Everyone is eager to chat about the Switch 2 console in general right now, and GamesRadar has spoken to a number of developers about what they want from the brand new console, and lo and behold, the eShop has entered the chat once again.
Yep, the eShop has been getting a little bit of a doing once again, similar to when we spoke to a raft of devs about their hopes for the digital store front's future. At this point, it's not really a surprise, or unwarranted, given the state the Switch's storefront has got itself into circa 2025. Besides the fact it's almost intolerably slow at times, it's also become a big old mess of low-quality titles that's a nightmare to browse, with serious discoverability issues, though it does sound like Nintendo is making some improvements on that front with last week's update.
In short, it's a bad time for devs in terms of getting their games up, played, and into the limelight. Chatting with a range of devs, Austin Wood over at GamesRadar says "Many, many of the developers I spoke to agreed that the Nintendo eShop is the kind of outdated, threadbare store that gives hot garbage a bad name." Woah. Ok.
Speaking to GamesRadar, Dave Oshry, who you'll know from some of the best "boomer shooters" out there right now (hello Amid Evil, Dusk and Ultrakill), keeps it short and simple saying that "Mostly the eShop needs to be much, MUCH BETTER", whilst Sam Barlow (Immortality, Her Story) agrees, noting that:
"I'd love to see a robust eShop and an ecosystem that supports indie developers with discoverability and a sensible approach to pricing"
GamesRadar also spoke to the likes of Possessor(s) director, Alx Preston, who specifically calls out a particular genre of game: "Oh, you don't like hentai on your Switch? With bad UI that takes 20 minutes to load one PNG?"
More social features, better discoverability, a full reset (!) and a way to make indies rise up through the trash, were all suggestions made during the course of interviews conducted before and after Nintendo's Switch 2 Direct.
Iconoclasts creator Joakim Sandberg rounds out the eShop chat by saying that "the current store has a sensation of just being a slow list that's added to, which makes it awful to look through and find new things."
None of this will come as any surprise, really, to anyone who's been using the eShop of late, it is 100% overloaded with titles in a way that makes finding what you want, or even just browsing in for an evening, a real headache.
It rings true, too, with interviews we conducted in the feature we mentioned above, in which the likes of Dan Muir (Hound Picked Games) voiced the opinion that, "the visibility tails off so quickly now, compared to recent years.
The message from the devs, then, is very clearly being communicated. Less trash, more smash please.
Of course, thanks to the recent Ask the Developer Volume 16: Part 4 interviews released by Nintendo, we do know that progress is being made. Takuhiro Dohta says that the "Nintendo eShop on Switch 2 has been improved and runs smoothly." In the same interview, Kouichi Kawamoto focused on a feature on the Nintendo eShop called 'Game Finds for You', which lets you quickly see screenshots and watch introduction videos for games.
For more dev thoughts on the Switch 2 in this pre-release phase of excitement and uncertainty, make sure to also check out our interview with another bunch of current Switch developers as they talk Switch 2 reactions and Dev-Kit disparities.
How do you feel about the eShop? Ready to burn it to the ground, or are you more patient than us? Let us know in the comments!