Well yeah, the changes if any to the actual online service itself is the key thing to look at. Stuff like free games is nothing more than a distraction.
The kind of stuff you should be looking for is (not a full list):
Cloud saves
Equivalents of Xbox's Party Chat and Game Chat
The mobile app being an extra option rather than the only way to voice chat
Dedicated servers for 1st party games (Note below)
Note: Including existing 1st party games like MK8 Deluxe and Splatoon 2 moving over to dedicated servers, not just new 1st party games.
Of course Nintendo ends up winning anyway though because if you want to keep playing the games online you'll buy the subscription even if the service is identical to how it is now just with a few free games here and there.
@Grumblevolcano I don't see why party chat isn't doable, am I remembering correctly that there is a game that can kind of make use of the headphone jack as a microphone or something? Maybe I dreamt it.
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I agree with Octane. No matter how "cheap" $20 is compared to the competition, it's still too much. Nintendo has done squat to show us that their online has improved versus past generations. In fact, it has actually gotten worse with the fact that the Switch, unlike the Wii U, has Friend Codes without usernames. In other ways, the online system is just unforgivably bare-bones. Nintendo's just getting greedy, and they have not given us any reason we should need to pay for their online services.
NES and SNES games? How about no. I've had decades to play these games. I've had several opportunities to get them on Virtual Console. I don't want to pay $20 a month to temporarily keep them on one system (at the end of the Switch's lifespan, you will have spent a ton of money for games that no longer even exist on your system). I want to pay for them once on Virtual Console and know that Nintendo will ensure that my purchase will mean something when the next system comes around, as well.
Of course Nintendo ends up winning anyway though because if you want to keep playing the games online you'll buy the subscription even if the service is identical to how it is now just with a few free games here and there.
This is exactly what I'm afraid is going to happen.
I don't want to pay $20 a month to temporarily keep them on one system (at the end of the Switch's lifespan, you will have spent a ton of money for games that no longer even exist on your system)
We actually got a visual novel for once, The Men of Yoshiwara: Kikuya. It's the same one that came out in Japan last week. It's a romance game for women, though. I'll do some research. Maybe it can be enjoyed by men like Hakuoki which the visual style reminds me of. It's only 20€ which seems to be 8€ less than on Steam so that's nice.
Check out my Gaming Nonograms thread here on Nintendo Life if you are into Picross or other similar games.
@zitpig Right, $20 a year. Just a mistake I made in my post. I do know it is $20 a year, and it changes nothing for me.
This is on Nintendo. Before coming out and telling us that we're going to have to begin paying for their online services, they should have proved to us why. Instead they were just like "BTW, you're going to have to pay for our online services now lol" and that was the end of it.
Nintendo has a long reputation among gamers for having very mediocre online infrastructures compared to their competition. So, to really come out and say that we're going to have to begin paying for their online without any sign that they're actually going to improve it is incredibly bold and really feels like a slap to the face.
The very least they could have done was list a bunch of major improvements they were looking to make to the online system and then say "We're going to need you to pay for a subscription for this service, we hope you understand". But nope, none of that.
If I were them, I probably would have given some details about what the service would provide or include before telling us how much it'd be. For their sake, I hope they impress us.
@Late - Whether these sorts of games/novels/err... apps appeal to the masses (male, female or other) or not, it's great that more esoteric stuff, like this, is released worldwide and I wish it every suscces. It's good to try something new from time to time.
@OorWullie They never said itbwas delayed to autumn im afraid. The only delay the Onljne ever had was to 2018. Just 2018. Now it is September 2018. A delay eould be falling outside 2018
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This is on Nintendo. Before coming out and telling us that we're going to have to begin paying for their online services, they should have proved to us why. Instead they were just like "BTW, you're going to have to pay for our online services now lol" and that was the end of it.
Patience padawan! ..there'll be a pre-launch announcement later this year!
If I were them, I probably would have given some details about what the service would provide or include before telling us how much it'd be. For their sake, I hope they impress us.
Indeed. You definitely catch more flys with honey than with vinegar.
Hopefully Nintendo will actually start talking about what will be available and what is planned before September's launch. They're not generally ones to talk about future plans, but they really ought to be.
