7th June
Hello and welcome back to our regular feature where we write a little bit about some of the games we’ve been playing. This week, we get all excited about the arrival of Nintendo’s new console, the Switch 2, and we pop on our filtration suits and head into the deserts of Arrakis with the launch of Dune: Awakening.
What have you been playing?
Catch up with the older editions of this column in our What We’ve Been Playing archive.
Switch 2
Switch 2 has arrived! Yay!? I might elaborate on this a little at some point, but I’m somehow both very excited by this new console and simultaneously a little bored. Key to this, I think, is the lack of a classic Nintendo platformer or adventure to dive into. Mario Kart World is great fun, but Mario Kart has always been my side game, the one I play for 30 minutes here or there, not the main event.
I know Zelda is there, but I’ve played a lot of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom already. Maybe I’m greedy, but I just wish this launch had a little more to it.
-Tom O
Dune Awakening, PC
For the past few months my only experience playing Dune Awakening was through closed press previews and solo trips through the betas: solitary experiences! But with the public release on the 5th I was able to finally hop into this Survival MMO with friends.
I’ve got to say, it’s a blast. Grouping up together, building a cramped shared accommodation, blasting through scavenger camps and nicking each other’s materials from chests. I already had fond thoughts of Dune Awakening but the social aspect adds another layer that’s incredibly moreish. Even with a Switch 2 sitting next to me I long for the sands.
It is also endlessly entertaining to watch fresh-faced Dune players run into the worm for the first time. Their audible gasp when they see it emerge, and their panic on Discord when they know the chase is on. A reminder that the social aspects of multiplayer games are where the real juice is.
-Connor
Mario Kart World, Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Switch 2
I’m doing a medley because that’s what famous singers like me do, isn’t it? A trio of my greatest hits, except, it’s not my greatest hits but Nintendo’s Switch 2. What a laboured introduction.
I spent an evening with Switch 2 and I like it a lot. The device is sexy and slinky, and alternating between it and the Switch OLED model really highlights what’s changed. Everything feels better – the thumbsticks, the size of the thing, the feel on the skin. It feels expensive.
The games also look better running on it. I’ve been really keen to see what the Zelda upgrades are all about, so I fired up Breath of the Wild and bought the upgrade to see, and I’m impressed. Frame-rates often feel like such a cold thing to talk about but the buttery smooth 60fps, which I assume is what it’s running at now, makes a huge difference, and I think the picture has improved too? That’s hardly a Digital Foundry analysis but it’s enough to say I immediately noticed the change.
Mario Kart World: what a delight. I love moments of discovery like this, as people rush to find what’s possible in the new game. I haven’t properly gotten into a Mario Kart game in generations so there’s a lot that’s new to me, but I’m enjoying grinding on rails and performing tricks in the air as ways to get speed boosts; the battle royale-like tournaments bring a new dimension; and free-roam I’ve only nosed around but it feels gently transformational. The 24-player races make difference, too, and somehow energise races without over-crowding them.
Great start.
-Bertie