Sakurai talks about the future of Smash Bros

Masahiro Sakurai “not thinking of a sequel” to Super Smash Bros.

In an interview with Japanese magazine Famitsu, Masahiro Sakurai was asked if he’s already pondering the next game for Super Smash Bros. but he’s currently undecided on what’s next.

“I am not thinking of a sequel. I am not thinking of it every time. However, I can’t say with certainty that this would be the end of Smash,” he told Famtisu, but he’d likely be involved if there was.

• Super Smash Bros. Ultimate debuted in late 2018
• Kingdom Hearts‘ Sora was the last DLC fighter
• Total sales topped 24.77m as of June 30, 2021
• He’s also ended his bi-weekly Famtisu column

’No successor’: “I currently don’t see a path where Smash can be produced without myself,” and said they “did actually try leaving it to someone else, but it didn’t go well.” Sakurai created Kirby too.

Figuring it out: Should Super Smash Bros. continue then he’d have to hold a “debate on whether it will succeed or not” with Nintendo. For now, he plans to lie low for a time to let the dust of Ultimate settle.

What was the first Laura Bow game?

a) The Dagger of Amon Ra
b) A Puzzle of Flesh
c) The Colonel’s Bequest
d) Land of the Lounge Lizards

The answer will be revealed at the bottom of today's issue. Join up with our community on Twitter and Facebook to discuss what the answer could be.

Gary Bowser pleads guilty to piracy, owes Nintendo $4.5m in restitution

Canadian Gary Bowser has altered his plea to guilty in the legal proceedings brought against him by Nintendo as a member of hacking group Team-Xecuter, and he’s got quite a bill to pay.

Team-Xecuter targeted many game companies arguing their activities weren’t ‘piracy’ but an extension of the ‘right to repair’ movement, despite providing means for pirated software to run.

Caught: Bowser was arrested in the Dominican Republic back in September 2020 and deported to the US. He was accused of advertising and trafficking circumvention devices as part of the group.

Payback: He initially denied wrongdoing but has now agreed to pay Nintendo $4.5 million in restitution, although Nintendo still has an open and separate legal case against him directly.

Early Legend of Zelda ‘portal tech demo’ shown off by former developer

British game maker Giles Goddard has shown off some of the early footage they put together showcasing teleporting ‘portals’ working on the Nintendo 64 using The Legend of Zelda.

Goddard has worked on classics like Star Fox, Super Mario 64, and other 90s titles. He also helped make the infamous Zelda 64 tech demo from 1995 of Link fighting a metallic knight.

N64 R&D: “You had a portal where you could look through, go in and you’d be teleported to a different part of the map,” he said. “It was R&D for the game, […] what could we do with the hardware on the N64?”

For science: Valve would greatly popularise the idea with the release of Portal. “When I saw Portal I thought ‘oh, actually, I had that running on the N64, I should have released it then!'” joked Goddard.

Let’s Build a Zoo PC giveaway

Do you like pixels? Do you like animals? Then you are going to love Let's Build a Zoo, which lets you build and manage your own zoo with over 500 different animals that you can also genetically engineer into a veritable infinity of adorable abominations.

Design enclosures, hire staff, keep your guests happy and make sure nature does not find a way out of your park. Enter our Let's Build a Zoo Giveaway for a chance to win a key and build the zoo of your dreams.

VR, Crime Pays and THQ Nordic sales

We start off with The Fall VR Sale over at Humble Bundle with up to 90% off a whole selection of virtual reality experiences that includes Batman, The Walking Dead a whole lot more.

Then we have the Crime Pays Sale with games falling off the back of a truck up to 90% off, and finally the THQ Nordic Anniversary Sale with discounts of up to 80% for some big names.

Song in the Smoke coming to SteamVR

17-Bit’s survival game Song in the Smoke is making its way to SteamVR expanding its presence on PC, which has been exclusive to the Oculus Store. There’s no release date yet but it’s got a Steam store page ready.

Blade & Sorcery: Nomad for Oculus Quest

A standalone and optimised release of Blade & Sorcery is heading for Oculus Quest 2 this November 4 with Blade & Sorcery: Nomad. It’s built specifically for the Oculus headset sharing “almost all of the features and content” as the PCVR version.

VR puzzler Gravitational out November 11

Delayed gravity-based puzzler Gravitational is finally ready as Brazilian studio Electric Monkeys nails it to November 11. We’ll play as Sebastian a wheelchair bound scientist using gravity-defying tech but something goes wrong and he must shutdown the experiment.

• Switch production 20% below Nintendo's plans as chip shortages lead to a fall in manufactured units
• Roblox devs apologise over major game outage with “several factors” triggering a perfect storm
• Stardew Valley board game reopens orders as they received fresh stock but might miss Christmas
• Forza Horizon 5 and both Minecraft versions now join Xbox Game Pass alongside so much more
• Sony are flying Jumbos full of PlayStation 5s to the UK specially chartered to deal with shortages this winter

What was the first Laura Bow game?

ANSWER: The Colonel’s Bequest!

Laura Bow isn’t a household name, but her two games with Sierra Entertainment helped influence adventure games on PC. Her first game was The Colonel’s Bequest all the way back in 1989. The game sees Laura Bow invited by her friend to a family sugar plantation, where a family will leads to high tensions and violent murders.

What makes The Colonel’s Bequest notable for the time is its greater focus on character interaction over puzzles and a lack of a scoring system similar to what we saw in King's Quest. Since this is a detective story heavily based on Agatha Christie, it’s only fair that the goal of the game is to figure out the motives and plans of its ensemble. It’s only six bucks on GOG, so it’s worth the cost of admission if you’re looking for an old-school mystery.

Today's issue of DailyBits was written by Gavin Herman, Erlend Grefsrud, Simon Priest, and Jamie Davey. If you have any feedback or news tips for the team, please email us!