Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@skywake
Graceful Explosion Machine is a superb little game. I put more time into that thing than I care to reveal. I was top of some of the leaderboards for awhile when it first came out.

I'm hoping we get something soon which I've never said. My V2 switch has seen better days. There's some jiggle in the joycon rails which stresses me out. Some obvious abrasion show on the switch and JC. It still works great, but im ready for something more sturdy.

@FishyS

When you say “predictions” are these people with any kind of actual information or are they just really good at predicting Nintendo?

Honestly, mostly people just making educated guesses. There have been some potential leaks. For example, Nintendo may have talked to vendors about Switch 2 (something which has to happen before a new console is released so games can be made). There are also a lot of fairly concrete potential leaks and rumours about precise chips which will be in Switch 2. But in terms of exact release dates? Basically 100% guesses. And even the plausible leaks haven't actually been confirmed (Nintendo implied the main one was false but they would never confirm new hardware before they want to so that doesn't necessarily mean much).

@FishyS

Did I read correctly that the chips are somehow still less powerful than the competing 9th gen consoles?

@Overzeal
It'll be a portable device, it's not going to outclass the PS5 and it'll almost surely fall well sort of the XBox Series S even. But that doesn't really matter too much if you're also portable, and cheaper. Also console generations are .... a bit of a fuzzy term. I'm not a fan. Personally I prefer to group consoles in terms of their relative power and then additionally whether or not they're portable

Tier 0: (single screen)
Atari, Fairchild, Pong etc

Tier 1: (scrolling 2D)
GB, GBC, NES, MS, Game Gear, Neo Geo Pocket

Tier 2: (peak 2D)
TurboGrafx, SNES, MD, GBA, NeoGeo

Tier 3: (basic 3D)
Saturn, PS, N64, DS

Tier 4: (peak 3D)
PSP, Vita, PS2, GC, Wii, Dreamcast, Xbox, 3DS

Tier 5: (early HD)
Wii U, 360, PS3, Switch

Tier 6: (peak HD)
PS4, XBOne, XBOne S, Steam Deck, Series S, PS4 Pro, XBOne X... Switch 2

Tier 7: (post HD)
PS5, XBOne Series X

Did I draw the above lines somewhat arbitrarily? I mean sure. Some of those tiers are much wider than others. But I feel as though there are definitely tiers of performance that hardware has to clear before you are in a place where the games are consistently clearing a hurdle

As it stands the Switch is very firmly an "early HD" tier piece of hardware. It can do HD but not always and it's not necessarily without effort or compromise. It's kinda like what the N64 was for 3D. The tier above? It's largely aiming for the same thing except now it consistently hits it, it's doing it with higher resolution assets. The Dreamcast was the first piece of hardware that came out where you could say yes, we have hardware now that has mastered 3D. The XBOne and PS4 were kinda the same for HD

That's the jump we're going to make here. The Switch is kinda the king of my "tier 5" here, Switch 2 will be at the lower end of my "tier 6". So on paper it's not a huge leap, but it'll be a "new tier" regardless. We're going to go from a console where some games hit 1080p/60fps but most games don't. A console where "post-HD" era options like HDR, VRR, 120fps, 4K aren't even selectable. A console where when you push the hardware you're often land at around 20fps and sometimes well under 720p

We'll go from that to a console that's consistently hitting 1080p/60fps. A console where "post-HD" options are a thing and are possibly even a key selling point. And since we're this far down the road entering this era there may even be some Ray Tracing stuff going on at the edges. But.... we won't be rendering at 1440p or 4K routinely, we're not going to see games, even easy to run titles, where Ray Tracing entirely replaces traditional rendering techniques. But on a ~6-7" screen.... ahh... who cares? You don't really need post-HD stuff on a screen that size

@Overzeal
???

Of COURSE it's not gonna outclass 9th gen consoles. What would give you the impression a $400 portable console running on 20 watts or less would somehow be able to outclass $500 power consoles built like tanks the size of a desktop PC draining 500-1,000 watts from your power outlet?

It'll be 10 years at minimum before we see a portable console even remotely compete with current 9th gen consoles.

Steamdeck is a perfect illustration of what to expect. That portable costs $400 - $650 and can roughly produce graphical fidelity on par with base PS4, albeit at 720p resolution. That is what Switch 2 will be. Pretty much to the tee. A Steamdeck that's smaller and lighter, has a dock with removable controllers and kickstand, and runs Nintendo games. That's Switch 2.

But that's more than sufficient. Switch 2 will benefit from optimization which PC ports don't get, and if it truly does have DLSS its going to punch far above its weight.

