Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

I would love to see the new Disney/Lucasfilms game company do a remaster and/or reimagining of Shadows of the Empire. That would rock.

@link3710 to be fair I think you’re simultaneously way too harsh and nowhere near harsh enough.

The N64 did have lots of pretty great “arcade plus” experiences that fit alongside games like Star Fox 64. Games like F-Zero X, Sin & Punishment, Diddy Kong Racing, Wave Race and games like Beetle Adventure Racing all hold up mechanically and have clean (albeit low resolution ) graphics. I think those games are as accessible and fun as they always were.

Then there’s a small but notable selection of games like Paper Mario and Mischief Makers.

But almost all N64 games have some things that have aged badly. Even the very best of them generally would benefit greatly from a little bit of work - putting a ROM through an emulator rendering in HD isn’t enough for those games.

@link3710

Btw the MClassic is excellent with DQ11. Just got mine and it was the first thing I tried. Really big improvement.

@Dezzy Good to hear! I still haven't had time to check lol

British newspaper the Gaurdian rank Switch as the greastest Handheld console of all time.

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2021/01/switch_ranked_great...

The Switch is probably the most time I've invested in a handheld console since maybe the PSP. Glad to see I'm likely not alone in that minus the PSP part because every other person I knew was a DS kind of guy

I have a question for anyone who has ever removed the back cover of their Switches:

I noticed there was some dust building up around the vents on the back, so I looked up a guide and tried to remove the cover. I had the right screw drivers and every screw was easily removed... except two. The uppermost screw on the joycon rail on each side (there's 5 screws on each side for those who don't know). These two screws were totally impossible to remove. I couldn't get them out no matter what and eventually I gave up for fear of damaging my Switch.

So my question is this: is there something different about those two screws? I couldn't see anything different. All the other screws were easy to remove and reinstall. It was just these two that I couldn't budge at all.

With all the other screws removed I was able to gently life the cover off enough to brush the dust away. But I'm still baffled about those two screws. I've seen people online strip down Switches many times (I just like watching repair videos sometimes) and they never mentioned anything about those screws being different that I can recall. But maybe this is something so simple that they just don't bother mentioning in and I'm just too much of a noob?

(I didn't think I was that incompetent. I've replaced the shells on two sets of joycon before... )

Frankly I wasn’t a fan of the DS. It was cool and it’s not like I didn’t like it, but it just didn’t have a lot of games I liked. I was actually a PSP guy myself during that era. Though I was a fairly casual gamer back then.

And, that carried forward to Vita, which I bought day one. It’s just that... Vita kinda fell through on its potential and 3DS was so much cooler to me at the time. The 3D effect amazed me and I’ve continued being a fan of the 3D to this day. I’m not as enamored with it as I used to be, but I never disliked it like some people did. And it got so many games I was way more into. I sunk a lot of time into Vita, but 3DS dominated my playtime even more than Wii U and PS4 combined. That was the first time a handheld turned out to be my primary console.

And, it’s not like I planned for that to happen. I had always liked handhelds but they were never my preference. Mostly because of the lack of full button set, games that were dialed back and not on par with what consoles could offer, extremely sub-HD resolutions, and it sucked giving up TV play to get it. And in rare cases where a game did release twice on console too, you’d usually have to buy two versions of it and play the lottery in hopes of it having cross save, and even if it did it was a hassle to use every single time, because you had to boot up the actual game and do it in the menu. That’s if you’re even lucky enough to have it at all.

Switch basically wrecked every single complaint and barrier from the handhelds of yesteryear. No full button set? Let’s fix that. Dual shoulder buttons, clickable analogs, rumble, the works. No more relying on touchscreen for buttons that can’t be mapped. Don’t like pared back games? Let’s fix that. Switch runs the actual Wii U games on handheld, releases that were actual console games when I was playing 3DS. No more settling for 25fps DKC Returns in 240p. Now I get HD DKC Tropical Freeze in 60fps with a far more luxurious and ergonomic handheld. All those PS3/360 games that missed out on Wii U, and could NEVER hope to run on 3DS? Ya, they’re all on Switch. In gorgeous HD handheld play with gyro aiming and dual analog controls. Current gen console games can’t run on handheld? That’s still kinda true, but only for the really demanding AAA titles. Pretty much everything else comes to Switch. Tired of 240p on 3DS and the predominant 360-480p on Vita (and occasionally 540p)? Now that’s the floor. Almost all Switch games have 540p as a bare minimum rather than a hopeful ceiling, and most do even better than that. Tired of having to give up tv play for the benefit of portability? No problem. Switch is both. Not only is it both, it even takes it one step farther than that with tabletop “portable console” mode, which is different than handheld. Handheld is not portable console. You’re not playing on a separate screen with a dedicated controller. In tabletop you get a true portable console experience. 3 versions in 1, for every single game, no cross buy needed, no cross save needed.

