DragonEleven

Saw a video this morning about another review unit that had arrived (can't remember who it was off the top of my head)... apparently the NDA specifically prevents them from showing the system out of the box... but doesn't stop them from showing it while still in the box... so they opened it up to give everyone a look, but made sure to keep it in the box while they did.

For all we know, they could allow you to download DQH1 and DQH2 separately.

If you have the means to, you might want to consider making backups of old games in case this happens... as long as you have a legally purchased copy, you can legally make copies as long as they are only for personal use.
Older discs are the most at risk, so I've only ever done this with PS1 games myself... but it's worth doing, as this isn't the only way a disc could be damaged.

hiphoptherobot clearly knew the console was stolen... no-one would have received a console from a 'friend' two weeks early without questioning how they got it, unless they were aware that it was most likely stolen.

I was half expecting there to be some sort of reference to the scene where we've seen Zelda bathing.

I spotted the available space when the video first leaked... didn't think it was really worth talking about, as it was around what I was expecting anyway.

@UmbreonsPapa I'm not so sure about that... they had said before that they wanted to keep the main series on the handheld consoles, and there's a good chance that like Nintendo, they consider the Switch to be a home console, not a handheld... and while they have said since then that they do intend to bring Pokemon games to the Switch, they did not specify main series games, suggesting that they might have been referring to spin-offs instead.

@thesilverbrick Pokemon have different rarities in different locations... that is a factor that the main series games and Pokemon GO share... but that does not mean that they have gotten rarer over time... that only means that Ledyba are more common in Johto than in Alola... if we were to return to Johto, we'd find them to be just as common as they always were there.

I can't believe you're so blind that you can't see that what I'm proposing is the very solution to the problem that you want to avoid.
By adding them all at once, you're looking at a maximum of around 30% chance of encountering a new Pokemon.
But by adding them 10 at a time, every 2 weeks, with encounter chance boosted by 10x for the first week of each (my estimate of the boost given by events), you're looking at the chance going up to around 50% every time new Pokemon are added.
This gives both a higher chance of encountering new Pokemon and a longer period of having more to do... exactly what both of us want... you're just too fixated on getting them all at once to realise that.
And you say that people complained about only getting the babies before... but was it really that bad? How many of the babies have you gotten since then? How many in the first month? ...or week, even? If you are a devoted player like you claim, then I'm guessing you got them pretty quickly. I'd gotten all but one of them in the first two weeks, and I was even ill for the majority of the time their chance was boosted. So can you really complain about that approach to adding new Pokemon?

@thesilverbrick Finding specific Pokemon in the main series games has never gotten any more difficult... you you're not making a shred of sense there... different Pokemon were available in different regions... you just had to look in the right place.
And to repeat myself... by adding Pokemon in smaller groups they could increase the spawn rates of the new Pokemon for a short period of time to make it easier to find the new Pokemon than if they added them all at once.
If they release them all at once, then your chance to find a new Pokemon would drop exponentially in no time, but a periodic release with increased chance would keep your chance of finding a new Pokemon higher than normal as long as they kept adding new Pokemon... just think about how easy it has been to find the pink Pokemon during the valentines event.

@DanteSolablood A smaller number of annoyances over a longer period of time is far better than a large number of annoyances all at once... a smaller number of annoyances you can put up with... a larger number of annoyances could make the game unplayable, and did so with a number of people around launch, who haven't played the game since as a result.

More spawn points does not make spawns more balanced, it only increases the number of unbalanced spawns... and your experience of spawns is almost the polar opposite of mine, which just supports my point about the balancing... in my town the variety of Pokemon is pretty limited... nests never seem to offer anything particularly rare, and I haven't seen some species outside of eggs since the first few weeks of the game being released.
CP-wise their adjustments so far have been rather ineffective, and actually quite harmful to gyms as a result... when the game was first released there was a round a dozen species of Pokemon that were frequently put on gyms... now we're down to about half a dozen, making it even more unbalanced in favour of those Pokemon.
And as your point about the chance of finding new Pokemon, I used the example of the babies for a reason... they were given an increased appearance rate for a week after they were released... making them easier to find... the same could be done with other new additions if done in small groups, completely solving that issue.

