@Ogbert I was gonna say the same to the guy. I get how GKC anger a lot of people but I view it differently. It’s just another option for devs and pubs. The ubi guy just said 64gb cart is $23 that’s insane. Surely the game releases at higher than $59 if on cart. Those costs will come down and hopefully pubs get more size options soon.
I will always prefer the entire game on cart but that ship was already sailing on SW1 with so many big games essentially using 8gb carts as key cards. One upside I see is GKC will allow typical street retail quick and random price cuts like we see with disc published games. I bet by black friday were getting 3rd party games like this on GCK for $20-$30.
I know everyone is hating on the game key carts but Doug pretty much made the case. They are going to allow more small Indy releases and then big AAA ones as well. You peeps are just not being realistic about the cost of real carts. Likely 64gb is largest current offering and there are going to be bigger games than that. 128gb is probably currently prohibitive. This is just giving devs and publishers more options to release retail versions of their games. We all have a choice on how to spend our gaming $$$ but if I am getting some ubi or ea game for $20 on black friday I’m not gonna care much if its a key cart. New full price releases hell no.
You are correct sir and I was going to make an exception for playstation. Most of their games do mostly install from disc and are playable without an update. Still, usually to get the latest build big updates need to be downloaded. Microsoft is worse in that in many cases an entire new build will be downloaded and very little is disc installed the upside is their servers are the fastest and if you have fast internet you will get much faster installs than from disc. I love discs and still archive some data on BRD. Hell I miss the days of handing someone a mix CD (lol) but discs days are numbered and likely only still exist not to please gamers but to bolster the street retail market. At least publishing discs is dirt cheap. I was really pleasantly surprised all the indie and small dev/publisher games that came to Switch in cart. As said not a fan of keycart but understand it’s need and how it could benefit games that come to retail. It will effect my purchasing but I won’t rule them out as I still see them as a better option than digital.
Your points and questions are good. I’m trying to decide myself how outraged I feel about it. I’m an OG gamer and collector so I want physical to be physical but this is 2025 and physical as we know it is hanging on by thread. Most discs for console are essentially keys. I will always prefer something playable on the physical media but that has been narrowing for 2 generations now.
Here are a few possible reasons why N did it. It is going to level the publishing cost versus disc therefore lowering the threshold for physical releases. This could bring many more small or AA level releases. The Switch got plenty of these on cart but with the key ‘concept’ S2 could get even more. In some ways it may help preserve the retail game market new and used. These games will be downloadable for likely 15+ years if history is our guide. It is better than code in a box because it’s a transferable license for a limited time of many years. I am just not going to pay full price for them. Nintendo and others better not do it for their cart releases if they want me buying their AAAs at launch at full price. I will buy the keycarts at discount and used. I don’t think N is threatened by used market as their games always have best used value and trade heavily yet they still sell 10s of millions of their big games physical. I just think its more a tool to help retain the retail market and I bet it gets used a ton inJapan for local only releases.
So yeah I hate it but it may serve its purpose commercially and financially while still giving the retail customer something better than a code.
I was fortunate to get a slim w/drive spiderman 2 bundle in April for $450. Held off a long time because I have a ps4pro and just didn’t see enough new content for ps5. It was wanting to play FF7 Rebirth that finally moved me. $800 just unreal. I think all it will do is push more people that we’re waiting to upgrade to go with ps5 slim. I don’t really think Sony expects to sell a lot of these, its a Tesla when most of us can only afford a Toyota hybrid.
Color me not super impressed. I mean the original Crazy Taxi on DC still looks impressive (especially if you use VGA cable to an older HDTV). I love how it is taking them like 4yrs to to make a new game. Shinobi looks good but how many Indy companies have churned out great 2D HD platformers that are excellent so do we really need it? I would rather see a Skies of Arcadia remaster/reboot or something like a new Phantasy Star online. I have sort of grown weary of all these remakes of old stuff, for gods sakes why not create new/modern titles in these classic franchises if you want to bring them back to life. Of course I am a veteran (read old) gamer so I played all this stuff once back in the day so maybe I should be kinder to the younger generations out there that never played these classics. Still something like Dead Cells or Mark of the Ninja blows away anything Shinobi ever did.
