Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@Toy_Link As of right now there is no other NFS game schedule for 2020

@NEStalgia
So, I can reaffirm it's not even remotely like that now. Everything is plug and play now. Everything is designed for controllers now (well, a few older games still arent and the occasional new release but I'd say 95%, and 4% just automatically work with steam controller even if mouse and keyboard only, like CoD Modern Warfare or Vampire Masquerade Bloodlines, those early 7th gen games). Its so incredibly streamlined. You know me. I was anti PC and now look at me. My PC is hooked up to my main 4ktv. I play it from my recliner. I dont even own a desk. It really is as console like as people say.

Steam big picture mode basically makes it an console. Native controller support for all 3 console brands, nearly every game having controller support and even games that are KB/M working with any controller, not just steam controller. You dont have to set anything up. It's already set up. Steam controller config (which works for ANY controller) has presets for KB/M games. Even if you did need to change it, that's what the community configs are. 15 seconds to load the top rated community config, all at the touch of a button, the home button on your controller to get in the config. And mapping takes literal seconds. I can map mouse gyro in any game in 15 seconds or less. Every time. It's so easy. Community configs accessible from that menu means never having trouble with controller schemes. People post elaborate schemes with icons that show ingame for virtual selection panels, its incredible.

I had somewhat aggravating experience with my older PC myself, not ANYWHERE like you. But the occasional game that black screened or what have you. I learned it was just that setup. Built ground up. And using AMD GPU. Stay away from their 5700. Just buy Nvidia and you're good. I can give you a link to the exact prebuilt I got from CUK, full warranty, Nvidia GPU and Intel CPU. The gold standard setup where games are always optimized for it.

It's literally like a console. You get a super thin wireless keyboard with touch mouse pad built in on the right hand side, only ever need it for the web. Set bios to wake on key press, and only ever use sleep mode. Can wake any time with pressing button on controller. Bam. Leave steam big picture mode minimized, controller works as mouse as long as it's running, you use rihkt analog to highlight minimized steam, click with Right trigger, it opens again. Select game. Click to play. It's faster than a console actually. As long as you're playing games and not downloading on the internet or doing other stuff, never need an keyboard really. Plus you get the chat pad for Xbox controller, in case you need to login with email for a game or something, easier than on screen keyboard.

I did have a bit of trouble getting Switch Pro to initially sync over bluetooth and stay paired once turned off, but once I got it, it's worked ever since. And I did buy the PS official wireless dongle for PS4 controller because it has better signal and less latency than BT. Works like a charm though. Also recommend the official wireless dongle for Xbox and the one for Steam controller. Avoid commercial bluetooth whenever possible.

And that's it. Keep your super thin, super lightweight, super low profile keyboard/mousepad combo next to your recliner, and your controller. Just grab and set in lap any time you need it. But for just gaming you wont need it. And steam controller doesnt require a desk or extra anything. Its same as any other controller, just better suited for certain types of games. All controllers can access and use the Steam controller config editor and load a community config designed for the controller you're using.

Apple computers are going ARM-based.

Switch is ARM-based.

Sorry I meant driving game, corrected it to such in my original comment.

@Toy_Link Ahh gotcha makes more sense. I do agree 2 remasters form the same studio, same genre releasing within months of each other would be a bit odd.

@NEStalgia

Keyboard for living room use

For $1200 you can grab this with an i5 CPU, 16GB RAM, 1TB SSD and a 2070 Super for 1440p gaming with ray tracing on the cheap.

https://cukusa.com/cuk-stratos-micro-intel-b360-i5-9400f-cust...

And for $1769 you can get the same prebuilt I got, but at specs suited for 1440p 60fps Ultra instead of 4K, choosing the 2070 Super, which Includes ray tracing and is future proofed for 1440p gaming for years to come (You could drop down to 2060 super but lose the ray tracing and won’t be as future proofed). Also has an i7 CPU and 2TB SSD (cause you’ll want at least 2TB of SSD for OS and top games you play).

https://cukusa.com/cuk-stratos-micro-intel-z390-custom-micro-...

Mine is the same one, but with the i9 CPU instead of i7, 32GB RAM instead of 16gb, 2080 ti GPU instead of 2070 Super, same 2TB NVMe SSD, and Windows 10 activation instead of no activation. Basically ups the cost another $1k and I have two 4TB SSDs I purchased separately which was another $900. But I wanted to go all in and not have to worry about upgrades or storage issues for 5-10 years.

