Hearken to this, my fellow retro gaming sickos: Nintendo is finally catering to our very unusual tastes with the latest updates to the Nintendo Switch Online retro game library. This time, we’ve gotten a pair of N64 games that I’d wager you’ve either never heard of or entirely forgotten up until this moment.
Extreme-G and Iggy’s Reckin’ Balls both hit the N64 library in the premium Expansion Pack tier of NSO earlier this week. They’re both racing games, but while Extreme-G is a fairly straightforward sci-fi racer, Iggy’s Reckin’ Balls is a bizarre, grappling-hook-based racer with ball-like characters and tracks mostly made up of big towers to climb.
Neither of these are the sorts of titles that’d typically make a list of the best N64 games. They’re not bad games by any stretch, but rather than defining the console they’re more the sort of thing that you might have fond memories of renting for a weekend or pulling out of a bargain bin back in the day. You’ll certainly find a lot of comments from people who did exactly that under the YouTube trailer for this release – hidden memories of pleasant games suddenly unlocking all these years later.
And while plenty of people remain annoyed that genuine classics like Super Smash Bros. have never been added to the service, games like these are what retro gaming is all about. Sure, people like me might’ve gotten into playing old games to experience the classics we missed the first time around, but I just bought a copy of Sony‘s bizarro PS2 racer Kinetica eBay. I might have a sickness, but the cure is more weird old games. In other words, you guys need to hop on Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg.
guy who has played 100 video games: Ocarina of Time not only changed the gaming landscape, but also changed my life. Truly a testament to the staying power of digital entertainmentguy who has played 1000 video games: you guys need to hop on Billy Hatcher and the Giant EggOctober 22, 2023
There’s a weird bit of history with Extreme-G and Iggy’s Reckin’ Balls, too, since both were put out by the long since defunct publisher Acclaim. If you look closely at the box art in the trailer above, you’ll see that the Acclaim logos have been scrubbed out and replaced by a logo for Throwback Entertainment – a small Canadian company that scooped up a chunk of the Acclaim library way back in 2006 and has been acting as a steward for old games since well before ‘retro gaming’ was an established hobby.
After 26 years stuck in Japan, Nintendo finally released a forgotten SNES Mario worldwide on Switch.