “overwhelming” is still ringing true to this moment. I don’t know when it may stop feeling overwhelming, if ever, but if so, it hasn’t for me at least. I don’t think that will necessarily be accurate for everyone though– anyone who is well-versed in games with similar crafting aspects (such as Minecraft and Dragon Quest Builders) and enjoys being more flexible with a world they can decorate will likely have an easier time. That said, I’m not the type of player who enjoys those types of building experiences which is part of the overwhelming feeling I tend to have while playing. I also mentioned as much with Animal Crossing that I do not enjoy flattening things down and building up— building upon what already exists is most comfortable for me which also became kind of difficult in some areas which I’ll expand on later. Similarly, people who are also used to games like Factorio and others with large automation systems will have a much easier time than I am as I ruin my entire town trying to keep things working.
That said, while I have a lot of enjoyment from playing because I love spending time with Pokemon and it’s why I was excited about the game from the first trailer, there is also an underlying sadness to the game that is rather hard to ignore and so sometimes I can just feel really sad even while having fun.
Regardless, I wanted to wait to write this post until I finished the following goals:
-Complete the story
-Get max rank in each best
-Complete my Pokedex
And I finally managed to do all of those.
If you’re wondering why “SquishyJen”, it’s because I name my first Ditto in every game “Squishy” but then that would come up if I play with friends and they would be like “Who is Squishy??” so I added the “Jen” part to make it obvious, but it sure made things a bit awkward for reasons I’ll get to. That said, I suppose it kind of works if you think Squishy gets called that every time it tried to mimic their trainer, but since my Pokemon OC’s name is Celina, I guess it’d be Squishlina then…
That said, it’s hard to really talk about all my feelings without going into spoiler territory so everything passed this sentence and the screenshot below (showing probably the only area I really decorated fully to my own aesthetics) will go into detailed spoiler territory of the story, mechanics, and various other parts of the game.
The short version though is that if you love seeing Pokemon interact and that is enough for you, then I think the game is worth it. But if you get overwhelmed easily and/or don’t really enjoy crafting and that kind of building, maybe try it or see someone else play first to see how you feel. Hanging out with Pokemon was enough for me to not regret getting this game (and filled the void I had where Legends Z-A really disappointed me with the only positive being Mega Audino’s return), but it doesn’t fix how overwhelming it is for me and how unlikely it is for me to actually do everything build-related I may have wanted. In the future, I may just play it for events unless something is changed with how Cloud Islands work.
Anyway, I hope everyone has a Happy Valentine’s Day!
I’ll hopefully have more posts soon– if you subscribe on Patreon, Ko-Fi, or through Youtube Membership, you probably know this month is pretty crazy for me ^^; I really hope things will be calmer next month.
The Direct is about to start and so I wanted to make a post about my thoughts from it. If you haven’t seen it yourself, you can watch it below:
As mentioned on Bluesky, the thing I’m hoping for most is a way to transfer everyone from the 3DS to the new game. I’d love to be able to pick up from there and it’d be easier than slowly having to try and rescan everyone (especially as I do not have the camera for the Nintendo Switch 2).
Other things I’d love is more relationship options (sure would be nice to make Haruka a girl like she is supposed to be), the expanded customization the Switch version of Miitopia gave us, and in general, I still miss the Mii Plaza and would love something like that for Nintendo Switch 2 and some kind of StreetPass Peripheral.
I also am hoping for a release date, but that’s something I would be surprised if it wasn’t in this.
Regardless, it’s starting now so I’m keeping my fingers crossed :) But I’m pretty sure I’ll still be excited either way.
I already love some of the outfits we see right at the start. I do see a “Create a Mii based off your system” so I should be able to make mine and my husband’s easily, but it’ll be a pain transferring others. There is a bunch of new customization stuff though so I hope we can also edit them as well. That said, it does mean everything will start over so need to re-get outfits and build up relationships from scratch.
