Topic: Anyone else not feel excited for the Switch?

Big like the EA partnership? I'll believe it when I see it when it comes to those third parties. So far a port of a very old game isn't exactly reassuring

@WillThisWork Epic.

?

??????

For the record, DOOM would be a pretty bad choice to initially market a console with. For starters it's a nostalgia property and Nintendo already has that base covered. But more than that it's just really violent and kinda conceptually ugly.

The red planet does not a blue ocean, have.

@Haru17
Yeah, I don't know why I said 3 years. I must've had Mario Kart 8 on the brain. But it's the same point anyways. This game isn't new. And on the other bit of nitpicking there? Note that I qualified it by saying "pretty much all of those" and then concluded by saying "unless all they're working on is Elder Scrolls Legends".

The point about Doom being very non-Nintendo? Well sure. And probably a bad pick for the trailer for that very reason. But I didn't say it would be a better pick. I said it would have had a bigger impact. The point being that Skyrim isn't by any stretch the craziest thing Bethesda could put on a Nintendo platform. If anything it's one of the most believable. The fact that Bethesda is involved at all is crazy.

@Operative
Well EA did release some games for the Wii U. That support basically disappeared beyond the launch window but they were there at the start. We got Need for Speed, Mass Effect 3 and FIFA. Now I'm not saying that the Switch will get ongoing support from a publisher like Bethesda. Not at all. I'm just saying I don't understand why people are acting as if we might not get anything at all from Bethesda. I think it's highly unlikely that we don't get something from them. It'll probably be Skyrim given that's what they showed off. But if it's something else? Odds are it's also big.

@skywake
All I'm saying is that I can see where DefHalan is coming from. I think that there is a reasonable possibility of Skyrim coming to NS, but, there is still a possibility that we won't see anything. That reddit post you found that lists devs for console partners for 3DS, Wii U and NS has Konami as a partner for the Wii U. From what I could find, the only games they released on the Wii U were VC games. Nor do I believe that Tetris Online made anything for Wii U, another console partner.

@shaneoh
I'm not convinced the scepticism is well founded. I get that everyone is burned by what happened with third parties on the Wii U. But really, we're pretty close to launch here. Are you guys really thinking that Nintendo went and asked for some game footage from all the devs who had got dev kits. And for some reason they decided to use some entirely fake footage of Skyrim which isn't actually coming at all. Footage from a third party who according to the extreme cynicism here might not ever actually make a game for this?

I just think it's a bit of a stretch.

I think expecting anything other than a port of such an old game is a stretch. I think expecting something big from Bethesda, of all third parties, is also a big stretch. I'd believe it if it was square Enix, but not a western publisher like Bethesda. When they announce Doom and Doom 2 or evil within and evil within 2 are coming to the switch same time as everyone else (for the sequels), then I'll rescind my skepticism.

It is possible, but not very probable

Have to admit that this is the first Nintendo home console release that I haven't been exited about, sadly.

It doesn't offer me personally anything that I can't do with PS4 Pro, PSVR and a Vita. This doesn't mean I'll never get one, but Nintendo are going to have to work pretty hard to convince me this time around.

@Operative
I think you need to step back a bit and actually look at what was actually being said. This is the comment that sparked this back and forward:

And chopping up my responses a bit here is what I've been saying in response:

I mean really, I don't see any reason to believe those games in the trailers were just tech demos. If they are? Then the Switch is completely screwed. Because Nintendo should have that many games to show by now. If not what on earth have they been doing for the last two years?

To put it another way. I share some of the scepticism about long term third party support. I'm also cautious about how good the launch will be given that we don't have the dates for any of these games. Are most of them launch games? All? Some? A couple? None? We don't know. So it could swing to either extreme. I'm optimistic personally but I do share some of the scepticism

I just don't see these games not being officially confirmed as an issue. In my mind they're basically confirmed but that doesn't change anything. That doesn't magically mean that the Switch is going to have a good amount of support. It doesn't mean that there won't be droughts. Whether these games are coming to the Switch or not (and they almost surely are) doesn't resolve those issues.

Which is why I said I understand why people are cautious about being hyped. I just don't understand why people are pinning that caution on whether or not Skyrim is a thing. Because IMO Skyrim being basically confirmed as a thing is neither here nor there for the Switch in the medium to long term. As big a deal as Bethesda being on board is it's not going to be the difference between a Wii style revival and a Wii U style flop.

I actually agree with this point which is why I am so weirded out they won't confirm them. A small state is all it would have taken but they said nothing. So I am not getting excited until I have confirmed software, and even then I may not get excited. A new Mario Kart, a new Splatoon (not enhanced ports) and Skyrim Remastered (not a port of the original release) would be exciting, but I have no confirmation if that is what is happening. Plenty of people think the Switch is just getting enhanced ports, which do not excite me. But the worst thing is we have nothing confirmed, so I am waiting for the confirmation.

@BiasedSonyFan my concern, at least, comes from the fact that if they don't get those games, they will continue their descent until eventually they're irrelevant all together. Ensuring they get the latest and most popular installments in famous franchises keeps Nintendo in the race.

Plus, being able to play Nintendo games and western made games is just an exciting concept.

You're right. Nintendo doesn't seem to want that. Many consumers do, though. So you see why there's this conflict here every generation.