I think who stays invested will likely corollate a lot to how robust the hardware is (like can it do capable ports of current and last gen x86 boxes) and how well it sells. Nintendo getting more friendly and courting 3rd parties helped but selling over 20M/yr Switches for like 7 years created a big draw. Some companies did very little regardless (Here is looking at you EA that never brought a Madden or much else other than some old ports). For sure Nintendo now has the best ecosystem they have ever had so hopefully Switch 2 keeps up the success.
Yes aware Starfield is currently XBOX/PC exclusive and that M$ owns Bethesda. Still we can dream.....plus M$ has some incentive to bring some of their titles to other platforms as with their large investments in Bethesda and Blizzard/Activision they are not going to be making enough return on investment to justify the cost selling only to 30M or so current XBOX users (especially when 1/2 of them are probably on GamePass). Time will tell but I would be super excited if we could get Forza Horizon 4 or 5 on Switch 2. I think its more likely that Nintendo gets some exclusives than $ony as M$ doesn't see Nintendo as a direct hardware competitor.
Way to think outside the box. I too like Starfield and believe it will improve with QOL fixes and DLC. It really gets dogged too much and I enjoyed playing the main story, factions, side quests, the base building isn’t bad either. I would like to have it on a portable system especially if they did cloud cross save with xbox;pc.
Also rooting for BG3. They did a quality port of Divinity OS2 on Switch so I believe BG3 could be done. It runs decent on Series S so Switch 2 might be able to pull it off.
This one hit my by surprise as I often find a way to watch them live when they release. I am jazzed for Metal Slug Tactics but it seems like it has been announced for years and bug me that no concrete release date just Fall 2024 which is already upon us. Castlevania Shadow drop is nice but wish it had a turn off map altogether option for full screen play. I have wanted Suiko 1 and 2 refresh forever. Those are two of my favorite games ever. Played them on PSX and then again much later on PSP. I’ll probably give them another go as they were so great in gameplay and story.
To me Three houses was a similar series evolution to what Breath and MarioO did for those series. Unlike many I liked the school/leveling loop. I played Blue first and developed most characters as intended, but when I played second time as Yellow I tried to work with characters latent skills and take them a different direction. This added a compelling angle to the teaching loop for me. 3H is a classic albeit not a traditional SRPG its more an RPG with SRPG combat. I also liked the DLC as it had a full alternate story though I wish it wasn’t so limited in the other aspects. Engage just hasn’t held me. I get back to games years later so suspect some day I will give it another go but much of it just felt cheesy. The ‘vibe’ just felt off in Engage.
This is a nicely compiled list…..there are a few omissions we can all complain about but overall it has a lot great recommendations. My tops are Metroid….a total modernization that adds free look with twin sticks was huge as I hated wii motion controls. Xenoblade DE because it was barely released in the USA and so few people got a chance to play it. Super Mario RPG and Paper TTYD because they were some of history’s finest and then the two GBA updates with Advance Wars and Mario vs. DK. Truly the Switch has birthed an entire generation of remakes/reboots and when you mix that with great new Nintendo content, incredible Indy support, and some excellent 3rd party ports it has the best library of any Nintendo console ever.
Well peeps it appears we are in the cash grab phase of the Switch's lifecycle for 3rd party ports. Its a shame as there have actually been a lot of good (some quite surprising) ports to Switch in the last 6 years. Much more demanding games like Skyrim, Divinity OS2, Witcher, Nier, No Man's Sky, Red Dead, and Doom16 have shown it can be done if the right team does it. In the end its probably about 50/50 the ports that had the proper care and run well and the ones that are total ass. Some of these quality ports were Gen7 so there is just no reason to blame the hardware when they can't get Gen6 game running properly. Publishers need to just stop with the cash grabs but what they figure is Switch and its 130M user base, even if its a bad job, enough people will buy them regardless. At least Nintendo had a knock out year as 2023 was the 2nd best year for them on the soon to be sunset platform.