Happy to see nonbinary options and that you can pick their romance options for everyone! It’ll make it easier for me to add my friends and them feel comfortable in the game too.
Mocha the teddy bear is the best.
I kind of wish there were some preset topics over just writing them in. Though, it’s possible there are and they just didn’t show them yet.
I love the dolly-dress. I want it in real life in pink.
The rooms look so much more interactive too which is really nice. I also love that it looks like you can decorate the exterior as well to make your island more you. That said, while you can add land, if everyone has a unique house, it feels like it might be a bit small? But maybe your island slowly grows… They do show some big examples with all kinds of different looks so it does seem like it may actually expand after all.
ANOTHER CUTE TEDDY BEAR MII… And Aliens???
The Little Quirks system sounds great. I love that I’ll be able to make a Mii even more like who I want them to be.
Also I love Mocha’s Teddy Bear room.
I might have to make a Teddy Bear Mii myself…
YOU CAN HAVE PETS… CUSTOM PETS… LOOK AT THAT ADORABLE PUPPY. (I also adore her outfit too) The customization honestly looks really amazing, though, I still tend to find it overwhelming…
It does look like Miis can actually live together as roommates and not just as a married couple which is really neat! I’m so excited for all the new ways you can pair Miis up. Apparently up to 8 residents can live together so either a big friend group or family. I am already thinking of pairing Miis up by fandom, though, some may require more than one house…
And we finally got a release date! April 16th, 2026 for both Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch 2.
Honestly, the game looks great, and I can’t wait for it. I’m also relieved it comes out over a month after Pokopia because I was worried I’d have to try and balance the two. I’m still hoping they might have some kind of transfer option, but if not, I guess I’ll have to get ready to remake a bunch of Miis…
The only thing that still seems up in the air from the 3DS game is if the Concert Hall will return. I’d like to hope so, but I’m surprised they didn’t show it then as it would just be an old returning feature. I guess we’ll have to see. I also REALLY hope it will be easier to earn money this time around because I had a rough time in the 3DS game.
I also hope we’ll actually have all the different regional stuff this time and things won’t be split up again. I’m a little worried since things were shown differently in the directs, but I’d love if we could keep all the different outfits and food in every game this time.
Initially, I planned to do daily posts talking about things, but with the walling of the update and just personal issues, it looks like we’re going with an overview post instead. I was so excited for the update, but I will admit it’s a bit of a let-down for me in some ways.
I don’t mind that there aren’t too many new items (Honestly, I’m relieved if anything), but I’m disappointed about how few rooms we can actually do in the hotel. I’ll talk about it more when we get further in, but for now, let’s just get started. As mentioned in my last entry, you can only do two hotel rooms a day unfortunately.
Before I did the day’s hotel rooms though, I ended up placing some of the new items around.
I then stopped by Resident Services to get the other Storage upgrade– this one cost 1.8 million.
With that then, we headed to the hotel for Rooms 2 and 3. Leilani was working on the outfits so I was able to set two different ones. I might change the hat of the right one…
The options for Room 3 were between Ranch and Simple. I ended up picking Ranch for a more Cottage Core-esque look. As for Room 4, the options were between Kiddie and Dreamy and Dreamy was very much the easy choice for me.
We then had to wait another day. I did a little more item placing (I don’t know if I’ll keep the Kiddie House there or not– it technically blocks that entrance, but it’s not like that entrance was ever really needed). Similarly, the Cat kind of blocks things a bit, but it doesn’t make anything unusable. In general, it’s hard to enjoy more items when I already have most things set the way I want it and no real way to increase the size. If only all rooms could become 10×10 like the ones we can decorate for others.
There was also one last stop to Resident Services to talk to Nook after getting our truly final storage upgrade.
It was then time to design some rooms. For Room 5, I got to pick Skyscraper or Diner and picked Skyscraper. As for Rom 6, I got to choose between a Lodge Room or Retro Japanese Room and since I felt the latter would just be close to what I did for one of the rooms already, I picked the Lodge Room.