@skywake
Tensor Cores mean it can do raytracing but I don't expect any games to utilize it. The cores will be for DLSS- fact they can also do RT will be more a coincidence than a purposeful addition I think. On a portable console where games walk a tightrope of performance and battery life, luxuries like raytracing are the first on the chopping block.

But like you said, it doesn't really matter. RT has been the single most overhyped and underdelivered selling point I've seen in a long time. When used for lighting it makes a huge difference, but I only have a select few games that truly benefitted from it (Cyberpunk was the most impressive imo).

Btw I think your tier list is spot on and a perfect illustration of the evolution of power in gaming hardware.

@JaxonH
Yeah, I'm not holding out for RT on Switch 2. I'm sure some titles will experiment with it, maybe the next 2D Metroid does some RT shadows or something. But it won't be Cyberpunk tier stuff

With that said, RT is definitely a big deal. It has always been the standard for rendering outside of games. It does make a difference and the fact that we can do it in real time now is just insane. But we're still kinda in the "Super FX Chip 3D" era for RT. Especially on consoles. It's still early days

1TB Lexar Micro SD $69.49
https://www.amazon.com/Lexar-Compatible-Nintendo-Switch-Smart...

512 GB Sandisk Extreme Micro SD $29.99
https://www.amazon.com/SanDisk-Extreme-microSDXC-Memory-Adapt...

Damn that's a deal. I still have 150gb or so left on my 2nd card. So I'm not in desperate need just yet. And considering we might be hearing of another system soon, might not even need another card.

@NintendoByNature
Do you intend to reuse your card on the next system?

In preparation for Switch 2, I was going to grab more 1.5TB micro SD cards, but then remembered Kioxia's 2TB cards are releasing next quarter. Would rather wait for those.

Switch 2 is gonna have larger file sizes. So if I filled 3 separate 1.5TB micro SD cards on Switch, it's probably gonna take 3 separate 2TB cards for Switch 2.

Then again, a LOT of 3rd party games were ported to Switch playing catch up for generations of missed support. The next system likely won't see the same blitzkrieg of ports the Switch saw. It'll get more steady, reliable support for sure, but a lot of the games worth owning which Nintendo missed over the years, they were ported to Switch. There's still a fair number but definitely less than going into the Switch era. So maybe the larger file sizes will be countered by not having 3 generations worth of 3rd party games being crammed into the lineup.

I'd really like to see Switch support hot swapping like Steamdeck. Currently, you eject the microSD with power on, and the system will error out and reboot. Being able to swap microSD out on the fly makes it a lot more convenient to split games among multiple micro SD.

Not as much an issue for me personally since I cram the top 1.5 TB of games on the main card, and rarely swap since all the games I wanna play most are on the main card. But for others who don't buy multiple micro SD of such large file size, being able to swap out several 512 GB would be a nice quality of life improvement, even if it is just saving 30 seconds. It feels like more.

Anyways, starting out with a 2TB will be non-negotiable for me. And if it happens to be BC (not counting on it since Switch was hacked, and now a flashcart), grabbing an extra 2TB card to fill with the top 50% of Switch games will also be needed. Time to start saving. They're not gonna be cheap.

Then again, the Sandisk 1.5TB were only $150 at launch, on sale for $130. Whereas the Micron 1.5TB that launched a year prior was $400. So maybe these 2TB will come in around $200. That would be nice. Could feasibly drop down to $150 by this Christmas.

@JaxonH good question. I hadn't really thought about it until now..I suppose it wouldn't be the worst idea to grab some more storage just in case I do. Are we confident the next console will take micro SD cards though?

@NintendoByNature @JaxonH
It's almost surely using microSD cards. I mean it's either that or non-user upgradable storage or they go full PS5 and have a user-upgradable SSD. The former would be a pretty bold move but I can hear the backlash already. The latter I'd be down for but.... would freak out the normies a bit

But yeah, even then we don't know how this all plays out. I mean it could be like the Switch at launch where we had 32GB of storage and on day 1 downloading BotW takes almost half the storage. Maybe they're cheap and give us 128GB and we're immediately hit with 50GB downloads. And in that case sure, microSD card up on day 1

But it could also be the other end of the scale. There's hardware accelerated file compression, maybe games are smaller on disk as a result, say a max of around 30GB. Maybe they're also fairly generous with the storage and we get 512GB built in. And if that's where we land then it'd be a good while before you'd need to get more storage even if you downloaded all the games....... will probably be somewhere in the middle of those two

My strategy with the Switch has generally been whenever I run out of storage buy a card twice as large to replace it. Because they get cheaper faster than I can go through them. And I just shuffle the cards around. Everything uses microSD cards. I think one ended up in my phone, one is in my Anbernic 35XX+, one is currently in my sister's Switch. I have a 512GB card ATM..... it's a tad over half full.... I have a feeling I won't need a new one before Switch 2....