Interesting info and for sure I like the 'friendly' relationship M$ and Nintendo have formed. I think it benefits both sides. Its funny you would mention a Nintendo Xbox because when I look at the Series S I think it would be a perfect Nintendo home console. Its has a nice form factor, low power consumption (compared to Series X or PS5) and packs a lot of punch for a $300 kit. When you look at what Nintendo can pull off on Switch with an aged Tegra X SoC it would be cool to see what a Zelda or 3D Mario would look and run like on a even a tame next gen home console. More than a takeover I would just like to see more collaboration and maybe some sharing of IPs. COD and other Activision titles may find some success on Switch but what about Forza 4 or 5, on Switch or Mario or Zelda mainline game on Xbox. I doubt that would ever happen unless their was an acquisition. I think how M$ handles the whole Activision/Blizzard takeover will be very telling. If M$ really wanted to entice Nintendo they could give them gamepass tomorrow for cloud play. It wouldn't take hardly any effort at all to put a cloud streaming client on Switch and then sell a cloud only gamepass for say $5 per month. I am not a huge fan of cloud streaming gaming myself but it has improved greatly and some titles can be played that way without too much performance loss. One thing for sure is $ony is definitely a market competitor with both M$ and Nintendo so I think the some of the co-operation is a case of the enemy of my enemy is my friend. One thing you can't deny is M$ is making crazy investments in gaming. The development of the best pay to play service with gamepass, the acquisition of first Bethseda/Bioware and now Blizzard/Activision. M$ is thinking long term and while they may lose the hardware sales competition again this cycle they are well positioned to do well in the future when all these development studios shore up their lack of compelling content issues.
Yes and no….what your saying is mostly true in the USA and to some degree even the rest of the western world. Japan is a little bit different and the government and the companies tend to have a more protective stance about their flag bearing companies. Sure if N wanted to sell things could be worked out but N has always expressed an interest in staying ‘pure’ in their game development and system creation. As for the board and share holders, they might reasonably have concerns about selling to M$. Nintendo has dominated Japan, totally outselling both ps4 and ps5 almost every month since Switch 2017 release. Meanwhile Microsoft has never been able to sell the Xbox brand in Japan. 4 generations and 20+ years and they can’t sell crap. So why would a Japanese company that has largely dominated japan since the 80s want to cede control to a company that has failed miserably in their market? Meanwhile N has done great in N. America whenever they have a hit product. So sure M$ would love to buy Nintendo and get a true foothold in Japan but I doubt it would ever really happen……and hopefully it doesn’t because if anyone ever purchased Nintendo they would certainly effect their creative freedom and then they wouldn’t be Nintendo anymore which would be a true loss.
Was just mentioning to someone else that if the next gen system sticks with carts they have to find a way to make larger carts available to devs at a reasonable price. Its beyond me why they can't do this as I can buy microSD at retail dirt cheap per GB now so read only cart memory at the quantities that Nintendo can manufacture it at should be cheaper. I only know of one game (Switcher) that even used the 32GB cart size. I hate it when carts essentially become dongles just for launching the game, but most 3rd part went with 8GB carts and did just that, forcing large downloads which is also slower than hell when coming from Nintendo's servers. If it using a newer NVidia SoC with all their latest bells and whistles I think it will be fine power wise, but they need to make sure it has enough system RAM and put in there mind that 32GB carts need to be the starting size and then it will be more viable for current AAA ports.
Oh yeah and in regards to your comment on GC.....you are exactly right cube was actually quite potent rendering wise, far better than PS2 and even on par with xbox....its bottleneck was the mini-DVD drive allowing only 1.3gb per disc, which limited texture size and quality, while OG XBOX was the first system to ship with an HDD. Still that little optical drive was a marvel as the Cube had the fastest load times of any disc based system ever. I am a collector of old systems and games and also a modder. I revisit old systems occasionally when they get new mods and I can say without reservation that the Cube games have held up over time incredibly well.....not even close as most PS2 stuff just looks like dirt and XBOX looks like clunky PC ports. A lot of Cube games had 480p support and on my old 1080p 47 inch LCD (that TV upscaled great I must admit) they look just great even by today's standards. They also look fricking incredible playing on the GamePad on a modded WiiU. Cube was the best of the not commercially successful systems, with the Dreamcast being a hair behind.