The next day, I only had one goal in mind: To work on the next rooms. Room 7 was a choice between Exquisite and Frozen– I picked Exquisite and while I don’t necessarily regret my choice, it wasn’t really what I was expecting. Room 8 ended up being the first choice I actually struggled choosing between and had to have my husband pick for me– Luxurious (Which is what I was expecting from Exquisite) or Antique. We ended up going with Antique.
With that, we finished all the hotel rooms which surprised me, to say the least. I figured we’d eventually get to do every theme with enough rooms to do so (with multiple floors– it’s not like the outside of a building has ever given you any real idea of the inside in this game) so learning there would just be the eight rooms is super disappointing.
I already figured this would be the VIP room based off the initial trailers/announcement and this did end up being correct. You essentially get to pick a villager currently staying there (or scan an Amiibo which you unlock the ability to after finishing the VIP room) to be upgraded to the VIP Room and then pick a theme for the room which includes all the previous themes plus a whole slew of themes only for the VIP room.
What upsets me though is there is only the one VIP room and apparently it will be “cleared out” daily– I worked hard on the VIP room. I don’t want it to be wiped and the idea of it being reset daily just ruined a lot of the excitement for me. I ended up picking the Mermaid Room for the VIP room, but I likely won’t do another one. I have no motivation to work hard on something that will just be reset each day.
Furthermore, we had the confirmation that to do any other themes, we could just… change one of the rooms we already did to a new theme which I also have no interest in doing. Maybe I would prefer doing another theme, but not at the expensive of getting rid of something I already worked hard on.
This ended up dragging the update down with me a lot. While it comes with some great Quality of Life stuff, it’s almost all catered to crafting which is something I don’t even want to see in an Animal Crossing again. Some of the items are cute, but I have little room to deal with it. It still blows my mind that decorating is such a major part of the game and that they had a search option in Happy Home Designer, but couldn’t bring it here for Happy Home Paradise or the new hotel.
The Slumber Islands are neat, and I’d love to put some of my ideas into fruition, but I don’t have the time or patience anymore to deal with it.
Overall, I was just really looking forward to making these hotel rooms and it being so limited really sucks.
I’d like to try and finish my catalog with the new items, but I probably won’t bother much with the new Nook Miles tasks. That said, unless something ends up changing with the hotel so we can do more rooms without losing the ones we already did, I can’t see myself playing much more after all unfortunately.
My ultimate goal may be to get every Villager a vacation house, but my secondary one would be to get the final two ranks. Unfortunately, it’s been a rough month so I only really managed to do one more house before the update:
Lyman – A Variety of Veggies – I feel like I mainly did what I wanted to, but I also had more ideas after I finished. I think making the inside a mix of a farm and restaurant maybe could have worked nicely, but I still think it turned out okay.
Regardless, it is officially update day so let’s talk about 3.0! Much to my surprise, while the Switch 2 Edition update wasn’t quite ready, the 3.0 update already launched early this morning. I expected it to be out this evening so that already turned my day on its head.
With the letter arriving about the new storage upgrades, I figured I’d go to Town Hall first… Except Tom Nook wasn’t there so off to the hotel I went.
I did like that they mentioned Lottie if you have the DLC.
Our first room theme to decorate was a Seaside Room and we had a guest pretty much immediately.
I then popped out to take a brief stop back at Resident Services to upgrade my storage but was stopped by Tom Nook to talk about the new crafting delivery service. I feel like I’ll only use this for however many tickets I’m short after completing rooms as I am a lot lower on crafting stuff than I realized. Probably due to all the storage issues.
Regardless, with that done, I made my way to Resident Services to finally upgrade my storage. It was 1.5 million bells and I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to see what the cost is for the final storage increase.
And then we celebrated the opening of the hotel.
I then went to make the second room. We could choose between two themes this time: Japanese or Modern. I decided to do the Japanese Room.