@thesilverbrick I don't think you're thinking the implications of such a huge addition through properly... as this is exactly my point about spawn balancing... dumping another 80 Pokemon into a pool of 150 Pokemon lowers your chance of getting a specific Pokemon from 1/150 to 1/230... that is what will cause it to be like a needle in a haystack, especially with the rare Pokemon.
Adding them in smaller groups would allow them to do exactly what they done with the babies... increased spawn rates for a short period of time before reverting to normal... this makes it easier to catch the new Pokemon for long-term players who have caught most others, while minimising the overall impact on spawn rates for everyone else.
Releasing the Pokemon periodically would also sustain the game much better in the long term... so many players stopped playing when they stopped finding new Pokemon in their local area, but if they keep adding more periodically this would give people a reason to keep playing the game.

And to use your moronic Gold and Silver comparison in a more accurate way... rather than just dumping all of the new Pokemon into Kanto, where you'd have had to search through all of the Pokemon you'd already caught in order to find them, they instead created the Johto region where you could encounter the new Pokemon gradually as you progressed round the region, with a handful of new species being introduced to you in each new route you visited, making it easier to find the new Pokemon, without making the old Pokemon inaccessible.

@countzero Size is a key aspect... handheld consoles are typically designed to fit into a standard pocket so that they can easily be carried around, so that you can have them with you whenever you want to play... but the Switch is too large to fit into a standard pocket... you'd need to either carry it in-hand constantly (which is impractical) or keep it in a bag (making it take longer to start and stop playing).

You could also consider it's power limitations while portable to be a factor... it's optimised for use as a home console... as long as it's being used as a portable it's not capable of using it's full processing power... and if they did allow it to use its full processing power, then the battery would run out far too quickly.

@thesilverbrick You obviously didn't see my second comment where I pointed out that I already have 150 of the 151 available in the region... and I do still play every day.
But you seem to have misunderstood my point... I'm not saying that they shouldn't add the Gen 2 Pokemon... only that they shouldn't do it all at once... they do need to add more, but they need to be careful about how they do it, or it could no more harm than good.

@DanteSolablood If anything, your points are all the more reason for them to take the addition of new Pokemon slowly... they've put so much work into getting it to where it is now, they shouldn't throw that away by dumping all of the gen 2 Pokemon at once.
Every change they've made to the game has caused more bugs to appear, and this will certainly be no different... and they've barely got the spawns for the current 150+ balanced, but even that could do with more work (it's a lot better than it was, but it's still far from perfect)... imagine what will happen when they have 230+ Pokemon spawns to balance instead.
If they take it slow, releasing just a dozen or so Pokemon at a time, then that will minimise the negative impact, making it easier for them to sort out any bugs or balancing issues that appear, before adding the next group of Pokemon.

@UmbreonsPapa Currently the only games on the way for the Switch are primarily home console games... no main series Pokemon game has been announced.
Regardless of how people may intend to use the console, I think Nintendo are making it clear that it is supposed to be a portable home console, rather than a handheld console.

For the record... I've got 150 of the 151 Pokemon available in the region (still working on candies for Togetic)... but I still think this is a bad move from Niantic... it's just too much all at once.

I can't help but think that this is just going to kill the game all over again... sure, people will come back to it for gen 2, but adding that many Pokemon all at once will just cause chaos with spawn and gym balancing... they'll just end up quitting again in no time.

They had the right idea when they added just the babies before Christmas... a handful of Pokemon like that didn't cause any problems, and any balancing they needed to do was virtually unnoticeable.

Plus, there's still various bugs that need fixing, cheating to be dealt with, trading and legendaries to be added, as well as other features that could do with improvement before they add that many new Pokemon.

@countzero Those are the traits of a handheld that have been given to a home console to create the Switch... it's like taking the wings of a bird and sticking them on a monkey... it doesn't make the monkey a bird, it makes it a flying monkey.

Handheld consoles aren't just designed to be portable... they're designed for flexibility... they can be played for as long or short periods as you want, whenever and wherever you want... it's easy to stop and start playing.
Home consoles, on the other hand, are designed solely for long periods of gameplay, with as little interruption as possible... and that is exactly what the Switch is for... you don't have to stop playing when you move away from the TV... it isn't designed for long-term play away from the TV, only long enough for you to be able to keep playing until you can get back to the TV.