No more Valkyria Chronicles 2 PSP version designed for handheld. Now we’re getting the real thing. Valkyria Chronicles 1 and even the newest console release, 4, as a console game, as a handheld game, as a portable console game. No more pixelated Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate with no online, unless you spend $100 for two versions to have on Wii U and 3DS, use the clunky save transfer tool to bounce between. Now we get Monster Hunter Rise, basically the MH World of the portable line. A game that looks so good half the responses in comments are a refusal to believe it’s running on Switch. Full button set. No loading zones. 3 versions in 1. No more Borderlands 2 at 20 FPS with missing buttons, using rear touchpad and corners of touchscreen for the 4 missing buttons, accidentally brushing your thumb against the corner of the screen and throwing a grenade indoors and killing yourself, or your middle finger accidentally brushing against the back of the consul and causing you to crouch when you’re running. Now we get a game that’s visually near indistinguishable from the PS4 remaster, at a rock solid Framerate, with gyro aiming, 3 versions in 1. And so on, and so on, and so on.

I’ve always liked Nintendo, mainly because it was what I was familiar with growing up, but I never had any particular attachment to them until I started playing all the amazing games on 3DS and Wii U. And as a new gamer who was discovering all these amazing experiences for the first time, it turned me into a fan. I didn’t like the systems and games because I was a fan of Nintendo, I became a fan of Nintendo because I liked the systems and games. And the same can be said for Switch. By the time the Switch released I was already a fan p, but the reason I love Nintendo so much now is because of how much I love the Switch. Their amazing system has blown me away and changed how I play games to such an extent that I can’t help but be a huge fan. As opposed to the other way around where someone merely likes something because they’re a fan. The hybrid concept really is that amazing.

It’s quite possible Nintendo screws it up in the future and abandons the hybrid concept. I don’t think they will, but it is a possibility. And while I would still continue to buy their hardware because I genuinely do enjoy the games they create, I wouldn’t be anywhere near as much of a fan if they opted for that route. My allegiance now lies with the hybrid concept as much as it does Nintendo. And I guarantee if anyone else makes a hybrid system like Switch, and it gets a brand new Monster Hunter built ground up, and equivalent library of amazing games, I’d love it every bit as much as Switch. Obviously any other system would be at a disadvantage because they’re not creating games like Super Mario 3D World, Pikmin 3, Fire Emblem Three Houses, Xenoblade Chronicles, etc. but if they had games just as good, I’d be just as much a fan.

My hope is that we hit the diminishing returns limit with PS/Xbox to where adding more power yields such negligible perceptible differences, they say screw it, may as well take the extra power and performance gains and make a hybrid. If we can have games that look essentially the same to the point nobody can even hardly tell a difference, but could offer them in hybrid format, why wouldn’t we? I’m not sure how long it will take but we will hit that limit one day and I’m inclined to believe we’re already hitting it. How much better are PS6 games really going to look? At this point it just feels like the cheerleaders will find reasons to see how much better it is but to a normal person just looking at the games I struggle to believe anyone will be able to tell a difference side by side with current gen. But maybe I’m wrong and it takes another two generations. That’s not the point. The point is we will hit that threshold in the coming years and when that day comes there will be nothing left to do with those power gains except go hybrid. I think it is... inevitable. We live in a mobile world. Phones went cellular, computers went wireless with laptops and tablets, movies went wireless with streaming, even headphones have gone mobile and wireless. Gaming is the only holdout. And while there are legitimate reasons for that now (substantial gains were still made with the new generation consoles), we will hit that point where a generational leap offers no noticeable difference visually or performance wise. It’s just going to be stacking up resolution and frame rates to insane levels that are completely unnecessary. When that day comes, I believe they’ll decide to make their next console a sidestep into a hybrid, like how Wii U sidestepped into Switch. Same fidelity basically, but hybrid. I think this will take 15 years before the technology gets to the point games can look like PS5 games on a portable system, but we will get there eventually. Switch is already paving the way, setting up the market.

You can stand 64's horrendous controls? I salute you, I tried recently, and I wanted to throw the controller at the screen. The few things I give 64 over Odyssey are the levels and the sense of accomplishment. Besides that, 64 has aged horribly.

