Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

As soon as he starts the game, it'll come back....

Yea, I don't dig that pizza, to be honest. I hate levels that have timers, and that's pretty much the whole premise of the series so...

My brain is like my Nintendo Switch SD card. It can hold about 5 years worth of data down to every last detail, near photographic memory, but anything beyond that starts getting perma-deleted. Like, I can remember the last 100 movies I've watched, but that 101st is a gonner. Brain says nope, only so much room to go around here, new one comes in, an old one gets bumped out.

As I played Wonderful 101 I was shocked at how little I recalled, aside from a few key moments, and even then it was only afterwards that it suddenly hit me, oooh yaaaah, I remember that now

@rallydefault
I share that sentiment, actually. I really do dislike timers.

But I went into Pikmin 3 with an open mind and I'm so glad I did. The timer wasnt stressful, it was merely a parameter around which your days must be planned. It forces you to strategize and be as efficient as possible. Otherwise you could dilly dally forever and there would be no real sense of challenge.

And I say "sense of challenge" because in truth, its never a real threat. I finished with so many days to spare because the game is really generous like that. Its clever, actually. It gives the illusion of urgency and a sense of challenge, even though once you beat the final level, you'll realize you had all the time in the world.

So, as someone who truly does agree with you in general, this is one of those rare exceptions to the rule, at least for me.

OK, I have to ask: what was up with the people saying the The Switcher 3 wasn't viable in docked mode?

This is gorgeous.

Not 1080p60fps Ultra settings gorgeous like my PC version, but WTF

HOW IS A HANDHELD DOING THIS?!

Oh man, I should have bought this version before now. I don't think I even need to bother with my PC version.

It's so pretty~

So i went to fire up bloodstained tonight to try out zengetsu, and i didnt know it, But you need to replay the final 2 bosses to get him playable, I already beat them about a year ago. And it was grueling. The last thing i want to do is jump in cold and attempt it again. Really stinks since i wanted to attempt a run through with him. Not sure why they wouldn't offer it if you beat the game once already.

@DarthNocturnal @rallydefault It's weird, because I usually dislike timers in games; like the 2D Mario games for example. But the timer in Pikmin is essential IMO, and I can't do without it. Pikmin 2 is my least favourite Pikmin game, and one of the reasons is that the dungeons completely remove the time mechanic (and you're spending 90% of your time in dungeons). And there's no day limit either.

@Ralizah
Glad to hear you're impressed. Usually you're a tough sell so I wasnt expecting you to appreciate the game's looks.

I always said Witcher 3 docked looked good enough to me. Definitely not like on my PC in 4k ultra, but it looks good enough to enjoy. A worthy sacrifice for the handheld play.

But keep in mind you can have both now. With cross save, you can play on PC on the TV and Switch on handheld.

I'm not sure why I take so many screenshot when I doubt I'll ever post or look at them again, but I'll never stop taking them anyway. It's probably my favorite bonus feature of the modern consoles, but Switch made it the snappiest.

@Ralizah yes it does its amazing

Heh, I did say when it came out that I thought it looked awesome, @Ralizah .... But everyone was busy bashing it for not being 8k Ultra UHD or whatever

@JaxonH @Octane
I gave Pikmin 3 a try (well, more than a try, I did beat it) and it just wasn't for me. That was back when new games on the Wii U were few and far between, and I'd already devoured NSMBU, so I needed something. You're right that the day/resource limit never threated me, but the daily time limits for exploration just irked me. I don't know. Like...it's kind of an adventure game but you're gonna put a timer on me when I'm out exploring? I'm also not a fan of motion controls (so I know I differ greatly from you, @JaxonH, on that one), so I played it with the sticks and that was not optimal lol

I didn't play 2, so if the majority of that one didn't have a timer, then I probably would have enjoyed that one a bit more. Just not my franchise, I guess. I do think it'll be weird if they don't at least port Pikmin 3 to the Switch. I don't know about 4, but porting 3 seems like a no-brainer. They've done it with almost everything else.

@JaxonH So, even just on its own, I think this version of the game looks nice, apart from some weird lighting issues that keep cropping up primarily in cutscenes.

