Feb 12 2020
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Fire Emblem Heroes Turns 3, Introduces Subscription-based Feh Pass

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Mobile strategy spin-off Fire Emblem Heroes is still getting updates and events three years after its release. During the month of February, Nintendo is hosting several special events to celebrate the anniversary. They’ve also introduced a new subscription service, the awkwardly named Feh Pass.

During the 3rd anniversary, you’ll be able to grab 333 Heroic Grails just by logging into Fire Emblem Heroes. A special summoning event will guarantee a 5 star hero summon from the pool of heroes that were added in 2019.

Other special events include Hero Fests, new quests, Daily Reward Maps, and Daily Bound Hero Battles, all of which can net Orbs and Dragonflowers. Aether Raids will also be available to earn special SP Aether Stones, which can be used to construct a unique 3rd anniversary structure.

Fire Emblem Heroes also now has a subscription service, which Nintendo is calling the Feh Pass. It comes with a rather shocking price: $9.49 per month.

The Feh Pass grants two 5 star Resplendent heroes each month, which include a hero in their normal, and resplendent attire. Resplendent Heroes feature new illustrations, voice acting, and boosted stats. The first Resplendent Hero is Lyn, available now. Starting on February 24, Cordelia will become available.

The Feh Pass also grants access to Special Quests, a re-do turn feature on maps, and the ability to replay the same map for no stamina cost. Kind of sucks that the last two are incredibly helpful features locked behind a paywall, in a game that already features real-money transactions and random loot boxes in the form of hero orbs.

Fire Emblem Heroes is free-to-play on iOS and Android.

Feb 12 2020
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Pokémon Home is Live, Pokémon Bank Free Through March 12

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Pokémon Home, the new cloud-based storage and trading app for pokémon, is now available on iOS, Android, and Nintendo Switch. Read our detailed breakdown of everything Pokémon Home offers.

Pokémon Home allows you to store, and more importantly, transfer Pokémon between games, including bringing in old favorites into Pokémon Sword and Shield – provided they are already in the Galar Pokédex. Infamously, Pokémon Sword and Shield was the first main pokémon game to not include a full National Dex, only supporting 400 of the nearly 900 total pokémon.

Pokémon Home supports the two mainline Pokémon releases: Sword and Shield, and Let’s Go, Pikachu and Let’s Go Eevee, as well as the Pokémon Bank app. Nintendo has plans to support Pokémon GO in the future.

Pokémon Bank was the previous cloud storage app, for Nintendo DS and 3DS. It supported all the previous generation Pokémon Games, from the GameBoy Advance era to 3DS (thanks to remakes like Fire Red for the earliest generation). Through Pokémon Bank and Pokémon Home, you can bring pokémon who are well over a decade old into the modern age!

There’s a catch, however. To transfer pokémon from Bank to Home, you’ll need to subscribe to the premium version of Pokémon Home. The premium plan costs $2.99 per month, or $4.99 for 3 months, and $15.99 for a year subscription.

If you haven’t ever used Bank before, or haven’t yet transferred that winning team from Sun and Moon, Nintendo is offering the use of Pokémon Bank for free for exactly one month, starting today, Feb 12, and ending March 12. By using Pokémon Bank and the free PokéTransporter app (for older games) you’ll be able to bring everyone over to Bank, then transfer everyone to Home.

Pokémon Home also includes a number of other features, including the Global Transfer System and Wonder Trades. Check out the official website for details.

Feb 03 2020
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Harry Potter: Wizards Unite Adds Adventure Sync for Easy Walkin’

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For hatching eggs in Pokémon GO there was no better feature than Adventure Sync. Niantic has recently added the steps tracker to their other augmented reality game, Harry Potter: Wizards Unite, to assist witches and wizards in unlocking their Portkey Portmanteaus.

Adventure Sync is an optional feature that allows the game to sync up with your smartphone’s built-in pedometer, which tracks the amount of distance you walk in a day.

Like Pokémon GO’s eggs, you need to walk a certain distance to unlock any acquired Portkey Portmanteaus. With Adventure Sync enabled, you no longer need to be in the game to apply your steps toward the unlocks.

Adventure Sync will need to be manually enabled in the settings menu. Assuming you have push notifications enabled, Wizards Unite will notify you when a Portmanteau has been unlocked.

As part of the update, Portmanteaus now feature different artwork depending on how much walking they require: a boot for 2 km, a kettle for 5 km, and a deflated ball for 10 km.

Players will now be able to acquire precious Spell Energy by interacting with Wrackspurts within a Portkey. Previous special or limited Portkey areas, such as Umbridge’s Office, are also returning, and we should start seeing new Foundables that weren’t previously found in Portkeys.

As a final incentive to unlocking new Portkeys, we’ll now be able to hold two additional Portmanteaus at one time, for a total of 10.

Harry Potter: Wizards Unite is available for free on iOS and Android mobile devices.