And then I was told I’d have to wait until tomorrow to do more rooms which was really disheartening. I was looking forward to spending time today doing all the rooms and seeing it be walled off like this really sucks.
The system itself is essentially the exact same as the DLC, just with some features removed. Unfortunately, they also didn’t really add any such as being able to search which is what I really wanted. I figure without it, I’ll just use the Recommended items and maybe try to find a couple of others if they initially came to my head when the theme is announced.
With a pin put into my plans, I headed to my bed to check out the new Dream Islands.
While I have ideas for two, I kind of forgot how… annoying terraforming is to do so I think I’ll put them on the backburner for now. Unsurprisingly, that meant I didn’t stick around long so I decided to head to Harvey’s Island to scan the Amiibo.
On the way, I ended up seeing Resetti walking around. I probably won’t use the new reset feature, but I know a lot of people who are likely excited for it.
It was then off to Harvey’s Island where we ran into one small issue– I could not find where we had put the Amiibo we specifically put aside for this update. We recently got some of the other Tears of the Kingdom Amiibo so I was able to use those for the new Zelda things, but I still need to find where we put the Splatoon ones…
If we find the Splatoon ones today, I’ll update this post, but otherwise, I guess I’ll make a new post when I can finally decorate more rooms…
With the update on the horizon (no pun intended), I’ve been wanted to try and go back to the one thing I wasn’t really satisfied with how much I still had left to do: Happy Home Paradise. That said, it became very quickly why I had essentially put that goal on the backburner– the lack of any kind of way to search for items and how frustrating searching through the inventory can be, sometimes taking me 10-20+ minutes.
On average, I finish a room in about 20-30 minutes, but whenever I’m having trouble with finding something in my inventory, it gets closer to an hour. It’s such a shame too as Happy Home Paradise fixes my biggest issue with Happy Home Designer by showing ALL the recommended items at all times where HHD would only show whatever new items you earned which would be barely anything as you got to the end of the game to the point where I had trouble coming up with ideas as the themes were too similar.
But the lack of a search bar takes a mode that should be fun and relaxing and makes it feel exhausting instead. I’m REALLY hoping the upcoming free update adds this considering it will be a similar decorating mode.
Regardless, I did my usual livestream thing and tried to get a few Vacation Homes done for our lovely visiting villagers.
Vic – An Adventurer’s Home Base – I pretty much had an idea right off the bat, but as I was still getting used to the controls, I didn’t really manage to do it like I hoped. I kind of wanted the inside to look like a combination of a run-down shack/inn and a tavern, but it didn’t really work out… I probably should have made it a bit bigger. I had a lot more ideas for the outside, but that’s something you can’t really do more about size-wise.
Canberra – International Eatery – I was pretty excited about this one in theory, but spending forever going through the search menu put a huge damper on it. I think it maybe would have worked a bit better if I made a second room be a souvenir room, but I really wanted to have like some of the bigger country souvenirs outside and the smaller ones against the backwall and just could not really get it the way I wanted to.
Bangle – Animal-Stuff Abode – While I’m not one for animal print, I absolutely love the stuffed animals and pet-esque items in the game. I feel like one of my “Dream Worlds” could absolutely be more catered to all of them as there are so many. Despite my excitement for it, I don’t know if I truly pulled it off– I think I should have included more animal-print clothing, but I just kind of ran out of space. After playing other games for so long with more options (Like being able to angle items and wall shelves and stuff), I just kept wanting to do things that I forgot aren’t actually possible in the game.
Hopkins – Bouncy Balloon Bungalow – This one was probably the one I was most satisfied with coming to fruition. While the outside is a bit plain, I feel like I really got the interior the way I wanted to.
I was debating if I should do another or not, but Lottie ended up making the decision for me as apparently, I hit 70 vacation homes completed! Which is both more and less than I expected. Knowing I still have hundreds to do really hurts, honestly…
At this point, I don’t really unlock anything else (I think maybe I could with the Roommate feature, but to be blunt, I don’t particularly have any interest in it beyond ones when Villagers actually request them), but I still really would like to make every Villager a Vacation Home.
