Topic: The Nintendo Switch Thread

@JaxonH In general, it has been shocking how well MicroSD has performed on Steam Deck compared to the SSD. Maybe not for every single game, but certainly in general.

Thankfully, with the OLED and improved pricing, snagging an SSD model was no longer the splurge it once seemed like.

I don't expect to buy memory for a while. With that in mind, taking potential hours off of transfer times over the course of my time with the device seems worth $5.

It's gonna be kinda wild when my handhelds start having more storage capacity than my rig thanks to the relentless march of pricing improvements on flash memory.

$10 says this comes to Switch 2

@Ralizah
Ha! No doubt. Got 2TB NVMe in Deck with 1.5TB microSD, and the Deckmate attachment with dual mSD slots ensures I keep another x2 1TB cards in the chamber for a total of 5.5TB everywhere I take it. Even Switch with its 1.5TB microSD, and the 3D printed cartridge with dual mSD slots ensures I keep another x2 1.5TB cards in the chamber for a total of 4.564TB everywhere I take it.

My desktop PC only has 10TB (2TB NVMe + 4TB SSD + 4TB SSD). I used to think that was massive beyond all sanity or reason. Now? It seems bog standard, a reasonable size to hold a Steam library + decades of roms for emulators.

Btw, have you tried the Prince Of Persia demo? This game is straight 🔥 🔥 🔥

I did watch several reviews which colored my perception of it in advance, but after playing it for just 20 min I'm convinced this game has the potential to rival Ori Blind Forest, Ori Will of the Wisps and Metroid Dread. You can just feel it in the responsive, precision controls and air dashing and combos, gorgeous graphics and music... it just nails it in nearly every respect.

It's sitting at an 88/100 on MC, same as Metroid Dread. Granted, Ori got 90 and 93, which as much as I LOVE those games, I do feel Dread is as good if not a bit better. I'd put Dread at 92 and both Oris at 90. But that's just me.

Atlus and Vanillaware bringing us Unicorn Overlord on March 8th for $59.99 (a digital deluxe for $69.99 includes a digital 132 page art book and 20 tracks in a 16-bit arranged music album)

https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/unicorn-overlord-s...

From the masterminds that brought 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim and Odin Sphere, ATLUS x Vanillaware presents the rebirth of tactical fantasy RPG. Fight against fate and embark on a royal adventure to regain your reign alongside trustworthy allies.

Unicorn Overlord combines the timeless tactical RPG genre with overworld exploration and innovative battle system for a unique epic fantasy experience in the iconic Vanillaware style.

Key Features:
· Traverse a vibrant world, assemble units and direct them into exquisitely animated battles
· Perform heroic deeds and grow renown throughout the five nations
· Cultivate a grand army with over 60 unique characters, from humans and elves to massive beasts and heavenly angels

I must have missed this announcement in the last Direct. In any case, preorders JUST went live 40 minutes ago.

This video does the best job breaking down how the game works in an easily digestible format

There's even a physical release and a slick Collector's Edition on Switch??? My oh my!!!

Unicorn Overlord Collector Edition Amazon

16-bit Music Preview

First impressions... Starlink X Dragon Quest

@gcunit

Feels more a like a Dragon Quest flavored Mad Max.

@Magician I'm not very familiar with the Mad Max franchise (films and games, other than the awesome Tina Turner song 'We Don't Need Another Hero'), but it was just the hovering, strafing vehicle-based combat that tickled memories of the 10 minutes I've spent playing Starlink that prompted my post.

Either way, looks interesting enough. Although where this sudden fashion for calling things '_and Land' has come from I have no idea.

@gcunit Thematically, Mad Max is about humanity surviving in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. Cobbling together the remains of the old world in order to scrape by. Pockets of civilization fighting over resources (water, fuel, food, etc). I highly recommend you watch at least the first 40 minutes or so of 2015's Fury Road.

Unhinged entertainment.

@JaxonH I played through the demo fairly quickly by skipping the cutscenes. It's exactly the sort of high-quality product I'd expect from the Rayman Origins/Legends devs. It also feels like it was designed around the capabilities of the Switch first and runs perfectly, as far as I can tell.

People can say what they like about Ubisoft, but the publisher has been pretty good to Nintendo this generation.

Personally, though, my time with the Switch will be fully dedicated to mopping up the various 2023 games I didn't finish or even start, like TotK, Pikmin 4, Advance Wars 2, Persona 5 Tactica, Rain Code, etc.

Figured I should pick up some new content to justify having picked up the OLED. Browsing through the eShop discount section last night and saw Gris was discounted to ~$5. Not entirely sure why I skipped it when it came out but watching the trailer? Yep, OLED is where this one should be played

Also been playing Hades again. I did say I intended to use this as motivation to clear Luigi's Mansion 3.... not sure that'll happen

Peak portable gaming right here.

A masterpiece that runs native HD 60fps on an OLED screen with NitroDeck converting Switch OLED into a Steamdeck OLED complete with 4 rear mappable buttons, except it's still smaller, way lighter and less bulky.

NitroDeck also released a firmware update which adds an optional zero deadzone mode for the HALL Effect analogs, better gyro precision, more rumble intensity levels to choose from and a few other less relevant changes/additions.

I still like the good ol' official joycon though (with d-pad mod, of course). Got a set of 3rd party joycon on the way with HD rumble, NFC, gyro, HAL Effect analogs, ergonomic grip, the whole nine. Curious to see how good those are.

@Ralizah
2023 generated quite the backlog, that's for sure. And 2024 should be a good candidate for catching up. I expect the release lineup to be slower with Switch 2 around the corner.