Yeah I have to give it to you on that front.....I have been surprised considering their relative level of support that UBI didn't try bringing one of the new AC games over, but I am pretty thrilled (as I am old and old school) about the the new PoP 2.5D game. I was also surprised that in the Batman collection they are bringing the latest game as they always said that wouldn't be possible. It will certainly be interesting to see where the spec ends up on the next Switch but I do think it will be viable for even more ports because DLSS really is quite impressive in what it can do so as long as the SoC can do solid 1080p rendering they will have it looking almost like 4K. More importantly in my mind is they give it enough RAM and assuming they use carts be it a new or same formfactor, that they find a way to make larger cart sizes affordable for devs because you aint bringing these modern 50GB+ games over on measly 16gb carts, and in the entire life of Switch there have been very few games that even use 32GB cart (Switcher).
I thought the overall direct was underwhelming and had the look of a this is the end of life for Switch (and I usually don't complain about directs for the record). But I was excited to see this. It was a favorite back on the GBA, my only regret is I wish they had tacked on an update of the original DK for GB. If any of you are old enough to remember that had the original DK arcade levels but then after that it had a bunch of more puzzle oriented levels that were sort of the start of the Mario vs. DK games. It was an original GB (pre color) title so it would have been a great opportunity to give it a modern makeover....oh well at least its been so long ago since I played this on GBA that puzzles will seem almost fresh......PS was also very exited about the 1K year door remake.....by far the best Paper Mario of all time.
I think devs supported PS4/XB1 longer than anticipated because of the pandemic and how it effected unit availability and sales for more than two years. PS5 should have been selling 20M a year and I heard even thru last year (2022) they were only able to push out about 13M units. Just like the kids and school I think this will sort of be the lost console generation. I threw a 1tb SSD in the PS4 pro and have gotten good use out of it playing Horizon West, new God of War, and other 3rd party which still look and run nice. Just finished the RE4 remake and was duly impressed. I do think the pressure is on to finally abandon last gen as there seemed to be little reason for me to bother buying a PS5 so far. I have sort of been waiting for the KOTOR reboot (in dev hell as it got pulled from Aspyr) and FF VII part 2 as there just isn't enough compelling exclusive content. I did buy an XSX in 2021 because I found one and I like how M$ has promoted BC all the way back to the OG Xbox and how a good number of games got FPS boost to 60, and HDR for X360. I had actually never played Fallout 4 or Dragon Age 3 and they were so much nicer with the FPS and load time boosts. GamePass is truly the bomb.....more content than anyone could play, significant day one releases, PC content as well, and as you mentioned use your old X1 as a cloud player. There is nothing even close to be had for $15 a month and far less if you do a little looking around (on ebay and other keycode sites).
Hey....I at least got you to moderate your position. LoL. I am gonna agree with you on the carts with huge downloads. That is more on the cheap arse devs and I think the pandemic sort of froze the price of memory from falling as fast as it normally would. Thankfully Nintendo managed to never do that as when a game needed a larger cart, they used one. I was impressed when Switcher came out as that needed a 32GB cart and the dev used it. More and more discs and carts have become DRM dongles which sucks, and it sort of sucks more for Switch because its supposed to be a portable system. Thankfully Switch did use MicroSD which has gotten super cheap (in the US at least) to put lots of storage in for digital or those large 'updates' for carts. Switch ended up getting far more 3rd party support than I ever expected it to. I figured even if it was a success its library would end up more like 3DS or Wii which was great Nintendo games, a few last gen ports, and a few original 3rd party developments. Also agree some of the ports were bad and just cash grabs, but a decent amount were impressive. I personally think they should have gone with an enhanced dock model that had a second GPU and extra RAM in the dock so that when docked it could run higher resolutions. Heck another cheaper possibility would have been to just have it clock up a lot more when docked and added extra thermal solutions to accommodate. Even without those considerations its no problem to push the OG Switch to full clocks docked (I have done it for years with no ill effect) which helps games that use dynamic resolution stay locked at higher resolution, and helps load times as well. Nintendo just always errors on the side of caution with thermals which is why they have never had an X360 Red Ring debacle.
