Topic: Is Nintendo resting on its laurels?

@Snaplocket No way, my pc is only 600 bucks, not to mention games cost less and play better, and my WiFi is awful, but games still run fine. All in all pc is definetly superior to Xbox and ps4

I know. I the only thing I was disagreeing with were your comments about integrated graphics. Ryzen has certainly taken it to a new level, especially for gaming, but it's hardly a new thing. They didn't invent it and it's not the difference between Gen 1 and Gen 2 Ryzen. The 2600 isn't an APU either

Oh I agree entirely. It's just that this means nothing to someone with a G3220 who's presumably running on integrated graphics. You literally have a machine that's an order of magnitude more powerful than that. PC gaming is fantastic value at the mid range and high end. At the very low end? It's not that great at all, and XBOne S is far more useful for gaming than an equivalently priced PC.

Yeah PC is just superior to PlayStation/Xbox in like 90% of scenarios imo. The only positives those two have are more convenience/simplicity (which to be fair is are VERY big positives. Even if pre-built computers are still better value than consoles, not everyone wants to care about specs and if their hardware is just magically not good enough anymore), cheaper upfront price, their own selection of exclusives, specific media functions like a Blu-Ray Player right out of the gate (if you don't slap one into your computer), and local multiplayer (but still completely gets nuked by Nintendo, the king of local multiplayer).

But PC has literally every controller available to be used for any game, free online, much more varied backwards compatibility, the best graphics/framerate, etc. The Switch gets away from those problems with its own features in local multiplayer (which is nothing you can pull off on PC or other consoles) and portability, and that's not even considering Nintendo's exclusives where you can't get anywhere else. Even Sony can lose some of their exclusives like Nioh going to PC.

TL;DR: PC + Nintendo mustard race. :^]

From March to last month this year:

1,88 million Switch sold
3,2 million Playstation 4 sold

Nintendo obviously can't develop a game as big as Breath of the Wild ever year, but what they can do to get more people to switch consoles is releasing all of their old games as downloadable. There's no reason why I shouldn't be able to buy all Nintendo developed NES, SNES, N64, GC and Wii games. A sort of "virtual console" if you catch my drift.

@2552-3286-2884 Please use the correct thread.

I simply subtracted the numbers from previous quarterly reports of both companies.

Last quarter the Switch had sold a total of 17,79 million, and this quarter 19,67 million. The same numbers for the Playstation 4 was 79 million and 82,2 million.

19,76 - 17,79 = 1,88
82,2 - 79 = 3,2

I think there are (as always) plenty of tangentially related but ultimately separate aspects to the performance of Switch now & projected future performance.

The line up this year has been underwhelming from some perspectives. Certainly it’s been lacking a major BoTW level release to excite the conventional gaming audience.

From other perspectives it’s actually been pretty good. Hollow Knight, DKTF, Bayonetta, Octopath etc. Great games but not games to sell millions of consoles (though they could all potentially sell millions of software units over the next few years - especially DKTF).

The line up later in the year is also lacking a BoTW level game. But Pokémon (this one especially) will hit a different demographic to the big games already on the Switch. I wouldn’t be surprised if MK8 ends up selling 1-1 with every console bought for Pokemon.

Ultimately it’s how well they can diversify the audience that will determine how many millions of units they can sell by the end of the generation. To do that effectively they’ll need to have different options & bundles at different prices.

As for where the ‘new games’ are I think there are two answers.

1: this is what Nintendo has. They don’t have huge teams. They can’t do a BoTW every 6 months.

2: they’re holding back (as in scheduling completion) relatively big releases for 2019 & 2020 when the install base (& potential sales) will be much bigger. Carry the system on BotW, MO, MK8 & repurposed Wii U games until then.

In reality I think we’ll probably find it’s a bit of both.

@Snaplocket if you have a nice chair, it can be

A good office chair can be more comfortable than a sofa, certainly more ergonomic.

But if you prefer a sofa in front of the TV and your favorite controller, you can do that. PC gaming isn't static like consoles.

Plus, keyboard and mouse makes certain genres much, much better.

