Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@Grumblevolcano
Yea, I think you got it. Games are "dead" as soon as the last patch arrives. Mario Maker 2 is now a dead game.

@NintendoByNature I checked the website store and it is gone there too:

https://www.nintendo.com/games/game-guide/#filter/:q=castlevania

From the looks of it Konami's removed these from the NA Wii U eshop:

• NES Castlevania games
• GBA Castlevania games
• Castlevania Dracula X
• Contra III The Alien Wars
• Cybernator
• Contra Advance The Alien Wars EX

I didn't check the TurboGrafx-16 games, could be more missing.

@Grumblevolcano its very odd. Almost makes me want to start going slap happy on the wii u eshop just in case. I'm kicking myself now for not grabbing all the CV games

@DarkRula Thanks, I did end up finding that on my own but it looks like you answered before I did - I just didn't see it. lol

@NintendoByNature I'd like to imagine that that is because of GBA titles being added to NSO or released in collections on Switch... but I'm not gonna hold my breath...

@NintendoByNature It makes me want to pick them up in case they get removed from the UK store too. Undecided because it could just be a NA thing given NoA pulled a similar trick with the Tropical Freeze Wii U back in 2018 meanwhile it stayed up on the Europe and Japan eshops.

@Heavyarms55 yea, but I'd love to own them as well.
@Grumblevolcano I probably would just in case but who am I to talk. I sat on them for a while lol. The only one I grabbed was aria of sorrow I believe

@NintendoByNature I mean, digital is digital, if I have them downloaded is all that really matters to me. Just no streaming. I've said many many times now that the main area I think the Switch is lacking in now, after gaining such a wonderful library overall is retro/legacy titles.

And I'm honestly sick of the catering to the 8 bit and 16 bit eras. Those games have been re-released on basically every platform under the sun and probably my toaster even. I really want more "newer" legacy content. N64, GBC era and Gamecube, GBA era stuff. Gamecube is nearly 20 years old now and very few of its titles have seen re-releases and ports. And while every illegal Chinese piracy box under the sun can emulate GBA games - I'm that weirdo who still wants them legally in some fashion.

When Switch was first being shown, before it even released, one of my thoughts was "this is going to be the penultimate platform to host retro games too! All classic portable and console titles on a device that can be either is literally perfect! I couldn't ask for me!" and the they did not bring VC to Switch...

So be it NSO or collections released from individual publishers, I don't care, but I do want to see that kind of content on Switch.

@Heavyarms55 Man, I was so looking forward to playing those GBA VC games on a hybrid console. It's fine to play games like those on the TV at times, but they're designed with portability in mind, and the Wii U GamePad just doesn't cut it for me.

@NintendoByNature @Grumblevolcano

https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/castlevania-aria-of-sor...

https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/castlevania-harmony-of-...

https://www.nintendo.com/games/detail/castlevania-dracula-x-w...

They don't show up when searching on the website, but the listings still seem to be live.

@Ralizah Exactly! I have several of them on Wii U but it just isn't the same - especially since the Wii U gamepad now, after playing thousands of hours of Switch, feels like a bulky fisher price toy in my hands...

But even before - I used to get annoyed because you still had to sit close to the Wii U. I couldn't even take the game one room over unless there was a direct line of sight... (I used to think it would have been so cool if the Wii U could borrow your router somehow and you could use the Gamepad anywhere in your home where you also had wi-fi!)

Back in jr. high school I had GBA and Gamecube with the Game Boy player. So I'd often play games on both and that's how I remember them. When Switch was announced, all that came flooding back to me - now I could play the same games on TV or portable again!

And the Switch library is, in my opinion, the best I've ever owned! I have over a hundred games on it with a big backlog! I'm not lacking in things to play! And yet, the one area the Switch still lacks in, is that legacy/retro content, especially GB, GBC, GBA, N64 and GC era stuff. All things, minus GC, that we had before on Wii and Wii U. And yes, I have a bunch on Wii U still, but I can't take my Wii U with me.

And that is the true strength of a system like the Win 2. Playing Steam games doesn’t net more than 3 hrs battery life. But you want GBA, N64, GameCube or Wii? 4 - 4.5 hrs all day, at 1.5x native res (which looks sharp on a 6” screen).