@rjejr
Yeah I think we likely would have gotten a Switch pro if not for the pandemic and the fact that Switch just kept selling like mad all the way until the present day. The Switch v1.1 is using a more power efficient chipset that when modded you can actually overclock to 2GHZ on the CPU, and 1GHZ on the the GPU as well as higher on the bus. I think we would have gotten something like that with more Flash Ram and the OLED screen. Once the window for a true mid-life upgrade passed I think Nintendo starting working on what we will get next year which will be a true leap in what a hybrid mobile chipset system can offer. I hope Switch 2 has BC but I sorta think it won't and that Nintendo will keep Switch v1 around a few more years as the cheaper little brother system. Rumor is it will use different cartridge tech, but heck they could put two slots on it like how the DS had a GBA slot.....I really hope we get an official announcement right after the holiday season (they won't do it before as why kill another banner sales holiday).
LoL.....I thought that as well....though I was kina hoping for Super Switch Pro v2.0 myself. Nintendo usually has some quirky feature advancement each generation so what I want is the 3 form factor Switch VR....can be played portable, has a dock for TV, and comes with headgear you can drop it into to play VR....now tell me that wouldn't be cool.
The tech demo showed off the new Matrix game and that is running on unreal engine 5......you power w***** just don't understand that anything can actually be made to run on anything. The Switch 2 will likely be aiming for 1080p rendering and then use DLSS to push it to 4K. Various demos and tests have shown that combo produces very nice results that to most people are hard to tell apart from higher render rates. I remember people with the same arguments on Switch and they all fell flat as it got many competent ports of current and last gen games. Fortunately Nintendo, Nvidia, and smart devs know more than you do about how to get games running on lesser hardware. The Switch would have gotten non of them if it wasn't a huge commercial success, which is why Nintendo can't put out your dream system.....wouldn't sell 100m+ units if the price point isn't right and isn't getting any 3rd party if it isn't a commercial success.
@Lady_rosalina
I wouldn't be so sure about that....they said the same thing about Switch and how many 'impossible' ports did it get? Quite a few and a they run and play nicely. I think that is why they showed of the Matrix demo which surely will look better on PS5 level hardware but the point was the system will run Unreal 5 and can run (even if scaled back) version of current cutting edge games, also when you have a console that is outselling everything for years that tends to get devs motivated to figure out a way to scale games to it.
@KramersMrMarbles
Never gonna happen if they stick with the hybrid concept. You can't get the same rendering power off of a system designed to run off batteries and you can't get even close (like SteamDeck) without charging a much higher price. Switch was outlandishly successful because Nintendo hit all the right notes with form factor, power, and price (and then their legendary game development)....that's why it is heading into year 7 and has sold over 100M units.
I like the people dogging Nintendo's use of 'old' tech. Its total BS, and ignorant, because the Tegra chipset was not that old when N employed it in 2017, and Nvidia actually created custom dev libraries for it that helped squeeze far more out of it than they were getting with Shield TV. That's why devs were able to put projects on it that no one believed would be possible. GPU is not just about performance, sure the Switch might have had the raw power of a last gen system, but it had modern GPU features and libraries to support it. Same will be true of this next chipset. Its going to use DLSS for near 4K look and word is ray tracing will also be supported. So while the raw rendering will be last gen numbers, it will indeed produce far better results. Also the Switch is a small form factor hybrid that is running on mobile SoC.....that configuration is NEVER going to have the same power as a full home console. Its not possible....Switch runs docked on 30W of power and handheld like 1/3 of that.....Your Xbox X/PS5 is likely pulling more than 200W. What should be lauded is what Nintendo, Nvidia, and great developers have been able to accomplish on such meager specs and power consumption. I know its gonna be a nice kit though I expect the price point to jump to $399 at launch, my only real question now is what will the BC be like or will it even be BC at all. Fingers crossed as wouldn't be great to run Switch v1 titles with patches that give 4K and FPS improvement like we got with ps4 pro.