But the fact that this is running on an outdated mobile chipset? The fact that it was already one of the most demanding modern-gen games on home consoles? The fact that it's targeting a similar framerate to the home console versions (Panic Button gets a lot of praise for porting DOOM and making it look reasonably nice, but I'm sure being able to halve the framerate did a lot to help in that regard; Saber Interactive had no such luxury)?

It's insanely impressive. This wasn't a game ever designed with the idea it'd be playable on a handheld system, but it carries over, and usually pretty well.

It has a few issues that I'd be more critical about if it were an exclusive (fighting multiple enemies in Skellige in the middle of a storm... got a bit hairy, and the game started feeling a tad demake-ish for a spell), but even if it were, the handheld performance at its worst seems so much better than what we got with Xenoblade 2. And its worst drops, from what I've seen, don't tend to last a hugely long time.

Honestly, this makes me even more irritated about the way Bloodstained turned out on Switch, lol. And the excuses made by people in general about the hardware not being able to run big games well.

It can. It does. There are no excuses.

@Ralizah
For sure. It comes down to skill, and to be perfectly honest, I think alot of these 3rd parties who make AAA games have a lot more skill than anyone else.

Take a look at the best looking games on Switch. They're all 3rd party AAA titles developed for hardware of an approximate performance level.

Look at how good Bioshock on Switch looks. And runs.

At least they patched up Bloodstained. I started a new game about a week ago and it was a lot better. Input lag was gone and no framerate stutters like at launch. At least, none in the first hour of playing, anyways.

@JaxonH I hear it still stutters around that big tower. At least the input lag is gone, though. That was the single worst aspect of the Switch version at launch.

To be fair, though, TW3 wouldn't be looking nearly so good in either mode if they hadn't patched in the option to change some of the graphics settings, because it still looks pretty bad with the anti-aliasing on.

I was also really impressed with Dragon Quest XI S. Another big, very pretty PS4 game that survived the transition mostly unscathed. And that port even had the benefit of a ton of improvements.

I'm not surprised the last gen stuff all runs extremely well on the Switch. Hopefully this means something like Catherine looks good on the system.

I haven't seen Bioshock on Switch. Is there extensive pre-release footage? I might grab the first game if it has gyro and runs well. Still a bit skeptical about XCOM 2, though.

@JaxonH - your opinion will change once you cross the underground cavern or the gear towers. The frame rate drops into the teens in those locations. In a weird bit of nostalgia, the slow down reminds me of Castlevania II for the NES, lol. sigh If only ArtPlay developed the game with the Switch as the primary platform rather than the Switch version being little more than an afterthought.

@rallydefault The regular controls are a bit weird in Pikmin, but that's how they were on the GameCube as well. I think it's hard to go back to once you're used to the motion controls, but it should be playable. I haven't tried Pikmin 3 without motion controls by the way, but I assume that it's similar to how it was on the Cube.

I get your point. And I normally don't like timers either, especially if you're exploring in a game. But at the same time I wouldn't want them to change it. Because it's one of the things that make it unique, and without that mechanic, it's just another adventure game. So I do appreciate it for trying something else.

I want 4 so bad at this point that it can only disappoint lol.

@Magician I still think it's funny that the Switch version, which very much feels like a half-hearted, late-in-the-process port, ended up way outselling the other console versions. The developers really misjudged which console fanbase to target for a nostalgic Castlevania game, lol.

Pikmin 2 is my favorite as well. The dungeons got brutal, but the floor by floor nature of them did allow for quick resets. I still remember the terror of the water wraith. Or finding the bulbmin.

@DarthNocturnal
Yea, I was pretty much forcing myself through the last parts of Pikmin 3 and doing the bare minimum, but I still had zero issues with having enough fruit.

I get that some people love that feeling of going out a bit each day, getting a bit stronger, and then returning the next day and being able to do a bit more. I just hate traversing multiple times through the same stuff over and over. I like games where things change and stay changed as you complete them. Even games where enemies respawn quickly irk me, though I usually look past it because that's more common than not.