I really hope the upcoming update will go better and they finally add a search bar for both HHD and for when we’re making rooms for the new hotel. I still wish they would also say outright if they want one floor or two, but I know that’s unlikely to change.
Addendum as of December 26th, 2025: People asked for my thoughts on Mega Dimension when I finished it. To sum it up, they took everything I hated about the main game and made it worse. Even more point grinding alongside annoying timers. additional RNG, and other temporary mechanics and it just… isn’t fun. I’m sure there are people who will get enjoyment from it (especially those who like shiny hunting), but it is very much not for me. I hated pretty much every moment of it and the final fight (post-game DLC) was infuriating. Like the main game, the highlight is in the stories and characters, but it doesn’t nearly carry the DLC as well.
I hope the next DLC will be much better.
I finished the game in early November (Besides the DLC which has the first part releasing tomorrow (technically in a few hours from now oops)), so I wanted to kind of just ramble on my thoughts with it. This will be another “off-the-cuff” review (so no particular order of thoughts– just me spewing words), but before anything else, I want to state a few things that will explain some of my feelings:
1. I did not like Legends: Arceus. It is one of the only “main” Pokemon games I didn’t even bother finishing. My frustration with it is why I never planned to get another Legends game.
2. Graphics never matter to me and rarely have any effect on how much I enjoy a game. I won’t be talking much about them.
3. I only bought this game because Mega Audino was in it. If Mega Audino hadn’t been confirmed, I had no plans to get it.
In general, I think whether you enjoy this game will depend a lot on why you wanted to play. It’s very much a “your mileage will vary” and even my own opinion goes back and forth, but I will say I was fairly invested in the story either way.
With that out of the way, let’s get to it.
I actually really enjoyed X/Y so I was kind of excited to get back to Kalos and see the story continue to unfold. While it is a bit disappointing to be locked solely to Lumiose City, I didn’t necessarily mind until I remembered one little issue: I constantly got lost in Lumiose City in X/Y and had a terrible time finding my way. While this at least didn’t have the headache inducing camera swinging of my journey with the handheld game, I very quickly got frustrated with the verticality added to the city as I had a lot of trouble figuring out how to get to certain roof tops and it wasn’t always clear if it was an area I just couldn’t get to yet because the thing to help you get up there wasn’t activated or if I was just missing the way to do so.
I think if the roof-top areas were more compact or just… specific areas only, maybe it wouldn’t have bothered me so much, but as someone who struggles with getting around, any time I needed to find my way to a specific roof top often ended up with me feeling especially frustrated, let alone the number of times I accidentally fell off said rooftop and needed to find my way back there. Any feelings I had of them being kind of neat vanished pretty fast especially as despite the numerous numbers of quick-travel spots, you never actually unlock any on the rooftops so it’s always just re-finding your way.
Adding onto the navigational troubles was a new feature that felt especially out of place: Scaffolding. I get the idea that because of all this maintenance going on, there is scaffolding/construction everywhere that turns into these weird obstacle courses, but honestly, they just felt out of place here and like an eye sore. Most of the courses were pretty similar as well while others were just expecting you to either jump off a rooftop or glide a certain way than any kind of actual route through them.
Wild Zones were also a bit frustrating as while you start out with some there right away, most get unlocked as you get further into the story. The issue is that these areas do literally take over the map so old teleports change, you may need to run through a wild zone to get somewhere, and while I’m not sure how it could be done, I really kind of wish they were their own areas instead of places getting made over for them. Or if they were at least clearly set to be ahead of time to help with getting around.
Not being a fan of Legends Arceus, it should be no surprise that I got tired of being chased by Alpha Pokemon really fast. I do not like the system and especially in this game where it is present day and the whole point is to protect from Rogue Mega Evolutions in the meantime while letting people and Pokemon live in harmony– it sure doesn’t feel very harmonious when there is at least one Alpha in every single area. There also just isn’t a lot of room to even run away due to how small the areas are… Plus, the need to use Mega Evolved Pokemon or Plus Moves to be able to even do much to them.