I thought 2013 was strong as well with all you mentioned plus the Tomb Raider reboot which is the best since the reboot IMO and then The Last of Us which was a fabulous swan song for PS3, oh yeah and Fire Emblem got its important successful return with FE Awakening.
Yeah hard to top 2006 for hardware with all three majors pushing new systems and those first HDs were a huge jump in what could be achieved. I remember waiting to buy X360 till March of 06 because Oblivion released. A good part of the rest of that year was spent playing that game and all the DLC that subsequently came out,. I know many idolize Skyrim but for me Oblivion far more memorable.
For most people that is probably true but it only goes back to 85 and gaming started for some of us before that in the arcades in the late 70s.
@WoomyNNYes
Agree 2017 is the best year for N since 2002. I mean BTW and MarioO alone are all time greats but you forgot Mario Rabbids (big srpg fan here) and then then year was capped with Xenoblade 3.
I thought this direct was really solid and while a lot of talking heads thought that Adv Wars would be the shadow drop, we get a wayyyy better shadow drop in the rumored but unannounced MP1R.....and we still get a coming soon date for Adv Wars. So much of what was shown is going to be purchases for me. I love Baten Kados and re-played the first one within the last 5yrs. Level 5 coming back in a big way and also good DLC announcements from N. Happy to see the FE DLC will include a story add-on eventually. The first 1/2 of 23 is looking epic with FE already released, Kirby coming, Adv Wars, MP1, Zelda, Pikmin 4 and then continued strong 3rd party support. Probably not as excited about GB/GBA as some (I'm a modder so I just have so many ways to play these oldies) but its nice for Switch to keep getting the legacy stuff. As for the rumors that Tears will be the last 'Major' release for Switch I am calling BS. Nintendo talked about nothing of their own in this direct for 2nd half of the year. Nintendo always does its best sales in the holiday season.....no way they are going to just waste the opportunity to push their major franchises to what will soon be a 120M unit audience. I expect we are going to see MP4 or a new Mario game by years end....put it down....2017 we got both Zelda and Mario and I think we will this year as well. Switch really has become the little system that could when you look at all the incredible content it has gotten beyond Nintendo's always excellent offerings.
MGS4 is awesome and for stupid reasons by stupid people it has never been updated and re-released so its PS3 only but highly recommended. MGS5 is one of the coolest third person combat simulators ever made IMO. There is so much weapons customization and all these mechs and vehicles. Its just so fun to prep for and then pull off missions and a ton of base stuff. I haven't played it for years so not sure if the online stuff is still going but the campaign is totally worth it. If you like sneak/combat games check out Splinter Cell BL. The last one made and its a great game that met commercial failure mostly because it released EOL on ps3/x360 and WiiU (best version IMO) and likely because of poor sales never got a ps4/xb1 release.
So Happy we now have Persona 3/4/5 on Switch. Many people said ‘Nintendo will never get mainline Persona’ and boom they were wrong. 5R is the best close to a 10 and P4G really hoods up as this game is getting close to a decade old, so a strong 9. P3P is showing its age and was a marvel on PSP but if you played it before pass on a replay IMO. Now we need an updated Devil Survivor 1/2 and Persona Q 1/2 (especially 2)….Those might take a little more work as they would need a remaster coming off of DS/3DS.
Huge SRPG fan and huge FE fan. Liking the direction its taking. Even though it diverged from the previous norms, I really loved 3 Houses. I liked the character development loop at the school and found on my second and third play throughs that it was more fun as I pushed characters out of their ‘preferred’ class paths into other classes which sometimes took most of the run to accomplish. My major complaint on three houses was I thought it was lacking in maps. Most the side quest maps just recycled and the DLC added the 4th house story and some better maps but still not enough IMO. What I would love to see is more ‘depth’ in the environments like XCOM2. It would be nice to be able to use structures as cover that can be attacked and destroyed and have multiple vertical levels. More mini-bosses and large enemies would be nice as well.