@StuTwo
Isn't Smash a BoTW level game?

@Alber-san

Absolutely not !

Super Smash Bros. for 3DS was out sold by Zelda Breath of the Wild (Switch version) by 20000 units which isn’t that much of a difference and factoring in the Wii U version of Smash, Smash Wii U and Smash 3DS combined sold about 14 million units, while Zelda BOTW sold approximately 11 million on both Switch and Wii U (the Wii U version of BOTW sold somewhere under 2.18 million according to Nintendo’s numbers)

@Alber-san Given the context, I don't think so. This seems to be more about game types rather than game sales. If I've understood the comment correctly, the next BotW level game will be Metroid Prime 4.

Nintendo doesn't tend to pump a huge budget into their games either. If we want to compare to the rest of the industry, they're more to AA than AAA in terms of budget. Imo that's a good thing so they're smart with what they do over faffing about with bad development decisions like what Square Enix does on a regular basis.

I think that, depending on what kind of PC you have, that could be true, but most people have either normal desktop PC's, or a (midi) Tower, which is anything BUT less static than a console. I also have a tower PC, and there's also all kinds of peripherals connected: and AiO printer, several external hard drives and so on. The cable mess behind my PC is probably twice as large than the one behind my TV...

And I can quite simply disconnect my console, and take it with me, or hook it up in another room, so in that respect too, it isn't more static. Consoles also couldn't be more static than a PC: the whole point of it is plug & play convenience, which is why so many people still prefer consoles over PC gaming, regardless of the option for better graphics and performance.

Again, here, it all depends on your setup. I wouldn't want to sit on my sofa with a keyboard and a mouse, so better controls in-game perhaps, but not more comfortable to use, because it would mean I would have to have either a small table, or some platform for my lap on which I could put the keyboard and mouse, which doesn't sound comfortable to me at all.

With a controller, I can practically lay flat on my back, and still control my game quite comfortably...

On a side note: console versions of certain genres of games are specifically tweaked to make use of a controller (such as aiming in fps games being slowed down a fraction, to account for stick travel), so using a keyboard and mouse to control them doesn't really gain you all that big of an advantage in them. I do agree on the PC versions of those games, obviously, but these are tailor-made for those kinds of controls, with a controller option tacked on as an alternative, or afterthought, depending how you look at it...

@StuTwo @Grumblevolcano @Mrtoad
I mean, Smash is a game that will surely appeal to hardcore audiences, just like BoTW did. So I guess it's not the same just because its focus isn't single player (?).

And while BoTW has sold more than Smash, this is a special situation. Games are selling more than usual on Switch and BoTW was the only worthwhile Switch game on release. Plus, unless Metroid changes a lot it won't sell as much as Smash.

So I don't see how Metroid is a BoTW level game and SSBU isn't.

@Alber-san I see BotW level in the context of @StuTwo's post as being your typical big open world adventure game hence why Pokemon is also not counted. Right now on that front you have BotW (March 2017), Super Mario Odyssey (October 2017) and Skyrim (November 2017). Mario Odyssey is different but has enough open world elements to count in the same group.

Meanwhile Smash Ultimate could never fit that structure.

@ThanosReXXX you misunderstood my use of static. A computer can be changed in numerous ways, it isn't fixed like a console. You can get all sorts of computers with different strengths and trade offs. It is a dynamic platform, as opposed to the static nature of consoles.

And when thinking on genres, I was mostly thinking about strategy games. If they all start aping after Nintendo and add motion controls, I think it is possible to lessen things like auto-aiming.

@Grumblevolcano
Ok but then what was the argument he was trying to make? That there hasn't been an open world this year on Switch? This year we got no racing games either, nor did we get a third person shooter (like Splatoon). Last year we didn't get a tennis game, or a big 2d platformer, or a puzzle game, or a fighting game on the level of Smash, etc. (You get the point).

BTW if we are counting third parties then Ark Survival Evolved is coming out this year.

@Therad Ah, okay. I did indeed completely misunderstand you, then.
My bad. Forget I ever mentioned anything...