I've said this before, but the Switch is not a handheld console... it is a home console that has been given some of the traits of a handheld to make it portable.
While I think it could be debated whether or not it can still be classed as a home console, or whether it should be classed separately as a hybrid console, this does not change the fact that it's not a handheld.

I'm finding it pretty fun myself... haven't spent any money on it but already got a party of 4/5 stars in the mid-20s.
The only thing I would really like to see improved would be how badges are earned for increasing the star value of characters... in order to do this with 4-star characters, you basically need to get them up to at least the high 20's in order to get the badges, only for them to reset to level 1 when you do increase their star value.

Koizumi's comment kind of makes me think they might be working on HD remakes of GameCube titles, rather than just doing a direct port onto the VC.
Wind Waker and Twilight Princess were successful examples of that, so they could be planning to do the same with other titles.

Adding up the story, dungeon, challenges, hero mode, and all the items that would come along with them just doesn't seem to be worth the price to me when you compare the price of the DLC to the price of the game.
However, the more I think about it, the more I think it will be the mystery map feature that will make up the difference... the map features appear to be pretty much complete as they are, so the only thing I can think of them adding would be some way of helping you to find any items, collectibles, etc. you might have missed.
I understand that this won't appeal to everyone, but completionists like myself would often buy a guide for the sole purpose of tracking down anything we might have missed, and even then it can be quite tricky in a game so large when you can't remember which you have or haven't found... but an in-game system for this being built into the map would make this far easier, and save the cost of buying a guide (which costs almost as much as the expansion pass)... so if that is what they're adding, then this will easily make it a worthwhile purchase for me.

The additional content sounds good, but I'm a little unsure of the price... it's basically a third of the price of the game for only a fraction of the content in comparison.
I'll still get it, but it'll need to be pretty amazing content in order to make it feel worthwhile.

I'm sorry, but I never saw this as being a long-term thing... I always saw it as being limited availability, so I don't see the point of complaining when they run out of this sort of thing.
Demand was higher than expected, and they do seem to have produced more than they originally planned already.

Limited supply is a sensible move in a lot of cases... not only does it generate more interest from consumers, but it also reduces waste from unsold units, which could cost them a lot of money if not enough are sold... so by limiting the number to an amount that they know they will sell could actually be more profitable to sell out than to overproduce and be left with unsold units.

@Shellcore I think you've underestimated the sort of people I'm talking about.
They weren't just expressing concern... they were just badmouthing the console, and using the limited line-up as an excuse to do so.
A limited line-up does not make the console itself bad, which is what they were saying... it could make a good console struggle to get started, but that's it.
They wouldn't listen to anything good anyone had to say about the Switch... they'd just respond to everything with "it's crap" or "it's got no games"... and when asked to back up their argument that 'everyone' was saying that, they'd just refer to articles expressing concern by the sort of people you were referring to, which don't actually support their argument.
But the morons who were listening to them didn't care... they couldn't be bothered to actually read the article... they just saw that it mentioned the limited line-up and were accepting it as being true.

Only two days before release... I don't see why they'd have saved anything good until that close.

I've recently noticed that the lack of games at launch is being used by Nintendo haters to badmouth the console in general... I'd usually just laugh that sort of thing off, but it is actually starting to put people off getting the Switch.
The haters are basically just telling them that everyone is saying that the Switch is a terrible console because of the limited launch line-up (which is moronic on a number of levels)... but the problem is that people then go away to check if what they're saying is true, but only search for articles about the line-up... so they see all the articles expressing concern for the Switch due to the line-up, but not the ones praising the console and the games.

Some people use the option of trading in games to support their decision to buy physical, but I never trade in games, so the option is irrelevant to me... it just comes down to price... as long as they keep their prices at the RRP, I will only buy digital if it's digital only, or on sale for less that the physical price.
Personally, I'm hoping the discounts that are supposed to come with the subscription service might help with this.

Got an email from Amazon yesterday saying that my order had been upgraded to release day delivery... I was expecting that anyway, but I do consider this confirmation that they haven't oversold preorders.

