Topic: Next Nintendo Direct?

I feel like when everyone finally reaches this conclusion will be when they announce a Direct.

@theJGG I upgraded to an Animal Crossing Switch last year but despite that I'd be all for them announcing a new model sooner rather than later. I play my Switch for several hours every day so I feel like I've already gotten my money's worth from the extra battery life and that I'd likely soon get my money's worth again for any upgrades that a new model offers.

@BenAV Fair point, by all means. I do that on a smaller scale; when buying video games. I like long video games, so I like getting a good hour:dollar ratio in. Persona 5 Royal, I paid £33 for, and I'm still discovering new things after beating the game. Good balance between longevity and fun is important.

@BenAV it will sell well enough and probably beat the best selling one in the series but not for much more (I would say 3M possible but 4M very unlikely)

@SortingHat bearing in mind the decisions come from Japan and that they don't care much about PC gaming I find that very unlikely

@Grumblevolcano i agree!

@theJGG I will upgrade four instantly when they are released without complaint if they help 900p games get to 1080p and 30fps get to 60fps. I'll buy six if it's just a tv only version which is a bit cheaper. Why? Because I'm an idiot and Lan gaming on my switch has been the most fun I have had multiplayer since goldeneye gaming.

@teo_o
Okay, that's good. For some reason, I thought I came off as harsh, and I don't know why. Also, what was the heads-up I gave you? I looked at my previous posts but I couldn't find the heads-up you're talking about. 🤔
That's a good point, even if Nintendo does pull a "Nintendo" with some of the decisions that they make, you have to respect the fact that Nintendo doesn't milk their series dry like you said.
They definitely are. I mean, that's their main reason why they started going into mobile, because they want to expand and solidify their IP's to "users who [genernally] don't have consoles, or are new to gaming" (I think it was something like that, but I'm not sure). I also believe Nintendo will start pulling from their "lower-end" (or lower budget) IP's because they already most (if not all) of their main series on the Switch, and we're only halfway through the Switch's lifecycle, so they'll still need more games to make.
That's probably why they scraped Bandai's Metroid, but I also think it's because Nintendo realizes they need Metroid Prime 4 to be great and not just good, and maybe all they were getting from Bandai's Metroid was good but not great (or even Metroid good).
Unless they do an open world Metrovania for MP 4, then I don't what else they can do to try to do to have it get even close to BOTW success. Like you said, Metroidvania is kinda hard to get 5+ Million for a Metroidvania game. I also believe that MP 4 is in good hands @retrostudios. 🤔
Forza Horizon would be kind of hard to have F-Zero in it, but maybe Forza Horizon might add a futuristic F-Zero (Esque) mode to compensate for that. I feel like they could (and should) have done a crossover with Fast RMX, as that fits perfectly with F-Zero.
Personally, I believe that a new F-Zero game will sell more than Metroid Prime 4, as it's been so long since the last F-Zero game released, and the F-Zero fanbase tends to be quiet for the most part (besides for making memes when a new F-Zero game doesn't get announced in a Direct) so I believe we have a silent majority situation regarding the F-Zero fanbase. 🤔

That's perfectly reasonable. The first Switch only came out less than four years ago, and the standard console life cycle is at least 5 years. Install base is massive, Switch exclusives still top the charts and the console itself continues to sell very well. Improvement in graphics is only going to be marginal moving forward (unlike with the NES -> SNES transition), and third-party AAA games don't sell that well on the Switch anyway. There's no good reason to split the market, and Nintendo should stay the course.

@Euler a switch pro wouldn't split the market anymore than a ps4 pro or xbox one x did.... Essentially it will just add better resolution or frame rates to the more expensive model. If you are content with your purchase I don't see the point in complaining that others got a better product.Simlpy upgrade or live with the original switch performance. Now if games were exclusive to a switch pro that would be a totally different thing. But I am going to assume there would be absolutely no reason for at least Nintendo first party games to do that.

For all those discussing an IPhone model, I do think that makes sense if Nintendo goes that direction. Release a new iteration every 4 or so years (instead of yearly, thank goodness), and any game can state what the oldest hardware it supports is. That way, we may have games still supporting OG Switch even in two generations if they aren't heavy to run. Plus, that way it'd probably be years before companies start to cut support for the base Switch for the majority of games coming out, while allowing them to target better performance on newer models or release games that aren't possible otherwise (most PS5/XBSX ports for starters, and some PS4/XB1 ports that have been ignored til now for technical reasons).