I also bought my own USB wireless adapter and Bluetooth adapter. The built in wireless/BT is weak sauce so I went into Device Manager and disabled those so they don’t interfere with the ones I plugged in. But you could try their USB wireless adapter. It’s only like an extra $5. May as well. It’s chef’s kiss all the way. Everything just works. It’s such a pleasant experience.

Oh, and before I forget. SSDs basically started as SLC (single layer cell). These have crazy longevity and write Speeds, but are also crazy expensive. Gen 2 saw MLC (multi layer cell) SSDs which stored TWO bytes of info per cell. Cost came down a bit. Still great write speeds. Still crazy expensive. Then came TLC (tri layer cell), which stores 3 bits of data per cell. Now here is where the problem started. By dividing a single cell into three portions it requires a final resolution to read each portion and that wears the drive out faster. It also takes longer to write. In fact, write speeds were now close to what normal HDDs were. The read speeds were still blitz fast, but write speeds tanked. So what they did is they started adding a cache of SLC to the drive for writing data, where it treats the TLC like SLC to get blazing fast write speeds. But the cache is limited. A 2TB drive may only have 70GB SLC cache. Not a problem for day-to-day use but if you’re ever copying several hundred gigabytes of data at once to the SSD, the write speeds tank to that of a normal HDD. it takes a while for the drive to refresh the cache. As long as you’re spacing out your large data writes and never exceeding the cache, you’ll never notice.

But costs were still high, so now here comes the QLC (quad layer cell), storing 4 bits per cell. And everything people said about TLC is now being said about QLC, except it’s way worse because with QLC the write speeds tank well below that of normal HDDs. As low as 80 mbps. Keep in mind normal mechanical HDDs are around 120 mbps. SLC SSDs can do around 600 mbps. But they add the cache. So most people never notice. Because the read speeds never tank. If you’re just using it to play games you will never know the difference. Not unless you’re downloading hundreds of GB of games and your download speed exceeds that of the SSD, then it’ll slow down. But once the game is on there you’re golden. It reads blazing fast. You’ll never use the write for anything aside from small save writes. But it also comes at the cost of degradation of the drive. They don’t last anywhere near as long as TLC much less MLC (SLC is basically not even sold on consumer level it’s so expensive nowadays- MLC is the top top expensive ones, TLC is now considered “premium” and QLC is now the norm). And some people make a big deal about that but the truth is you’re still getting so many hours of use out of the drive it’s not going to be an issue for 99.9% of people. I use QLC for my 2TB NVMe SSD and am perfectly happy with it as an OS drive.

Now. A 4TB MLC drive is like, almost $1000. A 4TB TLC drive is like $600. A 4TB QLC drive is $450. So you can see how QLC has put SSD within reach for normal consumers. And I got two 4TB TLC drives (the $600 ones) for just $450 each through smart shopping on eBay. So there are deals to be had and prices are still coming down. You want the Samsung EVO brand. Accept no substitutes. With others, especially SanDisk, you risk the high failure rate of their previous designs, which then got passed on to Western Digital Blue SSDs. So Samsung EVO only.

edit
Forgot to mention. SSDs can do like 3,000+ mbps. But because most are housed in hard drive like enclosures with a SATA interface, they are capped by the SATA limit of around 660 mbps. That’s still 5x faster than mechanical drives, but it’s not the full potential due to SATA data transfer limit.

Enter in... the NVMe SSD drive (traditional SATA interface SSD on left, wafer-thin m.2 interface NVMe SSDs on right)

It connects directly to the motherboard (PS5 is using this over PCIE 4.0 interface) and does not experience the speed cap of SATA, allowing them to reach 3,000 mbps or more. Which is 5x faster than traditional SSD, which were already 5x faster than HDD. So 25x faster than normal hard drives. Now, PS5 is going to achieve double that, I think? It’s really impressive but the fact remains, when you’re that fast, you’re already loading in a matter of seconds anyways, so the difference is going to be negligible for most. Load in 2 seconds instead of 4.

