Nintendo Switch IMPRESSIONS: Endless Ocean Luminous (2024)
Back during the heyday of the Nintendo Wii, there was no shortage of creative swings being made by software developers, both large and small: Attempts to stretch the boundaries of what video games could be. Since the console was appealing to just about every age range, it was a great period of opportunity to take chances, make mistakes and who knows? Perhaps even stumble upon some new type of interactive experience that actually worked. This resulted in plenty of bargain bins filled with what came to be known as “shovelware.” Games that were essentially quick cash in jobs attempting to capitalize on the motion control craze. And a couple of titles which stood out as arguably successful examples of experimentation in that overpopulated sea cough crowd, were the Endless Ocean games.
It’s been about 15 years since the second game in this series was released on the Wii and to say that the landscape of the medium has changed would be quite an understatement. While the Switch has managed to do the unthinkable and outsell that console (and now seven years since launch, continue to live near the top of the sales charts), it was still a surprise when this third installment, Luminous was announced a few months back. It seemed like a bit of a relic of a bygone era, a franchise that came and went and was cool and all but nothing I don’t think anyone was particularly nostalgic for.
I have to say that I did get a little excited when the trailer was revealed at the end of that Nintendo Direct. Mostly because I enjoyed the first game quite a bit and thought that the second was fine, if not more of the same. For those of you who never checked them out, this is what it is: You swim around exploring the ocean with very simple, elegant and easy to pick up controls, finding all sorts of sea creatures and fill up a logbook learning about them. There’s other stuff you can do, but that’s the real meat of the experience, the elevator pitch. To even call it a game doesn’t feel quite right, as it’s really more like (very pretty) interactive laptop wallpaper.
Now that’s not gonna work for some people and actually as it turns out, many people because the reviews for this one have been pretty harsh across the board. But the Endless Ocean series isn’t one that’s concerned about any sort of traditional ways of playing. There are no high scores, there’s no end boss, no “winning” as it were. Which for me, makes it a nice change of pace to throw on every now and then. I can 100% see why the snail-pace on display can be considered boring but that’s precisely why I dig it.
So last night after it finished downloading, I clocked in a few hours the way I used to back in the day: In a bit of an altered state with Music Has the Right to Children by Boards of Canada playing in the background. The original Endless Ocean had a really cool feature where you could play your own music during the game by throwing some MP3’s onto an SD card and it was that record plus Open Spaces from the There Will Be Blood soundtrack that were in full rotation during my deep sea dives. This was a very specific time period my friends.
Well, now that I’ve played a bit of it was it worth the wait? Were we even waiting for it?
Honestly, it really took me back in ways I wasn’t expecting. Yes, it does kind of boil down to it being more of more of the same but I’m totally fine with that. And outside of a modded SNES classic, the Switch is the only console that I have connected to our television so it’s nice to have a unique experience like this to check in with every now and then. It will certainly never see the play activity hours of something like Balatro, but with my Wii boxed up (somewhere) out there in the garage, this is a welcome and convenient addition to the library. If you enjoyed one or both of the other Endless Ocean games, I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t be able to get into Luminous. They could have just as well released the originals with widescreen support and a slick coat of HD paint and I’d have been happy. But instead we’ve got a new one! Of course today being day one, I’ve only begun to scratch the surface of the various modes and stuff. Apparently you can go online now with a bunch of people and explore together but…
…yeeeeah, I’m not doing that.
If you do manage to find a groove with Luminous and want to get a little something extra out of it, have a look at your missions and rewards on the Nintendo Switch Online page. From now through to the end of the month, you can trick out your profile icon with some random sea creatures for a low key flex.
And there’s also another one of those Tetris 99 Maximus Cups running from Friday, May 10th until the end of Monday, May 13th. Play some matches to score 100 points anytime during that time window and you can unlock Endless Ocean art, music and tetrimino(?) designs to the game. Those things have been awesome to collect and they can really stick it in and break it off if you miss out on a theme that you want.