ACA NeoGeo Samurai Shodown II – €6.99
AeternoBlade – €14.99
Frederic 2: Evil Strikes Back – €4.49 until February 15; regularly €4.99
Her Majesty’s Spiffing – €9.99
Mad Carnage – €4.99 (available February 2)
The Men of Yoshiwara: Kikuya – €19.99
Night in the Woods – €18.99
Shiftlings – Enhanced Edition – €9.36 until February 15; regularly €12.49
Sky Force Reloaded – €9.99
SteamWorld Dig – €9.99
Minecraft: Wii U Edition – Moana Character Pack – €2.99
Minecraft: Wii U Edition – Skin Pack 1 – €1.99
eShop Sales
Switch
Unbox: Newbie’s Adventure – €14.99 until February 8; regularly €29.99
Brawl – €7.99 until February 25; regularly €9.99
Brawlout – €14.99 until February 22; regularly €19.99
Frederic: Resurrection of Music – €4.01 until February 15; regularly €5.99
Grand Prix Rock ‘N Racing – €6.39 until February 19; regularly €7.99
Heroes of the Monkey Tavern – €6.99 until February 13; regularly €9.99
Sparkle 2 – €7.19 until February 7; regularly €7.99
The Count Lucanor – €7.49 until February 8; regularly €14.99
Woodle Tree – €4.49 until March 10; regularly €4.99
New 3DS
Ascent of Kings – €1.68 until February 8; regularly €2.25
3DS
Dan McFox: Head Hunter – €1.49 until February 15; regularly €2.49
Darts Up 3D – €0.98 until March 1; regularly €2.99
Epic Word Search Holiday Special – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
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Epic Word Search Collection 2 – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
Football Up 3D – €1.97 until March 1; regularly €2.99
Pic-a-Pix Color – €3.00 until February 15; regularly €5.00
Phil’s Epic Fill-a-Pix Adventure – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
Splat the Difference – €3.00 until February 15; regularly €5.00
Snow Moto Racing 3D – €5.99 until February 8; regularly €7.99
Sudoku Party – €3.00 until February 15; regularly €5.00
Word Logic by POWGI – €5.39 until February 15; regularly €8.99
Word Puzzles by POWGI – €5.39 until February 15; regularly €8.99
Word Search 10K – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
Word Puzzles by POWGI – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
Worcle Words – €5.39 until February 15; regularly €8.99
Wii U
Ascent of Kings – €1.49 until February 8; regularly €1.99
Pic-a-Pix Color – €3.00 until February 15; regularly €5.00
Sudoku Party – €3.00 until February 15; regularly €5.00
Word Logic by POWGI – €5.39 until February 15; regularly €8.99
Word Party – €9.59 until February 15; regularly €15.99
Word Puzzles by POWGI – €5.39 until February 15; regularly €8.99
Word Search by POWGI – €4.79 until February 15; regularly €7.99
Permanent Conditional Discount
Frederic 2: Evil Strikes Back – €2.49 for owners of Frederic: Resurrection of Music; regularly €4.99
Frederic 2: Evil Strikes Back – €3.34 for owners of Qbik or Sparkle 2 Evo or Violett; regularly €4.99
Patience, boys and girls. They'll give us details. I hate when people rush to conclusion like: "The Nintendo Switch Online is gonna suck so hard", and they don't know anything about it.
I'll wait for them to tell us more about their online services. Until then, for me, I'll reserve my judgement on it.
Making promise is easy. The hard part is keeping it.
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@Shellcore It also somewhat fills in a Monster Hunter shaped hole.....
@Therad "Free" games....sometimes good, sometimes bad, and sometimes games you even care about and don't already own . I'd much rather they give you store credits rather than a "free" game that doesn't interest you (Sometimes you win big....MGSV was once a PS+ one....I missed it of course....Other times you get Knack and Rime...................) They also give members-only sales and additional discounts to members. Like this week on PSN is Dragon Age: Inquisition GOTY edtion 50% off for + members (plus tons of games I don't care about.) And last week's sale PSN members got another 10% off...not off the discounted price but added to the total percentage of discount....so there was some nice savings where, if participating, your savings were way more than the cost of membership.
But it's a ponzi scheme like Costco....the more you buy the more you save, and if you don't buy much, you're saving nothing and spending more. I'm enjoying the sales for now because I've never participated before, but I like the $20/year with no "free" games and "sales" better than $60 a year with them, honestly. It's an easier pill to swallow.
