Topic: Is The Switch 2 Worth It???

@Bolt_Strike
Man, do you ever get sick of people making excellent points and then just being like, "Well yea, but uh... does it really?"

lol

@Polvasti

I'm sure the Switch 1 could do Cyberpunk. You see people running it on very weak PC hardware in a so called potato mode. Some of these computers have less than 200 Gflops of GPU performance and these aren't optimised versions for a fixed platform. The Switch 2 has roughly three times the CPU performance of Switch 1, a passmark score of about 2000 compared to 600 and that would be the main limitation. I've seen games converted to PS Vita and 3DS and they are ok. So yes it would be possible but of course it would be visually inferior and simplified to allow for lower CPU resources. An example of a game that had high PC requirements that came to Switch is I guess ARK: Survival Evolved. You can wander around defecating on Switch just like other formats. Yes texture quality and resolution is heavily reduced and I would say its not the full fat experience but it works and is playable. I remember when Half Life 2 came to the original Xbox. I loved it, it wasn't as good as PC but it was still a great game and all done in just 64MB of system memory. The Switch is 6x as powerful as the original Xbox in CPU performance and about 20x as powerful in docked GPU performance and not forgetting it has 64x as much memory.

I actually feel with the increase in pricing Nintendo may put more focus back on the original Switch. If Nintendo are forced to raise Switch 2 pricing and that limits the user base and Nintendo makes more of its money from software sales I feel a few games may come to Switch 1 that perhaps wouldn't have originally unless we had this RAM and storage chip crisis with hyper inflation.

I don't think the Switch will die with a wimper, I think we will see its death throes going on for perhaps another 3 years or more especially for smaller developers where their game is still a perfect fit.

I personally don't see mouse controls as a good thing, I don't like them. Just about any hardware can use them even the original Switch if running Linux or Android but I've never liked it myself much preferring a controller. I know they can be good for competitive multiplayer shooters but that isn't for me.

For what it's worth, Xenoblade 3D can run on an original 3DS if you mod it. The code is 100% compatible, and it doesn't use the extra RAM or any of the other features. It just suffers from severe slowdown at points, so I'd guess that they just made it a New 3DS exclusive to avoid the criticisms that it would have picked up if released for all models.

There are, of course, several other games that will only work on the New 3DS, such as Fire Emblem Warriors.

I have some concern for the people who saw those "impossible ports" on the Switch and thought "this is acceptable, I don't see any need for better hardware ever. Not even in 10 years from now when that would be incredibly viable". Both for their general inability to see the issue but also for their poor grasp of the economics at play

And the response I expect to get for this comment will be something along the lines of "they should just optimise the game". Righto, let's just all push this "optimise here" button and all will be good right? Unbelievable

@BonzoBanana
Dude... barf. Seriously.

You're not telling us anything we don't know. There are entire Youtube channels devoted to running games on waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay underspec PCs. That sort of thing has been around for years and years.

But what those channels don't do is actually PLAY through the whole game and enjoy it lol

Curious... have you tried to play something like Hogwarts Legacy on the Switch? Would love to know the answer.

@rallydefault Yeah, there's also the related genre of running games on emulators for thirty seconds before the frame rate sinks, glitches start appearing and the game crashes.

On the whole, I'd stick up for "impossible" Switch ports being a good way to experience games on a handheld platform that wouldn't otherwise have been possible at the time. However, you're doing yourself something of a disservice these days by not using something more powerful to play them, and the Switch 2 is one such option.