Topic: Nintendo Switch 2

@Azileron which makes sense! I think it just used most often since it's the easiest and simplest to justify when talking online or in public.

Like 100 hours of kinda boring gameplay or content, is still not that fun even if it's 60$ for example. But if it's like, 30 hours of pretty fun story and gameplay, paying 60$ is like... It's ok? Like not perfect, maybe some padding, but it doesn't seem bad if you enjoy solid 70-80% of the game.

Ring-a-ling-a-ling!!! We have yet another game people were complaining about performance but upon release it's a near flawless victory with the frame rate graph flatter than the plains of Nebraska. Not to mention gyro aiming as well as mouse aiming.

Yup. Cronos looks like a
seriously impressive debut on Switch 2

Should we start taking bets on the next game that gets headlines and youtube vids sounding the alarm over performance only to see it release in a perfectly satisfactory state?

It's good that it's a locked 30, but the visual quality and only 30 fps on a completely new console is disappointing, isn't it..? I mean it doesn't even look that good.

I came to the site to check the reviews for Silksong and Star Wars: Outlaws, and was surprised to see there isn't any, even though both games came out today. Didn't NL get review copies of them?

@OmnitronVariant
Heck no it's not disappointing. Its a brand new portable console running on less than 10 freaking watts, and this is a current gen AAA game. You'd see an ice cream truck in hell before you'd see a game like this exceed 30fps on a 10W handheld. It's a miracle it even runs at ten frames per second.

Anyone disappointed simply doesn't understand anything about video games or what they require. Not only is it not disappointing, it's downright exciting, and we'll serve as the new benchmark for what can be accomplished on the hardware (edit I was thinking Star Wars Outlaws when I said it would serve as the new benchmark, Idk why my mind drifted- Cronos isn't quite setting a new benchmark but it's definitely well done, releases day and date and offers both gyro and mouse aiming... so I guess it is at least setting the example.

If you EXPECTED a game like this to run higher than 30fps just because it's a "new system" so that you think it's "disappointing" it holds a rock solid 30fps, I don't even know what to say because your expectations are so far out there I can't even see them with binoculars anymore.

Future note:
No. A 10W handheld system won't run current gen AAA games at higher framerates, whether it's "brand new" or not. This is not a PS5, this is a portable Switch 2. That means instead of 60fps you get 30fps, but you get it on a 3-in-1 trybrid console.

@Polvasti
Silksong devs specifically stated, they will not send review copies out before release, because it would not be fair to backers.
If anyone else got to play the game before they did. They already sent me a code but it won't unlock until the game officially releases. Idk about Star Wars.

But we do know it looks incredibly good- many are saying it's the best looking handheld game they've seen in their life. And we know performance is stable and holding down a nice, smooth 30fps with good frame timing. As to whether the game itself is good or not I'm sure you could read a review for any platform for that.

@JaxonH You're conflating "technically impressive" with "visually appealing". The game is a modern AAA title with a lot of fancy rendering techniques that do not scale well to look good on this 10w handheld, even if strictly technically speaking it's impressive.

I was a game engine engineer until I quit the industry. I understand how difficult it is to get this game running on 10w. But from a customer point of view? I don't care. I want the game to look good on its own merits. This is an important distinction.

I don't think the game looks good on Switch 2, even if it's obviously technically impressive that it can even run on it at all. Does that make sense?

Edit: I see you edited to mention you were thinking about Star Wars Outlaws, but I'll keep my points above the same, as I feel they apply equally well to that, sans locked-30 fps from the previous comment, which SWO doesn't seem to manage last I checked?

@JaxonH Thanks for the info, I didn't know that about Silksong. I was a bit surprised to learn that it will only be 30 fps, since Hollow Knight was 60 fps on the Switch, and based on the trailers Silksong doesn't look that much more demanding. I wonder if there'll be a 60 fps version for the Switch 2? In most cases 30 fps is perfectly fine for me as long as there's no significant drops and the frame pacing is steady, but with game like these that require a lot of precise timing in your movements, 60 fps would be ideal.

@OmnitronVariant Disapointing? It is? I usually can’t tell the difference so long as a game hovers around 30fps. Usually not even on my list of why I buy a game.

I am so curious as to what frame-rate sensitive people see when they game. I suppose I am lucky though. My lack of perception means I can play most games with no issues. The only games I worry about are fighting games and so long as I have a good training mode with hit boxes and timers I am fine (as I still can’t tell the difference physically.) Music games can be off but usually just requires a tv or in-game tweak (and I suspect I have to lower the fps to see it).

@Azileron
Oh, I absolutely agree, it's just (unfortunately) how most people seem to judge "value" of video games.

@Ryu_Niiyama It’s about how the end result looks… Ignore that it’s an impressive port; does the end result actually look good on its own merits on a brand new console? I don’t see how anyone can claim it does.

People need to stop letting hypemasters and influencers confuse them by talking about how technically impressive a port is: It’s irrelevant. All that matters is whether the end result looks good and runs well. These AAA ports look like blurry ***** and run poorly. As a customer, it’s not acceptable.