Sony also offers cloud saves (Nintendo probably will too which might be worth it as I have 2 switches and can't move my saves and digital games between them still....) but XBox offers cloud saves free even without membership.
@zitpig You're not paying for the online infrastructure unless there are dedicated servers. There's a rumor Splatoon will get dedicated servers. But XBL and PSN don't have dedicated, the other players are the server. All the platform provides is matchmaking servers.....yes, they cost money, but they've also been running them for over a decade for free and the games had the cost factored in....so it's still money on the top. Ongoing maintenance for major online games does cost though....another reason why GaaS stinks (and Miyamoto agrees...)
Free games...yeah...there are some winners....but looking at the history of BOTH PS+ and XBLG.......very very few of the freebies are terribly appealing and the appealing ones are games I likely already bought YEARS before they were free. And so many are games that are $5-10 otherwise by the time they're free (though, that's WITH subscription.....) Game Pass looks almost more appealing....$10 a month for an unlimited Blockbuster rental run....but most of the games in there are pretty old and meh as well. Make it a true Netflix/Spotify experience and I'll buy two XBoxen and a third for safety. Of course then it's $60/yr to play online and $10/mo to access the library....So $15/mo for unlimited rentals. Not a bad deal....if the catalog weren't old and anemic. I virtually lived at the rental store in the NES/SNES days so it's a return to form $3.50 for 3 days including the Friday night you pick it up.....fun times.
@zitpig "Powered by hundreds of thousands of servers, Xbox Live delivers maximum performance while reducing lag and cheating. Experience the most advanced multiplayer on a network built for speed and reliability."
Don't take the spin at face value. While it's "powered by hundreds of thousands of servers" you don't think they have global datacenters just running XBox matchmaking and Halo servers, do you? Those "hundreds of thousands of servers" are the Azure Cloud infrastructure. Also powering things like databases for Citicorp, SAP hosting for companies like Boeing, all Windows related services, Microsoft accounts, MSDN, all non-enterprise SQL Servers, etc. etc. XBox uses a small part of their existing server infrastructure. Just wait until they charge you monthly for Windows security patches to "pay for the infrastructure"
@Octane To play a little devils advocate, GameSpy used to be the standard matchmaking client on PC. They went bankrupt. "Free" may not be the best way to pay for even matchmaking servers. Steam does it now, but Steam's paying for it with proceeds from the store without R&D costs as a platform holder...or even developer anymore. Plus as a private company they don't have to show growth plans to shareholders. Probably the more important part.
@SLIGEACH_EIRE Technically there's more games I'd play online on Switch than on PS4. Splatoon, ARMS, Smash (lets just assume), Rocket League, Minecraft, DQ Builders 2, Rabbids, Titan Quest, maybe DBZ:X2, USF2, Doom, etc. Sure some of those are on PS4 too, but I'm more likely for a quick drop-in session to play on Switch than fire up the PS4 for a quick match of something. PS4, to me, is for long solo slogs, unless you're super into MMOs, Destiny, COD, etc. I'd be more likely to buy online continually for Switch than for PS4.
[Gah I just realized 2 more pages appeared and half the things I just wrote somebody else already said...oh well.]
@anti-matter you're not getting any freebies from Sony. You're paying for them. What do you think the $5 a month is for?
@Harmonie I don't really see Nintendo's network as notably worse than Sony's network. Versus Microsoft, sure, they built their platform on the online. But Sony seems to get it just as wrong and bare bones than Nintendo. At least on Switch we haven't had as many random outages as WiiU OR PS4....
@Octane For players? So the gameplay won't suck so hard. The P2P is a nightmare where some players have just-so-subtle lag advantages and teleport or jitter like crazy. Dedicated servers would mitigate that and the laggy players positioning would be known to the central server and that player would be the one hindered rather than giving them an advantage. For Nintendo? Promoting Splatoon and it's competitive environment as a high-end shooter. It's not impossible it will happen. Nintendo prides itself on polish as a differentiation and that could really steamline that game. It's not impossible, though I'm still not holding it likely.
@NEStalgia Dedicated servers won't mitigate that issue (though to be fair, it is very rare, I haven't encountered it myself yet). The bottleneck is going to be people's internet connection. If that sucks, no dedicated server can make the experience any better.
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