@timleon @link3710 @JaxonX

So I've been playing around with my MClassic. So far, my findings are that it's excellent for 720p->1440p conversions. Plenty of Switch games look great with it.
However, I haven't found much improvement on retro games. I tried a few gamecube games, and the difference was frankly negligible. Pretty much pointless in those cases. Does everyone else find the same, or am I missing some important factor in how to set it up? Like do you need to change the console output resolution or something? Cos I'm on my Wii U. So I've set that to 720p. Meaning I guess gamecube games are already getting some kind of upscaling by the console?

@Dezzy This is pretty much consistent with my observations. There's probably something about the algorithm used that makes it optimal at ~720p.

@timleon

Yeah probably something like that.

I just found my best usage of it so far. Metal Gear Rising on the Xbox One/Series X. That's normally only 720p, but the jump up to 1440p makes it look amazing. Of course it's 60fps as well. Improves it so much.

So another remake of Corpse Party was announced for the Switch, releasing next month in Japan. Currently it has not been confirmed for a western release, but I think the chances are pretty high. I'm both happy and sad, happy for the release but sad because I just bought a copy of the game for the 3DS on ebay 2 days ago for a pretty hefty price.

@Dezzy
Ya, they say 720p upscales best to 1440p because it's a perfect multiple. But if the game goes to 1080p it looks better just outputting at 1080p, for example.

As for retro games, never really paid attention. The mClassic has a switch for retro game mode (unless you bought the older mCable), so enable that. The thing to remember is it cleans up micro jaggies best- that's its strong suit. So large pixelations wont really get any benefit. But any game with micro fine stair stepping jaggies, those all get smoothed over. Some retro games benefit, as I've seen in videos. But I'm not sure which generation of games benefits most.

@Cynas The Back to School Edition on 3DS must have had a pretty low print run, since it got expensive pretty quickly.

https://www.siliconera.com/corpse-party-blood-covered-repeate...

Seems like they're adding more content. Again. Corpse Party first released in 1996 and has been getting ported and remade and expanded for almost two and a half decades now.

I wonder if they'll re-release Book of Shadows at some point? Would be weird to have the first and third games on the Switch, but not the middle entry.

I bought it on Steam, but I really want a Switch port of Sachiko's Hysteric Birthday Bash. I hate reading VNs on PC.

@Ralizah Luckily the version I chose to buy was the Back to School edition, so hopefully it retains its value when the Switch version comes out. Mainly because I would be sad to see the price significantly drop after I just paid a little over $100 for it, but I know that's just me being selfish.

Now my dilemma is: Should I open the 3DS copy or wait until the Switch version comes out? If the Switch version is going to have more content I feel like it would be better to wait it out, but I've been wanting to try it out for so long and we don't have a confirmation on the western release yet.

Why cant they bring that "Curse of the Curry God" game over to Switch? The one that was on Vita?

Or remake Jeanne d'Arc. Or give us a Stella Glow sequel.

Seems like all the cult classic strategy games are forever trapped on legacy hardware.

I was also totally a PSP guy honestly. I owe that system a lot for being the console that got me into Megami Tensei and Final Fantasy in addition to being the first console I played games like Mega Man X and Ghosts n' Goblins on.

I know the DS was the more widely owned and welcomed handheld of the two but the PSP was such an amazing system, especially for Sony's first crack at trying to match Nintendo's handheld success. The Switch kind of recaptured that magic that I first felt playing the PSP as a kid. It may not have my childhood classics like Persona 3 and Peace Walker, but the Switch is basically the full realization of what Sony wanted handheld gaming to become in my eyes. I still have my 3000 model from 2011. I sunk god knows how many hours into stuff like LittleBigPlanet, Chains of Olympus, Peace Walker, the Final Fantasy ports, ModNation Racers, Secret Agent Clank, the Persona 1 and 2 remakes, Persona 3 Portable and so much other stuff.

Other than a few games I absolutely love, the PSP's library has never really done much for me.

3DS was my portal to Megami Tensei. SO many good MegaTen games on that system.

I also played my first 3D Zelda on it.

@Cynas If you didn't buy it for collection purposes only, I'd say you should go ahead and play it. It's a really solid port of a classic game. If you keep the box and stuff in good condition, it should maintain its value.

Just... be sure to play it with headphones on. It was an early, but still very effective, showcase for 3D audio. I remember the effect of a fly buzzing around my ear really wowed me when I first played the PSP version.

@Rambler
you can say that again

I’d better not. Any more text walls and I might need a publisher 😉