That is based on SEGA's RRP though... once retailers decide their price it'll probably be the same... although that's still an improvement.

If they can get a VR headset working that uses the Switch's screen, then they could have a pretty major impact on VR in gaming, as it will make it far more accessible for people who can't afford the additional cost of the elaborate headsets that are currently being used.

Slightly surprised to see the Wii U getting an increase in sales... although I guess people are probably getting them ready to play BotW and don't want to splash out on a Switch.

Perfect... Clefable is one of the few I still need and I only need a few more candies for the rest.

No mention of the rumoured introduction of Espeon and Umbreon though.

I tend to use the Wii U's web browser for YouTube more than anything, as I dislike the proper YouTube app.
Aside from that, I do use it now and again, but have found myself starting to use my phone for that instead, so as to avoid interrupting play.
Basically, although I would like it if they kept the web browser, I doubt I'd miss it.

Interesting how it looks as if the cover image has actually been created but cutting two separate images together... it looks like Zelda is holding the rusted Master Sword, while Link is holding the repaired Master Sword.

@Locke159 All of the characters are different, so it largely comes down to personal preference.
You can raise the star rank of heroes once they reach level 20... it does reset them to level 1, but boosts their base stats at the same time.

You can see this as either positive or negative...
Positive... it won't be a lazy port like the Nintendo consoles often receive for multi-platform titles.
Negative... it probably won't have all of the same features as the other versions.

@LeRaposa I'm pretty sure they've said they will never go pay-to-win, but I think they've always maintained a desire to remain free-to-play for apps like this.

@retro_player_22 I think you're getting confused with Mario Run, but there's no limit on the number of chapters you can play.

Played a decent amount of this already but don't see any sign of any pay-to-win element setting in yet... if anything it will be the orbs that are the issue, but I've already got two 5-star heroes and around half a dozen 4-star ones just from using the orbs you get for free, and I'm almost ready to start raising the rank of some of my heroes as well... it will be slower than paying for orbs to get higher rank heroes, but I don't mind that.

Is anyone else still hoping for a BotW demo?

Should have called it Minémon to avoid any legal issues that would come from using the Pokémon name.

I remember them mentioning that traditional button controls were an option in one of the live streams... so that part is kind of old news.
But it is nice to get a bit more insight into the development of the game, as well as confirmation that there will be more characters and game modes.

I don't think the success of these smartphone games is supposed to be judged on a financial basis... I don't think Nintendo are actually intending to make much money from them... just enough to offset the cost of making them.
The real intention behind these games appears to be as a form of marketing... drawing in more users from the smartphone game market.
In this sense, it would be obvious for them to choose Mario first (being Nintendo's mascot franchise), and Fire Emblem makes sense when you consider they have Echoes and Warriors coming this year, and the untitled Switch game... they're getting more people interested in the franchise before the new games are released.

Hard to tell exactly how good this is until we know the exact details of the service... it still seems a little vague for me to judge.

I've been criticising Mario Run for a while... there was obviously not going to be any longevity to it's success with the approach they've been taking to it... that has obviously been realised now.
Fire Emblem Heroes seems to have a similar problem... it seems like a decent game so far, and I'm sure it will get a decent number of downloads, but there's currently no real reason to spend any money on it.

Personally, I get the impression that they see their mobile games as more of a marketing tool, rather than being a proper source of income... a way of getting mobile gamers interested in the different Nintendo franchises, in order to attract more people to their consoles, which is their primary source of income.

I'm curious about what the 'Tandem' application could be... could be another game that they haven't announced yet.

I find this particularly funny considering that the two Nintendo Skylanders/Amiibo come with vehicles.

The case and screen protectors are all I'd be interested in, but the accessory set from Nintendo themselves seems just as good... and better value.
I might have been more tempted by the premium screen protector if the Switch used a stylus like the DS/3DS or gamepad, due to the additional scratch protection, but I doubt it will be as necessary when just using fingers.

That's a 4? Looks more like a 7 to me.

@impurekind 1-2-Switch is trademarked, but even if it wasn't, it shows that the similarity is not coincidental, which would be enough to take legal action... if they'd used a completely different name, then what you're saying would be true, but that's not the case here.