Topic: 2019 concerns

Yeah im Switch only, and thats by choice.
Got rid of my PS4 Pro 6 months after the Switch launched and havent looked back.
Cyberpunk 2077 is probably the only game that would make me buy another console.

All that said though, Switch's offerings are a lot more "niche" than what PC/other consoles give. So if you go all-in on one platform, consider what provides you the best stuff instead of just blindly going for one platform.

So anecdotes like me and a lot of others here shouldn't exactly speak for everyone else.

Is this because of deficiencies in the Switch's library or because of how we've come to define "core" and "casual" gamers. It's kinda during the PS3/360/Wii days that this particular usage of these terms gained traction. Of course it was true at that point, the things the PS3/360 & PC could do were well beyond what was possible on Wii. The 360 at launch was significantly ahead of the curve and the Wii at launch would have struggled to wow people with it's on specs 5 years prior. The audiences were also vastly different so it just made sense to categorise the platforms as such.

But the fact is that the gap between Switch and PS4/XBOne is significantly smaller than it was between Wii and 360/PS3. Both technically and in terms of audience. Sure it launched late in the cycle but even so I think it's fairly safe to say that there's less of a performance gap between Switch and even the XBOne X than there was between the Wii and the 360. I think it's also fair to say that there are more "mature" games on Switch that sell well than there were on Wii. Also the "mature" games the Switch gets aren't seen as novelties like MadWorld was on Wii.

I think this is only going to change more as the Switch continues to gain ground. Eventually some of these developers and publishers will have to make a bit more of an effort for Switch. If they don't they'll find themselves cutting themselves off from an audience of "core" consumers who are perfectly happy to be Switch only gamers.

@skywake I guess I could also say the same about XBO and PS. The point is that having only one console isn’t great and you would be missing out on everything else. I love both casual and “hardcore” games on my Switch, but that doesn’t mean I wouldn’t want to use PC. The Switch appeals to all kinds of gamers, as do all of the consoles. And by hardcore I meant someone that’s been playing video games for quite a while, even though that doesn’t define the player’s skill level.

I don't think it has much at all to do with skill level or the amount of time you've been playing games. I also think that you can be part of the "core" gamer audience and be a one platform consumer. These things do tend to be correlated but that's not how I'd define the term if you were to use it.

I'd define it something more along the lines of this. A "core" gamer is someone who purchases and plays on average 1 new game a month or more. Doesn't matter if it's a retail release, indie title, a game on sale or whatever. The point is you're going through enough content that you're always looking for the next thing. This is the consumer that Reggie was talking about when he said this back in '08:

If you're a casual consumer that sort of schedule is more than fine. You can go months without something new, at the end of the platform's life you'll have less than 10 games. But if you're the kind of consumer who's buying into something new every month you will ask "where are the games, what's coming out in August and October?". That consumer will tend to buy into a second platform if they're not getting that volume of content on a single platform.

But I think it's still fair to say that the Switch is getting enough to potentially satisfy that consumer. I mean I typically buy more than one game a month on average. The only reason I buy games on PC over the Switch is because consoles are garbage for FPS (even when Switch has those titles)

I don't really agree with this. I'd argue PC gaming makes more sense today precisely because of these two reasons. It used to be that there were a lot of platform exclusives, these days there are not. So when you go with a PC these days it's not like you're missing out on that many games outside of Nintendo's stuff.

And in terms of system specs? It's much, much harder to go wrong these days than it used to be. Pretty much any CPU these days will handle the vast majority of titles. You are unlikely to need more than 8GB of RAM to run the vast majority of games and 8GB+ is standard. Storage isn't really much of a concern anymore either. Then for the GPU? Unless you're going for 4K most mid range GPUs can handle the vast majority of titles without issue.

Sure you can still get really into PC hardware and you can spend a LOT of money getting high spec gear. And yes there are still titles that are platform exclusives, there always will be. But the gap between PCs and Consoles has never been smaller. And this movement has almost exclusively been to the benefit of PC gaming

@skywake I think the average consumer have far fewer titles than 10. The attach rate is something like 8-9, but some gamers (i.e Jaxon) will skew that number upwards. It would be interesting to see the median number of games instead.