I would rather play them on Switch, but... like they’re gonna release the GBA entries Fire Emblem, Fire Emblem Sacred Stones or an English version of Fire Emblem Blazing Blade on Switch. Like they’re gonna release Fire Emblem Path of Radiance (GameCube) or Fire Emblem Radiant Dawn (Wii) on Switch. Or Metroid Prime Trilogy. Or F-Zero GX (GameCube). Or Paper Mario Thousand Year Door (GameCube).

Until that day comes (never) I’ll do what I must to have those games portably. If they ever hack the v2 Switch I’d buy another just for emulating GC and playing Portal on the Switch version of Android OS.

@Heavyarms55 don't get me wrong, any retro content is better than none, but id much prefer having them stored on my device forever, be it wii u or switch. I'm with you that the switch is the perfect retro device, but they aren't cashing in on it for some reason.

At some point though, they do need to give us GameCube titles, i mean, cmon now. Its not like gc was some sort of special hardware that can't be emulated.

@Ralizah thats strange. I grabbed harmony just in case something funny happens

I do agree that post-SNES Nintendo nostalgia is underappreciated, but it does feel like that's only partially on Nintendo. N64 nostalgia without Rare is just objectively incomplete and always will be as long as that's an issue. GBA nostalgia is reliant on remakes of...NES/SNES games. And Gamecube was just not that popular.

I don't think that excuses everything, and nostalgia is more than just about what was popular back then (Earthbound was one of the best selling VC games on Wii U, for example). But I do kinda get why Nintendo focuses on the games they focus on. Not to mention, post-SNES VC was usually lacking in terms of a quantity of games. Like weren't there maybe 20 N64 games on Wii?

checks I was close, 21! 19 of them are first party btw.

Though I didn't realize how many GBA games were on Wii U. I must've zoned out after the initial release of GBA VC.

To be fair to third party....it's Nintendo themselves that are the stand out for neglecting retro content on Switch.
Some third party, though, have stepped up. We have retro Castlevania, Mega Man, Doom, Turok, and tons of other classic titles from arcades and ports of games from many previous generations, from generation 3 up to the immediate preceding one. The notable stand out is Nintendo, only offering their pitiful NSO app for anything before the Wii U.

@Heavyarms55 So you wanted a Remote Play functionality for the Wii U? It'd be cool if it could work. I never could get it to work well between my PS4 and Vita, though.

Anyway, yeah, I'm mostly happy with my Switch, but it's utterly baffling to me that they ditched the Virtual Console the instant they created a system that could very easily be the ultimate virtual console device.

Nintendo gonna Nintendo, I guess. I'd happily pay top dollar to have access to these games, even if it was just available via NSO. But so far all we've gotten is the same NES/SNES lineup that they've pushing on us since 2007 or so. History didn't end with the SNES. The Wii and Wii U both had access to games from a variety of classic systems, but we can't have GBA games on Switch? I don't get it.

@JaxonH Well, putting aside the insane price tag of one of those things, I really just want a way to legally play it on a portable system. I mean, I COULD download an emulator on my phone, grab a bluetooth controller, and play old ROMs that way. And I have. It's how I played Shin Megami Tensei on SNES (a game that was never officially translated until some iphone port released a couple of years ago). But I like to do stuff legally and officially whenever possible. It's why I keep buying retro collections and used to buy VC games, despite having access to almost all of that stuff via a vast library of ROMs and ISOs.

Well, if they didn't, they couldn't use those old games as a way to get people to pay for online, now could they? I mean, its not like they could actually improve their online service to get people to pay for their online service after all.

@kkslider5552000 But they don't. They just have old NES and SNES games, and even the latter took forever to add. I'd even be happy paying more per month for NSO if it meant having access to a wealth of older Nintendo games.

@kkslider5552000
I remember Midway being pretty antagonistic to those who were asking for a Wii VC version of Mortal Kombat.

Wouldn't be surprised if a few companies had the same attitude towards VC and just didn't display it as openly.

There's 2 parts to the end of VC:
1. Allowing indie games to flourish - you know for certain that the charts page would've filled with the same games repeatedly (e.g. SMB, SMB3, SMW, SM64, MK64, LttP, OoT) if VC existed on the Switch and fewer people would buy indie games

2. Online subscription service - Xbox Live Gold and PS+ have relied on free games every month for the service for years now and Nintendo wouldn't do that with Switch games so they use old games instead. That said, both service's free games have been very meh recently.

The month when it turned out that the Dark Souls Remastered and Dying Light rumour was fake with the actual PS+ month being Farming Simulator and Cities Skylines was a classic.