Nintendo needs to demand publishers release games that look good and runs well on their hardware judged by its own metrics, not based on technical mumbojumbo like “well it’s super demanding on <other hardware> so it even running on Switch 2 is a miracle”.

Hogwash.

@OmnitronVariant
And yet, the irony of your statements is that “looks good” tends to be a pretty subjective thing.

@Polvasti
??

Silksong is 120fps

I must have got confused or something. Because I wasn't referring to Silksong.

Cronos and Star Wars run at 30fps. But Silksong is 60fps on Switch and 120fps on NSW2.

Star Wars Outlaws is only 20 GB on Switch 2. And it has extensive gyro aiming options in the settings.

I'm... dang near speechless. A quality current gen AAA game with good resolution both docked and handheld, with a very smooth and stable framerate, and a small file size and with gyro aiming. Oh, and it has raytracing too, for what its worth.

It's basically a perfect port. Its everything you'd want a Switch 2 game to be. We've seen a number of quality games get quality ports but usually they have insanely large file sizes or they don't offer gyro aiming or the performance is a little wonky or whatever.

This is the last game I'd have expected to nail the bullseye across the board like this. Just the fact it looks great visually and runs great is impressive in itself. But wrapping it all up in a 20 GB file size with an entire menu devoted to various gyro aiming options elevates it from a recommendation to a must-buy imo.

Keep cranking out games of this caliber with gyro and/or mouse integration and tiny file size (it's only a couple GB larger than Kirby for goodness sakes) and I'll gobble em all up, one after another.

@JaxonH it gives me a lot of hope for more current gen ports (BG3, Death Stranding 2, FF7 Rebirth).

It's a portable console, I'm not sure what you were expecting for a game with RT lighting. Frankly I do agree that the game doesn't look great but the distracting thing for me is the noise. Which is also present on PS5. But on a small screen I'm sure it'd be fine. Stable 30fps with the image that I saw? That's pretty decent on this kind of device

Also.....
https://steamdeckhq.com/game-reviews/star-wars-outlaws/

Unfortunately, Star Wars Outlaws runs poorly on the Steam Deck, likely due to enforced Ray-Tracing. Although you can get the game to boot and "play", the performance is just unacceptable, often in the mid-20s and occasionally dropping below 20 FPS even with no action on the screen. Star Wars Outlaws is a game you'll have to skip playing on the Steam Deck

@skywake Part of porting and optimizing a game and its engine is also not using technology the host platform can't feasibly support. Ray-tracing isn't an automatic benefit to a game. I know and fully understand ray-tracing is impressive to run at all on the Switch 2 — I used to work on game engines. From scratch. I get it. But I don't care from a customer level when the end result is a very low resolution, blurry upscaled image where everything else has to be cut back to the bare minimum just to have that feature work at all.

It's a bad optimization job. I'm not going to waste my time explaining the minutia of why ray-tracing isn't some magic checkbox that makes things "next-gen", I have a feeling you don't care. But if you do care there's plenty of resources to learn the pros and cons and why it's not even necessary for a game like Star Wars Outlaws. In fact the game could run and look better without it, but they chose to design it from the ground up with that feature and in the process alienate large swathes of hardware.

Yes it's impressive it runs at all on Switch 2. And if Switch 2 is your only platform and you're willing to just accept any visual quality level as long as you get the game ported, that's OK. But I think it was a really bad decision and I'm not impressed.

@OmnitronVariant
I'm not defending the game or Ubisoft's approach here. As I said the game has a fairly noisy image even on PS5 and personally I'm not a fan of it. Also I'm not picking it up because I still haven't gone through Jedi Survivor

But given the decisions they made and given how this game performs on other platforms I would say the results are perfectly reasonable for a portable gaming device. The image is alright for a screen that small and a stable 30fps (plus VRR to assist) is fine. It's not perfect, it's not fantastic, but it's certainly serviceable

To call it disappointing given the cards delt is, frankly, a naive and unrealistic take

@skywake The cards dealt are irrelevant to me as a customer, so I wouldn't buy it. I'm not one of those people who chant "corporations bad" as a knee-jerk reaction, I get there are challenges. But we also shouldn't defend them for them if the result is subpar.

We might subjective disagree here and that's fine. Subjectively I don't buy games that look this fuzzy, ugly (IMO), and extremely pared back, even if it were the only platform I had available. There's plenty of games — I don't need to part with my money for what I perceive as mediocre efforts.

@OmnitronVariant
TBH I feel like you're arguing with someone other than me here. I'm not defending the game, I'm not buying the game. I'm just saying that calling the results here "disappointing" is unnecessarily negative

If someone wants to play this game and wants a portable experience? I think the end result here is serviceable and, frankly, is a better result than I was expecting

Took a few screenshots in Star Wars Outlaws. This game is really impressive visually for a trybrid console.

Seems Elden Ring has already improved since the last demo, too. As expected. By release it should be a nice finished product.