Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@JaxonH You dont grasp sarcasm do you?

But no, on PS4 I think the release date especially on PS4 is...a really bad place to put it lets be honest. On Switch, less so.

I can't account for people's tastes, but I can account for September and October being an absolute Battle Royale for sales.

@Knuckles-Fajita
For sure. But still... its concerning. Other games in that time frame are doing quite well.

It kills me seeing great games die an undeserved death. And while things could still pick up for our beloved Valkyria Chronicles (a game I hold in very high regard) it's not looking good

@JaxonH I think VC4 could be a revival....but that date...jesus it does not get worse.

@Knuckles-Fajita Even with Switch it's not a particularly good release date. Another Battle Royale but rather than RDR2 being the cause, it's Pokemon and Smash.

@JaxonH Valkyria Chronicles 4 is near enough full price. You can't compare that to Indies, which launch at a budget price and are often impulse buys. Spending £42 on VC4 on PS4 or £50 on Switch if you will (Amazon), is a commitment, especially in such a crowded release window.

Game is going to bomb. It would've done exponentially better as a Summer release.

@JaxonH Meh. I'm going to buy it at launch, enjoy it, and spread the good word while also accepting that, like the original, it'll largely go ignored until people rediscover it years down the road and it becomes another cult classic that people lament the poor sales of.

If VC4 bombs, as it's looking like it might, I'm expecting the franchise to be abandoned for the next generation or two, unfortunately.

I didn't know there was a demo available. I'll try it out. I did watch some gameplay videos of VC Remastered (I think it was) a few years ago, but I wasn't sold unfortunately.

The reason people care about game sales is simply because good sales means a good chance you'll get more of the franchise you love. I think it makes perfect sense to worry about a game you like doing well. If it bombs, you lose the franchise.

@DarthNocturnal VCR on PC was pretty cheap at launch, and it has gotten insanely so since that time. I think I downloaded my copy a year after launch for $9.99, but it has dipped down as low as $4.99 in sales since then.

I imagine its success was also partially due to excitement about SEGA publishing more of their games on PC.

The degree to which Japanese games have expanded onto Steam in the last few years is actually pretty remarkable.

Yeah that's pretty much it. I'd never invest time into a SP franchise if I knew that the story would be left untold. This has never happened to me thus far and by some small miracle I'm getting both Kingdom Hearts 3 and Darksiders 3 in 2019 .

@DarthNocturnal Why....just....why would you buy VC4 on X1? I mean I love my 1X. I buy everything that's not an exclusive or on Switch on 1X....but that game looks the same on Switch as it does on 1X, and just begs to be portable considering most entries of the series were exclusively on portable Switch is pretty clearly the primary platform in this case. They abandoned PS3 after the first and went to PSP, now Switch...

@JaxonH You said it yourself.....the genre. SRPG/TRPG just isn't a very popular genre outside Japan. FE gets some love because of Smash fame mostly, I think, it's brought the name to more people, but it takes a certain type of player to get into any SRPG, and there just aren't huge numbers of those players, especially when there are so many huge franchises on that list.

Heck even Fallout Tactics bombed catastrophically in the day. I don't think it's a knock on Valkyria so much as a niche genre from a series without a lot of brand power that was kind of a cult classic a decade ago, and then a niche Japanese handheld series after that.

@NEStalgia The original excitment of FE to the west, sure that was because of Smash (Marth and Roy in Melee). The most recent wave of FE excitement (2013 - present) has nothing to do with Smash, rather because of the changes Awakening made to the FE formula and so the reverse happens (Awakening being so popular leading to Smash essentially becoming Super Modern Fire Emblem Bros.). Next up you'll see Tharja be a Robin echo

VC4, Langrisser 1/2HD and FE! Good time to be a fan of strategy games

@DarthNocturnal I don't know, it seems the ideal genre for portable access. Considering it's the same price to get handheld + docked as it is to tether it to the X1 it seems a no brainer You have the Switch and you really don't lose anything putting it on Switch instead. It's not like it looks particularly amazing on the 1X. Diablo III I could understand, it looks amazing on 1X and kind of so-so on Switch....but with VC4 there's no down-side at all...

@Grumble Haha, even with phoenix mode FE is a hard game to love if you're not into strategy games. It goes out of it's way to be difficult. I think Awakening and RD gained an audience that cared due to Smash, and then the Awakening hype created more Awakening hype. And then Heroes on mobile boosted it again. It's popular because it's FE, though, not because anyone likes SRPGs North of Tokyo.

Poor Valkyria is a small niche game from a fairly unknown franchise competing with a ton of colossal franchise drops no matter what system you're on this year (Spiderman, RDR2, Smash, Pokemon....even Forza Horizon. It's a terrible launch window for that type of game. )

I don't think it has anything to do with Sega at all. A large chunk of PC gamers are fans of tactical and strategic games, it is just a good market for this kind of game.

Open question about Okami HD: what's the point of changing equipment? I don't see a strength stat anywhere, and the only difference between my first weapon and the one I got for clearing the first dungeon seems to be the ability to use ink bullets (which seem pretty useless so far).

@NEStalgia The only other platform I could see a multi-system owner preferring to play VC4 on is PC, given it supposedly runs at 60fps. Which doesn't really impact the gameplay at all, given its strategic character, but it does look a bit nicer.

@Therad I disagree. I know a lot of people who bought it to support SEGA (and Japanese, more broadly) releases on PC. Besides, it's not like it's the sort of strategy game PC gamers are used to. It's very much a console game in design.

Granted, I still think the low-ish price was the biggest factor at play.

But I guess we'll see. If VC4 sells better on Steam than on other platforms, you might have a point. But I don't think it will.

@Ralizah For ink bullet you need to paint more than one dot. The more you paint, the more damage they do. Different weapons have different combos, different range, etc. Some are objectively stronger than others, but you will recognise them when you see them.

Awakening's success really didnt have to do with Smash, although I'm sure it may have helped a bit with awareness. It was higher production game early in the 3DS life span, and got some marketing behind it. A lot of people bought it because it seemed to be this hidden 1st party gem. Nintendo fans love 1st party IP. And it came across as a long, lost top tier Nintendo franchise that was suddenly re-discovered. Almost like a brand new Nintendo IP for people. And it was fantastic.

I just figured with Valkyria Chronicles 4 not being grid based, and the amazing art direction and more Fire Emblem esque warring country setting, that more people would be excited for it, at least the JRPG fans since it's not that different a genre

@Octane Yeah, I've been painting multiple bullets, but they don't seem to impact enemies much. Waste of ink. Maybe enemies more susceptible to it will come into play later.

Well, I thought weapons might change the way my character moves, but Amaterasu's moveset looks identical with the new weapon. Weird. Maybe the only benefit of the new gear really is the ink bullets ability.

I get the sense I wouldn't have liked this on PS2. The inking is mostly pretty great on the touchscreen, but trying to make bombs and circles with a control stick? Blegh.