In that same sense, I really did not enjoy the Rogue Mega Evolution battles. While they were less frustrating than Legends Arceus overall, I think my biggest issues were the changes done to Mega Evolution in the first place due to these (I’ll get to that later) and that having to both deal with your own health while also trying to keep your Pokemon out of harm was exhausting. I’ve never been particularly good at dodging which is why I kind of struggle with more extensive battles, but even if I could keep track of everything on screen, I didn’t necessarily manage to react fast enough to handle it (Or sometimes I just panicked and hit the wrong buttons).
When they first mentioned this real-time combat system, I was kind of expecting more control over my Pokemon’s movements, but instead, you really just had your trainer and depending on what attack you picked, your Pokemon may move closer to you. Pokemon also have set walking speeds so even if you’re running for your life, there isn’t any guarantee your Pokemon will stay close to you.
The most frustrating part of the system though is that you constantly have to hold down ZL to target a Pokemon to use an attack. I don’t know why it doesn’t work that once you target them, they stay targeted so you can attack easier, but nope, constantly have to hold it down which just felt so unnecessary to me. It also frequently led to me accidentally pushing the left stick down causing my character to crouch often when in the middle of running for my life which absolutely did not help.
Which brings me to the biggest let-down for me– the change to Mega Evolution being a timed thing instead of a one and done button. Not only was this incredibly frustrating in the actual boss-esque battles on top of needing to build up energy first as that was the main way to do damage (You could also use “Plus moves” from non-mega evolved Pokemon but it also required constantly re-hitting buttons and using up that same mega energy– Similarly, even if you had the energy maxed out before entering these battles, it would be reset when it started to force you to deal with the stupid energy gathering system), but it led to a lot of issues just playing in general:
No other character has to deal with this so where they have neat moments to immediately mega evolve their Pokemon, especially during certain battles in the ending, you’re stuck still trying to farm up energy.
Unless your Mega Pokemon isn’t currently out, that bar is always draining. Just wanted to take pictures? Too bad, you are now timed as the energy keeps dwindling down.
Similarly, they let you run around with a Mega, but it’ll still eventually turn back…
And it’s just… so frustrating. Like fine, if you need to earn energy in the boss battles, still earn the energy slowly, but then let it last. Don’t make it go away or at least let it go down slower in general. I really wish it could have stayed to being one button immediately that stays for the entire battle like how it worked in ORAS and X/Y. These having real-time combat should not have had any change to that. And it makes them feel less special and gimmicky like Dynamaxing where it can only work for a short time. Megas were a form transformation and they shouldn’t have been changed to some stamina system.
Or just, I don’t know, actually add some difficulty/accessibility modes like Megas do not have a stamina bar, your trainer can’t take damage, etc. The biggest issue with Pokemon lately is it wants to appease both hardcore and casual players but it ends up disappointing both because the former will find it too easy and the latter will get fed up with stuff clearly aimed at the former.
Such as the Restaurant Battles which are side quests that involve doing multiple battles in a row without being able to use any items (outside of held items obviously, but if you’re mega evolving, you can’t exactly give them a berry to hold). It’s not something I enjoy so those side quests will end up just… not being completed in the long run. Or the annoying side quests that require you using specific Pokemon only.
Considering I bought this game specifically because my favorite Pokemon was finally back, I was just… so incredibly disappointed that I couldn’t fully hang out with it. Even ignoring the timed issue with photos, Megas were a bit shafted in terms of poses/animations as well. While a Pokemon may have different animations depending on the music you play while taking a photo, for megas, the only pose they get is the “ready to fight pose”. Audino cheers, sits down to sleep… Mega Audino just stands there smiling, but hey, at least they actually modeled their mouth opening which is more than I can say Pokemon GO did as Mega Audino absorbs food through its face. As mentioned, only pose that is the same is the battle pose for obvious reasons, but it feels disappointing that they couldn’t give unique poses (or even just… animate the non-mega evolved poses onto the mega evolution like they did with the ready to fight animation) for the other things.