Jan 29 2020
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Pokémon GO Battle League Preseason Begins this Week

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Pokémon GO is about to get a lot more competitive. The GO Battle League has begun rolling out to Pokémon GO players, based on trainer level.

The GO Battle League is Pokémon GO’s online competitive multiplayer mode. As per the announcement last year, the GO Battle League features three different leagues (Great, Ultra, Master), though only one will be available at a time, rotating throughout a season.

During the preseason everyone will start with the Great League, before rotating to Ultra and Master every two weeks. Ultra League will be available starting Monday, Feb. 10, and Master beginning on Feb. 24, with Great League returning March 9.

Ranks begin at 1 and go up to 10, though ranks will partially reset when Season 1 officially begins. Niantic has not yet determined how long the preseason – or any season will be, a factor that will be determined throughout the preseason.

To access the Battle League you’ll need to walk five kilometers (3.1 miles) to unlock five online matches, which can be done up to three times a day. You can also spend PokéCoins to skip the walk and jump right into battle. Your first set of matches will be free, however.

Winning matches earn large amounts of Stardust as well as items and exclusive pokémon encounters. The first exclusive GO Battle League reward pokémon will be Pikachu Libre.

Pokémon GO is also in the middle of its Lunar New Year event, causing more red pokémon like Charmander, Vulpix, and Magikarp to appear in the wild and hatching from eggs. A Limited Research event tasks you with encounter Minccino, and because of the Year of the Rat, you’ll find lots of mouse-themed pokémon in the wild, such as Sentret and Pikachu.

The Pokémon GO Lunar New Year event ends Feb. 3.

Jan 28 2020
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Pokémon Home Free and Paid Versions Detailed, Coming Feb.

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Pokémon Home is a new cloud service app designed to help pokémon trainers store, trade, and transfer their collection of pokémon across multiple generations of games. Nintendo and The Pokémon Company have announced Pokémon Home is coming next month to iOS and Android mobile devices, as well as the Nintendo Switch, and provided details on the pricing and functionality.

Pokémon Home will be free to download for basic functionality, but you’ll need to enroll in the Premium Plan subscription if you’re hoping to transfer older generation pokémon from the 3DS era, as well as store and trade a larger amount of pokémon.

The Premium Plan is priced as follows (not including tax):

  • 1 month – $2.99
  • 3 months – $4.99
  • 12 months – $15.99

The free version allows the transfer of pokémon between the current Switch generation: Let’s Go, Eevee, Let’s Go, Pikachu, Sword, and Shield. However, once a pokemon from Let’s Go, Eevee or Let’s Go, Pikachu is transferred to Sword and Shield, it cannot be returned to its original game, due to Sword and Shield’s expanded features.

Pokémon GO will not be supported at launch but “there are plans to support Pokémon GO in the future.”

The basic plan only supports up to 30 pokémon in storage, and limits the number of pokémon you can include in Wonder Box trades and the Global Trade System.

With the Premium Plan, users can trade pokémon from Nintendo’s previous cloud service app, Pokémon Bank, which supported the Nintendo 3DS era of Pokémon games (and earlier using Poké Transporter). As a helpful bonus, both older apps will be free for one month after Pokémon Home’s release, letting you get everything organized into Bank, then into Home, though you’ll still need to pay for at least one month of Home for the Premium Plan. This should be obvious but: transferring from Bank to Home is a one-way street.

The Premium version also supports up to 6,000 pokémon in storage, up to 10 pokémon in Wonder Boxes, and 3 pokémon in the GTS. Premium users can also host trade rooms for more direct online trading.

To support all these pokémon, Home will officially add the National Dex to the latest generation (including Mega Evolutions). Pokémon Home also features Mystery Gifts, Home Points (which can be transferred to Battle Points), the Judge function (for Premium users), and various stats and pokémon news.

Note that there are important differences between the Switch and mobile versions of Home. Namely, the Switch version is used to move pokémon between the Switch games themselves, while the mobile version can perform trades and receive mystery gifts. Both versions can transfer from Pokémon Bank.

Pokémon Home is launching in February for mobile and Switch.

Jan 23 2020
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tetris

Tetris is Now on Mobile and It’s Free to Play

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Chances are you’ve played at least some form of Tetris in your lifetime; it’s one of the best-selling video games of all time (along with Minecraft). And now you can play it on your mobile phone, for free, courtesy of N3TWORK and The Tetris Company.

“Tetris is one of the most recognizable games in the world and we’re delighted today to make that experience available for free to millions of people worldwide,” said Neil Young, founder and CEO, N3TWORK. “We’re launching Tetris with a traditional solo gameplay mode, but we want fans to know that we’ve got so much more in store for them, and this is just the foundation of an incredible Tetris app experience we’re building at N3TWORK.”

This new version of tetris features swipe controls built specifically for mobile devices. It’s launching with a solo mode that can be played offline, as well as five different themes and 50 different player avatars. An online high score table is coming soon.

Tetris is available on both iOS and Android mobile devices. It’s free to play with ads, or you can pay $4.99 to disable the ads.