@BiasedSonyFan
Ultimately developers and publishers, wherever they are, care about one thing. Being profitable.

Profit = Cut of the sale * Attach rate for game * Install base - Development costs

The amount of money they're going to get from each game sold? It'll be about the same across all platforms. Not a differentiating factor. The attach rate? It might be higher on Nintendo it might be lower. Depends on the game and who buys into the platform. Probably not that big a variable. Development costs? Well platform holders always make a big song and dance about how easy their platform is to develop for. With the Switch being Tegra based I think this time I actually believe them. So that's a tick.

So that leaves......

Install base

Highly variable. Some game consoles have sold 100+ million units. Others have struggled to get much over 10mill. All things being equal it's the difference between a AAA game selling 100k and 1million. It's a big deal, probably the biggest deal. So if the Switch sells well? Developers will jump through all sorts of hoops to support it. And they will because from what I can gather the Switch will be about as close in power to the XBOne as the XBOne is to the PS4.

But if Switch is powerful enough and developer friendly enough, porting to it should be cheap and allow multi-platform games to get Switch ports. Any return greater than their costs makes it worthwhile.

So the cheaper it is to port, the more profit they can make, the more likely they will support the system.

@BiasedSonyFan
Those are definitely factors they're just not as important as the install base. For example look at some of the games that existed across Wii and the generations before and after. Resident Evil 4 was one of the third party darlings on the Gamecube and came out late in its cycle. The Wii port was an early library filler that didn't match the audience at all. The Wii version sold more.

Smash Bros is the Gamecube game, it's the game that defined the system more than probably any other game. It was also one of the best Wii U titles, a return to form. In comparison the Wii version is widely regarded as one of the worst entries in the series. Yet the Wii version outsold both 2:1. Because of the install base.

Call of Duty. The definition of a western third party game that didn't fit the idea of the Wii. Yet the entries that did come to the Wii when it was still technically kinda possible? It didn't make much of any sense to get them on the Wii. But because of the massive install base they all sold around 1-2mill units. Which is crazy given it's such an extreme example

With the Switch I don't think there will be that massive hardware and demographic miss-match. The hardware gap won't be as big because it wouldn't need a vent at the top if it was. The Wii U isn't that underpowered and the Tegra has been able to beat the Wii U for a couple of years now. And unlike the Wii they don't appear to be targeting non-gamers. They're targeting people who don't want their game to end when they have to leave the house.

So install base? It'll be the main factor here.

yup. Or to be more specific the less effort required to port and the more units they can potentially sell? The more likely a publisher is going to give them the green light. And in extreme examples the more likely a publisher is going to demand a port is made for that platform so they can stay in the black.

Like Rayman Legends. It was very clear that the developers wanted to make something for the Wii U. But the higher ups crunched the numbers and forced them to delay it so they could launch it on more platforms. If the Wii U had sold better early on? That wouldn't have happened. If it had done Wii numbers you would've seen it happen in the other direction.

@BiasedSonyFan
In reply to your earlier post. You can't say any of those things for sure. And even if what you were saying does end up being true it's only a compounding factor. Install base is still king. It just happens that this cycle install base has lined up with power so those things have stacked. What happens if they don't?

I mean think about it. The Switch is basically the successor for three of the five current generation platforms. With the 3DS being the best selling of those at ~60mill units or ~12mill/units per year. If the Switch sells at that sort of rate? It could pretty easily overtake the XBOne in a few years. Such a platform would be pretty hard to ignore.

For the hardware differential? I already addressed it. It's a case of diminishing returns for hardware improvements. When the Wii was less than 1/10th the power of the 360 in an era where we were making a jump to 1080p? It was a huge issue. With something that's maybe a bit more than 1/2 the power of the XBOne? In a product that is designed to be portable? In an era where graphical leaps mean less than they once did? To put it mildly, I don't think it's as big a deal.

@BiasedSonyFan
They key word there is "some", it's not an all or nothing market. To continue the example from the other page consider CoD for a second. On the Wii it didn't make any sense because of the huge gap in power. But on Wii it still sold over a million copies in all but the last iteration. Enough that they kept making the game on that platform until 2011.

And on the Wii U despite the horrible install base? It still sold around half a million units. Which is about what you'd expect them to sell on that platform given the number of units that were out there. Not enough for them to still bother with it but still some sales. And power wasn't the issue here because they made another two games for the 360/PS3. It was pretty much all install base related.

The Switch probably isn't in either boat. It's not as under-powered as the Wii was compared to its immediate competition. It probably won't sell as poorly as the Wii U did. Sure some gamers will ignore it because they can get more fps elsewhere. But some won't. And the number who won't ignore it will be easily visible to everyone because it'll be, more or less, proportional to the install base.

Thinking about it further with the Switch there might not even be a clear preference between systems for people who own both. If you had both a Wii and a 360? Which version of CoD you get was largely made for you. Similar with the Wii U and PS4. But with the Switch and PS4? Lets say Bethesda does put a game like Dishonored 2 on the Switch and you own a PS4 and a Switch. Which version do you get? The one with the better FPS or the one that's good enough visually and you can take with you? It's not immediately clear.

And some gamers are really excited for the Switch. By your reasoning, that means it'll succeed!