I really wanted more cute cafe moments, but for both that and sitting on a bench with your Pokemon, mega evolution is automatically undone, regardless of the timer. I also wish we could have multiple Pokemon out with us while we’re sitting at the cafe.
Regardless, for a game that I bought in hopes to hang out with Mega Audino, I barely got to do that due to all of this.
Of course, that wasn’t the only big disappointment for me… Customization was really upsetting as well. I will say if you are more of a pants and jackets type of person, there is plenty to choose from. Lots of hats, lots of shoes, more colors for most things, and even a neat customization option where you can mix and match parts of the same type of item. Unfortunately, there are some styles that are unique or maybe only have one other option and were also be limited in overall colors as well so while some things give you a lot to mix and match with, others fall incredibly short.
The main issue is the lack of skirts and dresses– something that had a lot more options in X/Y. In fact, there is only one actual skirt in the game which comes with tights forced in (which, as someone who was wearing tights anyway, it would have been nice to pick from any tights and not just the designed ones with the mini skirt)– every other skirt is a “skort” which unlike actual skorts that just have shorts sewn into the underside of a skirt, these are skirts in the front and shorts in the back making it feel more like wearing a loincloth in front of some shorts rather than a skort or a skirt.
There are no dresses at all. Despite how many characters around Lumiose may be wearing one.
And it’s like, sure, I guess I can take a cute picture but considering you will usually be seeing your character from behind, I just had to see her wearing these ugly shorts that really didn’t work as well.
I had been so excited about customization considering the long wavy ponytail and cute dresses and skirts in X/Y, but not only do we just have that huge lack of options skirt/dress-wise here, most of the hairstyles are on the shorter side as well with the ponytail being a short straight ponytail because the only long wavy hair is some mid-length style down to your mid-back. If there was at least a ponytail version of it, I’d be a bit less annoyed, but there isn’t. It feels like they put all the detail in the color options at the expense of actual hair styles.
It just really sucks. And especially with the skirt/dress issue, the only excuse I can think of is laziness due to all the verticality and not wanting to deal with any possible issues of dresses flipping up or something which just… I don’t know, you could make actual skorts or just do the weird black blob, who cares, just let me look cute.
Where the game does excel is with its characters, even if it did one thing I really hate, but that is a spoiler so I’ll be talking a bit more generally and mention when we’ll be getting into spoiler territory.
I think every character, including returning ones from X/Y, get a lot more fleshed out in the game. You have more moments hanging out and bonding with them and it helps give more of a connection than a lot of other Pokemon games have with your friend group. That said, while it does a lot for most characters here, I still found myself wondering about a lot of the other X/Y characters where most just get a footnote or cryptic response without more information.
I’m hoping maybe we’ll see more of them in the DLC, but who knows.
Even each Pokemon Center has an actual visually distinct Nurse Joy and you can even find some of them, with unique names, in the Z-A Battles.
The story itself was also interesting to some extent but was definitely carried by the characters more so than anything else. Where things got frustrating was with the choices it gave to our character. Without going into specifics, the most frustrating things were how many choices we got that were either:
-The same thing but said different ways. (To some extent, I didn’t necessarily always mind this as I often wanted to pick just one option of the two, but sometimes my answer wouldn’t be there at all and it becomes a question of why they gave us a choice in the first place)
-It doesn’t matter if there are other choices– there is only one right answer, and you can’t pick anything else. This is something that really killed one of the final choices in the game for me.
There was also a choice during a Mega Evolution side quest where you could pick your favorite mega, but it only actually gave you the choice to pick from the new starter ones. My disappointment was immense.
And with that, anything below this point goes into detailed story spoilers. If you do not want to be spoiled, I’d recommend stopping here, but otherwise, keep reading!