Might follow your lead on backlog myself. I'd really like to not make any more purchases on Steam until Switch 2 gets here so I can see what games will be coming over and which won't. But what usually happens is, I give in and just buy on Deck knowing a lot of these may come to Switch 2... and knowing that means I'll end up buying it twice. Gonna have to be a LOT more careful once Switch 2 is out cause unlike Switch, nearly every game will be a candidate for future Switch 2 release.

@skywake Gris is beautiful even normally — does it really look even better on OLED? Very short game, but still in my top 20 on Switch.

I can never manage to finish Luigi's Mansion 3 either. It has great art, interesting gameplay in theory... but I feel like you kind of get the picture after a while and I lost all motivation to continue.

I'm super pumped for prince of persia. Ordered from best buy and I'm trying to have a clean slate for next week when it launches. Almost done with Psychonauts 2 and I'm about a 1/3 of the way through ghost trick.

@FishyS
I mean, I'm playing it on the OLED so I'm not really doing a side by side comparison with how it looks on the non-OLED screen. But It's a game where you frequently have large parts of the screen that's just dead black. And not in a "look at this one cool level" kind of way, just generally it's a part of the aesthetic. Also it's a game where your character is relatively small on the screen so the slightly larger screen certainly can't hurt either

But yeah, pretty good game to show off the screen

@JaxonH @Ralizah Yeah 2024 is looking like a good time to work on the backlog. So far the only must-purchases for me are TTYD and the Apollo Justice Trilogy, though Another Code and Prince of Persia intrigue me.

Really enjoyed the Prince of Persia demo, but probably going on my wishlist until a sale. The one thing I didn't like as much in the demo was the parry mechanic and the demo never has a boss so you don't really get a feel of how essential parry is to the game or even really how it gets used in practice; a bit of a miss in the demo.

Started Dragon Quest Origins on Steamdeck OLED and made THE best controller config via Steam Input. Since the game only has KB/M controls I made a config where right analog moves camera (set touching right analog to = right mouse click and moving it = mouse, so using it now moves the camera) and left analog is set to moving character, clicking L3 toggles run. Left TouchPad touching brings up on screen virtual menu for numbers 1-9 for conversation responses and hotbar selection for spells and items, while holding R5 rear grip mode shifts it to a different on screen virtual menu with quick save, load, map, inventory, etc. L/B are mouse scroll to zoom in and out, and so much more. It legit feels not only playable like a console game but better than I could have dreamed.

Hope they bring Dragon Age Trilogy to Switch 2, and Mass Effect Trilogy. But at least Deck has them for now.

And with Emudeck installing Emulation Station, I got Dolphin installed and set up separate from Primehack, was playing Sin & Punishment 2 with gyro and it works insanely well.

Old GC and Wii Nintendo games are great on Deck. The retro on Switch are best but since it lacks GC/Wii, this is a great alternative. Couldn't get Metroid Other M working good though. On desktop I can but on Deck, can't map it right to toggle from sideways Wiimote to pointing for missiles and straight up to reload.

Hope Switch 2 has GC and Wii added to NSO+. Gonna have to. Nobody will pay $50/yr if they're not adding systems.

My MigSwitch mod chip apparently doesn't include dumper for physical games. It'll be sold separately and isn't releasing day one. They offered me 40% Off when it does release or 40% Off a hardmod for OLED. At $180 discounted to $132, I'm probably gonna do that for my spare Zelda OLED.

Then I can dump all my games including digital, and physical games with updates and DLC. The dumper tool would have only been for physical, and no idea how updates, DLC and digital would be backed up.

@FishyS
I think parry is similar to Dread, except less beneficial as Dread used it in a way that it did massive damage and replenished items. You can also dodge so I think it's more just a tool in your belt- use whichever suits your playstyle. Dodge or parry or a mix of both.

@IceClimbers
Give the demos a try. Another Code was better than I thought. Wasn't initially gonna buy it but now I am.

Price of Persia is a day one for sure. Probably a GotY contender even, despite only being 2 weeks into January.

@FishyS
The demo feels great. They nailed the feel of the Prince games, in my opinion, and I've played them all. I'm stoked for next week!

I did consider waiting, though... only because Ubisoft has a tendency to discount pretty quickly. I don't know, I'm torn.

I felt like the timing of parry is extremely natural in Dread and not so much in Prince of Persia. There is some similar discussion online so it's not 100% just me. There was also some suggestion that parry might be required for bosses but the demo didn't have a boss. Parry does do big damage btw — some of the time?? And it does have a replenishing effect if you have the right amulet or whatever. The dodge feels wonderful and doesn't have any timing weirdness.

Yeah, the party timing feels a bit off, I was rarely landing it. I'm sure I'd get used to it but I certainly wasn't hitting it through the demo. Maybe I'm used to the timing for some other game (Dread maybe?) and need to re-learn. Not sure. But it didn't feel great

Movement in general though is pretty fantastic. Kinda like some combination of Rayman Legends, Metroid Dread and Ori. That alone had me considering picking it up. It's also pretty good looking and runs pretty damn well. I think I saw the framerate dip once in the demo but it was only for a couple of seconds and it wasn't particularly bad. Switch is definitely the place to get it

..... only thing that gives me some pause is, as @rallydefault said, Ubisoft is going to discount this thing to oblivion. But also, Swtich 2 is a factor. Will buying it now carry to Switch 2? Will it be ported to Swith 2? Will it run better on Switch 2? I mean who knows, maybe if I wait until the end of this year I can get it for 60% off and get a portable version that runs at 1080p/90fps with VRR. Less of a factor here, the game is basically flawless on Switch and additional hardware isn't going to improve it much. But certainly a non-zero factor. The discount thing though.....