Super Smash Bros. Ultimate doesn’t need an introduction for most gamers. The series began as a casual fighting party game with the first installment back in 1999 on the N64, but evolved into a full-fledged competitive fighter over the years with nearly 100 playable characters (including DLC content) and even more stages to battle it out with friends.
Whether you’re looking to dive into the Smash Bros. world for the first time with the purchase of a new Nintendo Switch this holiday season or are just on the hunt for deals on the classics, the Cyber Week discount on Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is definitely worth checking out. You can grab one of the best Switch games out there at Amazon right now for just $50 (a cool 16% discount off the normal price). Seasoned Switch owners will know that discounts on first-party Switch games are few and far between, so this is definitely a deal you’ll want to take advantage of — chances are you won’t see this game at a better price for quite a while.
Super Smash Bros. Ultimate is an absolute blast for both competitive gamers and casual fans. Younger players or players building up their fighting skills can tackle the arcade mode (which has a difficulty slider), play against CPU enemies at their skill level or have an all-out brawl with friends in offline multiplayer. More advanced players can always bump up the difficulty or participate in online matches with players on their level. It’s easily one of the best multiplayer games on Switch and has been for many years.
And if you’re looking to pick up a game to play solo, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate delivers a decent single-player experience as well. The World of Light campaign is a world-colliding journey that pits a single player against an evil being. After a mysterious and powerful being transforms nearly all Nintendo characters into possessed slaves, it’s up to Kirby to free them and utilize “spirits” (power-ups that alter fighter stats) in order to power up the growing team and return balance to the universe. It’s not drastically different from the limited stories we’ve seen from Smash Bros. before, but through a mix of puzzles and stage design, World of Light truly feels like a comprehensive look at Nintendo history.
And while you’re hunting for Cyber Week game deals, you might want to take a look at our roundup of best Switch controllers as well — Super Smash Bros. Ultimate can be played with any control but is much better with a designated traditional controller instead of the standard Joy-Cons.
Acer’s Predator Atlas 8 finally has a US release date and price, several months after the company first showed off the handheld in May. The highlight is the Intel Arc G3 Extreme chip inside, which has been adopted by only a couple of other consoles besides the Atlas 8. This version will go on sale exclusively at Best Buy on November 1 for $1,299.99.
Acer originally said the Atlas 8 would arrive in North America in October, but left pricing open at the time. The launch came amid the ongoing DRAM crunch, which has made memory more expensive across the PC industry and complicated pricing for hardware makers.
Gaming laptops and I have a complicated relationship. One of my first gaming rigs was an Acer Predator that was already outdated when I bought it. I was a broke college kid, and that was the best I could afford. So trying out high-end gaming laptops is always fun. But ASUS' ROG Zephyrus G14 is a lot more than a laptop that can run AAA games. It is portable, so you're not lugging around a 2.5kg machine everywhere you go. It is built well, none of that plastic chassis, and can even function as a normal laptop outside of just gaming.
Google Play is borrowing one of the Nintendo Switch’s most useful little tricks. A new Sidekick tool called Playbacks captures a short clip after something interesting has already happened, sparing players from running a screen recorder throughout an entire game.
Playbacks is part of Google Play Store v53.8 and keeps saved clips on the phone. Google first announced it earlier this month, but the new Play Store update marks its arrival for players. Anyone who has watched a perfect win vanish because the record button came too late already understands the appeal.