Says the guy that desperately wants sims 4 on the switch. You do realize that the best version is on PC, right?

I am personally a PC gamer first and foremost. This is because my preferred genres are usually better on PC. I can't agree with people saying Civ VI is just as good on switch as it is on PC, it is a far slower and clunkier experience on console. While I do like fire emblem, there is little doubt in my mind it would be a better experience on PC.

But I do think certain genres are definitely better on consoles. I.e platformers, fighters and third-person games etc. I think Nintendo is the best complement for me. The PS4 could probably fill that role as well, but my rose tinted glasses makes Nintendo the best choice.

You're probably right but either way the "average" consumer is buying far less content than anyone on these forums would be. Anecdotally when I've seen ads of people selling consoles ~5 games seems the usual number. Though I'm not sure whether or not "core gamers" are more attached to their consoles and are less likely to sell. Either way I think ~10 as an average at EOL is a close enough estimate.

Not trying to convince you of anything I just think it's an odd argument to make. For a start these days when people say "exclusive" what they mean is "console exclusive". And the exclusives that are actually exclusives aren't anywhere near as common as they used to be. Of the 10 best selling PS4 games last year only two weren't on PC.

And your second point is just odd. There have been what, two major releases in the last 5 years or so that had seriously poor PC optimisation at launch? I think one of them hit AMD cards harder than it hit NVidia. Sure, that's definitely a thing that has happened but it's not like console gamers are immune from crappy game launches. Even so it's not like the game didn't run on AMD, it ran like garbage on both from memory.

It’s rather strange to see the “concerns” of some around the internet in regards to Switch’s line-up. I can’t open up my browser these days without seeing a new Switch announcement, developers expressing interest in putting their titles on Switch or being positive about the financial performance of their Switch sku’s.

The internet, or in this case, people insecure about the purchases, people who are easily swayed, concern trollers and what not just have their goggles on and never look beyond their own interests. Metroid Prime 4 development restarted? Well there isn’t anything left to play!

Everybody with half a brain: ... what?

If you look at the releaselist, Nintendo will be allright. They released NSMB U Deluxe, Travis Strikes Again and this year will feature Daemon x Machina, Yoshi’s Crafted World, Fire Emblem Three Houses, Town, Pokémon 8, Animal Crossing, Luigi’s Mansion 3 and Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3. And thats just what’s known.

As for third parties; you won’t get everything. Still, with Final Fantasy, Resident Evil, Darksiders, Mortal Kombat 11, Doom Eternal, Crash Team Racing and others arriving 2019 will be interesting. Switch will be allright.

@Sadist It's all about the lack of release dates. While we know about plenty of games coming sometime in the future, we know virtually nothing about when they'll come except the games already released, Yoshi and a few 3rd party games. Vague release windows like "2019" mean nothing.

@Yorumi Yeah, although if I were to tell someone to invest in ONE platform only, it's PC. Infinite backwards and forwards compatibility (for the most part, Idk about MSDOS games or stuff like that), infinite controller options (mouse + keyboard, PS4 controller, Xbox controller, Switch/Wii U controller, you name it), the best performance in games, the ability to go beyond 60fps (which does make a difference, trust me NLers), mods for cool stuff, and almost all third-party games.

No console can match what PC has.

I'm still a Nintendo fan first and foremost and will game on my Switch over PC because I actually do value portability a lot and the other platforms don't give me as much games I'm interested, but you can't really argue against PC or even Sony/Microsoft's strength as a sole platform compared to Nintendo.

Although I could also argue that people that don't really buy much games per year can still make do with a Nintendo console as their primary platform, expanding beyond just hardcore Nintendo fans. For those that invest heavily into gaming though, going multiplatform is indeed the best option.

@Yorumi @EvilLucario Exactly what both of you say. In the past I thought that being just a Nintendo gamer only would be enough to for me. But as time passed, I see many games on other consoles that I really like and want to play. As a person that likes many different types of games, one console isn't enough to play all of them.