@NintendoByNature
I'm very confident. Which means holding off for the 2TB is probably a wise move.

What comes after is the question though. MicroSD has topped out at 2TB, and speeds likely won't exceed more than 300 mbps without a new format.

MicroSD Express seemed to be that successor, but it just fell by the wayside. One company planning to make them just never did, and the other released a full size SD Express that disappointed, and no devices use either of them still, despite being announced 6 years ago.

Seems CFexpress is going to be the new format, unless a gaming console like Switch 3 adopts MicroSD Express and partners with a manufacturer to produce them to Kickstart adoption. Cause camera companies just don't seem interested.

Which, whatever. CFexpress is a bit bigger but it'll work. I think microSD Express would be better due to size but, the industry adopts what it adopts.

@skywake @JaxonH if it's a handheld hybrid, more than likely it'll use micro SD cards. Now that i really think about it, I guess I'm in no rush to grab one until we know for sure. The only thing I'd do with my current one is pass it down to my daughter for her lite. I still have a boat load of space on my current card, so it's not like the roof is caving in just yet.

@JaxonH I grabbed one of the 512GB SanDisk Extremes for my Steam Deck a few days ago. The Ultra was $5 cheaper, but it seems like the write speeds were sufficiently faster on this to justify the minor increased expense. Definitely appreciate the extra space.

@JaxonH
microSD Express would be an interesting move but also a bit unusual for Nintendo. They tend to be fairly conservative in terms of the technology they use. I'd be surprised if we get anything other than just straight up microSD card support. I think we can also rule out CFexpress for a similar reason, it had a head start over SD Express sure but.... you'd drop compatibility for regular microSD cards if you went that route

With that said, at this stage Switch is globally probably responsible for a non-trivial proportion of high capacity microSD card sales. I'm sure that'll just continue with whatever Switch 2 ends up doing. So I don't think whether or not something is an established tech is a huge issue. Whatever media Nintendo supports, assuming they don't go full Sony on it, there will eventually be availability

@skywake Yeah, they do tend to go with proven technology rather than take a risk.
Unlikely to go with any competing technologies before one or the other has proven to win out.

But they're going to have to choose something after this coming generation because micro sd SDXC simply won't cut it in the 2030's. Well, they might keep it for other purposes as mentioned, but current gen Switch 3 games at that time would be severely hampered if they were still stuck with load times from 20 years prior (in fact, likely far worse as file sizes continue to grow, and pools of assets loaded become ever larger, despite hardcap on the speed it can be read.

I say just mandate installs on SSD and provide a spare m.2 2232 NVMe slot for customers to expand if desired, like PS5 did. And if the day comes the next portable file storage format wins out, adopt it. Until then just ride the NVMe train as long as necessary.

@JaxonH
Yeah, Switch 3 I think they'll definitely need to step it up. But at the rate storage is getting cheaper and faster by then I suspect there won't be much of a discussion to have. Flash generally drops in price per GB by around 2X every 2 years. Switch launched in 2017 with 32GB of storage, pretty cheap with the storage at the time but that's what it was. Extrapolate backwards and you land at 1GB in 2007 which is basically the Wii, so it tracks. Go forwards? You land at 512GB in 2025 and 4TB in 2031

And with that increase in capacity the increase in speed just comes along for the ride. So that's not much of a concern either

Game sizes get bigger? I mean yeah, they sure do. But draw that line also. The biggest games in the 90s were across maybe 3 CDs. So lets say 2GB. The HD generation, correct me if I'm wrong but I don't think there were any multi-disk PS3 games. Firmly under 50GB in the 2000s. These days you see some games pushing beyond 100GB, 200GB has been cracked I believe. So we've gone 100X in around 30 years..... which isn't nothing.... but flash has got 1000X cheaper per GB in 20 years.....

One of my earlier posts on this forum was a prediction that optical media would eventually die out and be replaced by "cartridges". But that by the time we get to that era in like the mid 2020s it'd likely not matter because we would have moved pretty much entirely digital only anyways. I think I can make another prediction. I think that eventually we'll reach the point where we'll need faster external storage media for portable gaming devices as they push into the PS5 tier spec. But by the time we reach that point there will be so much internal storage included in the console most people won't bother with it