@Grumblevolcano @BenAV Yeah, multiple series have had record breaking sales, so if all goes well with Prime 4, it should probably hit at least 3-5 million.

@Balta666 The PS5 and Xbox Series X don't have that any more than the Switch Pro would.

@Bolt_Strike I'm pretty sure over time the PS5/Series X will become vastly more attractive propositions for development due to them being next-gen systems and that being where developers can start to expand on their ideas even more than they could this gen. I personally don't buy the rumors at all that Switch Pro is going to be like a next-gen Switch or anything of that sort. It'll probably be a hardware refresh akin to the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X or any of Nintendo's handheld refreshes, but it's probably not going to bring Nintendo that much closer to running next-gen games natively.

@sixrings If it has exclusive games, it would divide the market. If it doesn't have exclusive games, hard to see what the selling point would be (the people obsessed with power are solidly with PS5/XSX/PC).

@Euler That isn't exactly true. There are plenty of people obsessed with power which would like to play first party Nintendo games with less of a compromise. If I could play BOTW in 1080p with a steady 30fps I would be happy. Or can I have Mario Odyssey, Luigis Mansion 3, Kirby, Zelda Links Awakening, Splatoon 2 run at 1080p 60fps?

If somehow DLSS can help make the games look even better on a 4k tv then its an added bonus.

I basically buy every Nintendo first party game but just opted out of Age of Calamity and Yoshi because of their performance.

Sure the switch pro might not be for everyone but surely there is an audience who would gladly pay to play their games as good as they can get them.

They won't drop support. It will just be like the New 3DS: a very minor upgrade. Nearly all games will then work on both systems, but the Pro will offer a range of upgrades. Higher resolution. Possibly higher framerate if the base game is 30fps.

@sixrings Bowser said the momentum of the switch is strong and nintendo is looking to disrupt the typical 4 year cycle. Perhaps they are seeing comparable numbers to the Wii. If nintendo is looking into only pump up resolution with every hardware refresh, by the 7th year the switch will be a total bottle neck for any port except Indies.
I fear the trend of streaming for triple A titles, which is something I don't particularly like, but the bright side could be we'll finally have a good WiFi antenna inside the switch. I really like your idea of the switch basically becoming a stable 1080 60 of itself (with DLSS up to 4k).

@Euler Honestly it was never really an argument of power at all. At least not nowadays

The PS2 won its generation and it was far less powerful than the first Xbox and even the GameCube

The PS4 was initially more powerful than the Xbox One but mostly won due to its price and the fact that it wasn't doing any of the practices that Microsoft was doing like having the console always be online, or restricting the usage of used games etc.

The PS5 is also marginally less powerful than the Series X and it's probably still going to sell more just due to how much more positive Sony's brand image is when it comes to consoles worldwide compared to Xbox. Even the Switch has so far sold considerably more than the Xbox One and it's way newer than that system and way less powerful

At this point leaps in tech don't define consoles because they're getting smaller and more indistinguishable each console generation anyway. The biggest leap of this new gen is probably the integration of SSDs on home consoles but graphically the jump to PS5/Series X from PS4/Xbox One is probably the smallest it's been in a long time despite the innovations in stuff like real time ray tracing and making 60fps standard across the majority of games

It was always going to be about the games. People buying these consoles these days aren't as much power junkies as you might think they are. Consoles like Switch still make great companion systems to platforms like PlayStation and Xbox due to its unique library of games, particularly the Nintendo ones. A lot of people on this site like myself own both a Switch and another platform, in my case a PS4 for the Sony first party and third party exclusives, and a PC for multiplats

@teo_o No perhaps, the numbers on Switch are definitely comparable to the Wii.

Take a look at the wii sales plotted over time (insert obligatory disclaimer that the second link to VGChartz is only an estimate when it comes to the data outside of quarterly results, since not all regions publish hardware results)

https://www.vgchartz.com/article/446857/switch-vs-wii-sales-c...
https://www.vgchartz.com/article/446715/switch-vs-wii-sales-c...

By this point in its life cycle, the Wii was already on the decline, having soaked up the majority of it's market. Switch is a bit behind in raw numbers, but it's still growing in hardware sales year over year. At this point, it's likely that the Switch is going to outsell not just the Wii, but even the PS4 and Gameboy/GBC lifetime (though prooobably not the DS or PS2). Since the Wii is heavily frontloaded in sales, keeping it up with it for this long is amazing.

@TheFrenchiestFry Exactly. The specs stopped mattering right about when everyone stopped putting the number of bits on the front of the console, and people that want the newest AAA games already own at least one of the other systems.