Problem is, most motherboards only accommodate one NVMe slot. And those that do offer more slots actually disable 2 SATA ports for every additional NVMe inserted. So we can be a pain if you try to use more than one. There are adapters they sell that plug into PCIE slots but again, it’s a hassle. They just released the first ever 8TB NVMe SSD. But 2TB NVMe is about $200 and pretty common. The CUK pc I linked offers a 2TB NVMe for your OS for $215 extra (already accounted for in quoted price). Totally worth it. Beyond that, IMO it’s best to use traditional SSD for bulk storage of games, since you can easily add 2 more SSD via SATA ports. The PC I linked is a micro build. So way smaller than a normal tower. Space is cramped. But I can show you how to add two additional SSDs using Velcro with adhesive to Velcro the SSDs down to the bottom plate below the GPU. Cheap and effective, easy access to swap out. Just have to clip the cable ties in back to pull out the SATA port and power cable (or two if you’re adding two drives), feed them through to the front to plug into your SSDs, and zip tie cables in back into place again (never neglect good cable management). Took me about 15 min in total (took longer to decide how to attach but once I decided on Velcro the job itself was cake).

also sorry for off topic, maybe we should continue this in the PC thread

Anyone know if in acnh, when there's a ceremony (such as after a new building opens) it will be available the next day if you don't do it same day?

@Toy_Link Need For Speed could be releasing next March though, that's within 12 months and more than far enough away form Burnout to do fine. If it comes with all the DLC as a complete edition, it could be far and away the best semi-serious racing game on the system.

Anyways, I know a PvZ has been an oft-requested title, so happy for those people who wanted it.

@NEStalgia Yup, ceremonies last multiple days, not sure how many.

I can’t tell if the seven games releasing on Switch by EA are meant to be good, bad or just meh. I will say that despite some people I read thinking The Sims was a certainty, it wasn’t really a shock to me to see it not happen.

I missed this, somehow. Not interested in any of the other EA offerings, but this looks surprisingly interesting. Like a mix between an Alice game and something like Nightmare Before Christmas, visually.

Although they keep referring to a single die as "dice," and it's bothering me.

Since I got my 512gb micro sd card yesterday, I've had 2 games now say the data is corrupt. Both of which were able to launch and 1 even played yesterday. Today I went to fire it up and closed down saying the data is corrupt. The other games I've downloaded to this new sd card have been fine ( I only have a few others downloaded to it). I checked on Nintendo support and it's saying it could be A bad card, an old one, among a couple other things. If I re-format the card, will it delete my save data? I'm 40hrs into xenoblade and don't want to lose it.

Also anyone else have this happen to them? What was your solution?

Edit: make that couple more corrupted games

@NintendoByNature Your save data should be stored on your console's built in flash memory, so I wouldn't worry about it. If you remain worried, then get NSO and transfer your save data to the cloud.

@Ralizah thanks thats what i thought. The only game im really concerned about is xc..ill give it a shot and see what happens. If it persists I'm going to resend the card in and get a new one.

@NintendoByNature Yeah, sometimes formatting works. If it doesn't, though, you'll absolutely want to return the card. Because some percentage of them will be duds out of the factory.

@NintendoByNature
Sounds like a bad SD. I had that happen with an Integral brand one. The SanDisk though are 9 for 9 so far. Not to say any brand is perfect- even SanDisk has like 2-4% failure rate. It’s just the limits of the technology. Sometimes you get unlucky.

@Ralizah good to know thanks. So far I formatted, and tested two games on the sd card and so far so good. I have a few more downloading and I'll give it another couple go's.
@JaxonH that stinks if true. At least Amazon is good About returns. I'll know by tomorrow if itll be sent back since i have to wait for things to DL before testing for corruption

I've always been really interested in the multiplayer shooter PvZ games. They seem really cool, and should've been on Nintendo ASAP when Splatoon became a big deal imo.

I really liked Need for Speed back in the day but I think Hot Pursuit is the reboot and one of the new ones people don't really like, so that's a shame.

My realistic expectation for EA was that they would just dump all or most of the EA Originals on Switch, since they sort of fit that indie-game vibe that the Switch has, and they most likely wouldn't be too demanding (or use the Frostbite engine). So honestly, the actual lineup was a bit surprising to me.

Overall I guess I'd say it's a "whatever" for me. Not a worst case scenario, but I'm not super pumped about it either. I've heard good things about NFS, but having 2 of the 7 games be racing games seems to be a bit of a wasted opportunity. Also have heard good things about PvZ, but have somehow never played one before. The biggest shock is no Unravel 1. There were previous rumblings about that one. Wonder what happened there.

I agree, it’s so annoying. Die EA. Just die EA.

Dice pedantry is not my cup of tea. Just let it go. A sheep; some sheep. It's not that hard