The art style choices mean some will love and some will hate but I like it personally. As for ‘previews’ and reviews and such. Previews tend to be ‘positive’ especially for beloved franchises that have strong track records (like most N games). User reviews do tend to run hot and cold as genre preferences tend to show thru more. I like looking at the aggregate scores and what you tend to find on most good to great games is the aggregate critic and user scores are usually pretty close meaning their is agreement that the game is worthy of purchase.
For those that say ‘I don’t really like SRPGs’ will this game make me like them….No probably not. SRPGs are a niche that many people find play too slowly and are too complex. If you don’t like strategy and tactics these games aren’t for you. I would recommend trying the Mario Rabbids games as they to me are arcade SRPGs playing much faster, and generally in fewer rounds. Also they are just more light hearted and silly which is great unless you hate sophomoric humor. For me the rabbids are funny but whats more funny is that Mario and the gang are the ‘serious’ elements to the rabbids inane absurdity. The best part is this popped up without much pre-fanfare and now its coming before I can even finish Sparks.
While I understand people being against day 1 paid DLC, this is Nintendo so I few them a little differently because they generally aren’t going to chop a game just to sell DLC. The game will be full and robust and have plenty of content on day 1. Also no one does more free DLC than N. Games like Arms, AC, Kirby, Mario Tennis and Golf and Switch sports have all had lots of free DLC. This is a season pass which is getting more prominent on Day1. So just don’t but it on day 1, play the game and after wearing it out by the Season pass and play on. As long as those season passes deliver good content across all waves I am fine with it. The DLC from 3houses was well worth the buy in the end.
@sanderev Actually several very prominent Switch scene (mod scene) guys have proven that is not true. The Switch SD card slot can hit speeds up to about 100MB/sec which most newer UHS-I cards can accomplish. Meanwhile the internal NAND is capable of 240MB/sec with up to 480MB/sec burst speeds. With games that are decently optimized you really don't see much of a difference, but games that use a lot of small files in their structure tend to benefit the most. There are some famous examples like Lego City which has very long 60sec type loads when coming off SD or Cart but they can be cut to 20sec from the NAND. Another early game BattleChasers NW (great game based off an underappreciated grafx novel) had really bad animation stutter during the battle sequences but when I moved that game to NAND it smoothed right out. The USB ports are only USB2 on Switch but the SD and NAND bus are actually 'full speed'. Looks like this game is just trash, sad that it is selling like hotcakes and fans of the series don't seem to care. Nintendo should definitely step in and demand better from GF and the Poke Co as each generation the tech gets worse, those clowns at GF apparently never learned to code on anything after the GBA/DS.
@Axecon The devs know the Switch well enough to know what it’s capable of and the engine is likely too ambitious. We’ve seen this too often in the last two console gens with major day1 flops like Fallout76, ME4, Ark, CP2077. Sometimes devs stick with them and games that were unacceptable tech wise are cleaned up and eventually are playable. I like what M$ has done with XBSX as many last gen games got a 60fps boost and between that and boosted cpu and load times its made some games great. Their are generally options for making x86 games run better either with higher end console versions or a beast PC. With Nintendo the options aren’t as great because if it does’t run well on Switch your stuck. Nintendo really should step in and demand a better product from the PokeCo as Pokemon is synonymous with Nintendo and GF putting out subpar products reflects badly on N. Looking at all the great ports and 1st party releases on Switch there is no excuse to put out a technically gimped game.
WiiU had a great library but was what baffling is that N didn’t support the dual screen concept better. Some of the best use of the GP was 3rd party titles. Missing from this list are Mass E3 which used the GP for real time map which no other system had, also Splinter Cell BL which was a great game with best version on WiiU. The fact it never got a real SRPG is baffling as GP was made for it and yet no FE, no AdvWars, no Starcraft or Xcom. Thankfully Switch has become a SRPG powerhouse. The biggest miss by N was never bringing CG to VC as the damned system runs GC natively. Honestly modding the WiiU makes it about 3x better. It becomes the ultimate Nintendo BC machine allowing you to play WiiU/Wii/GC/N64/SNES/NES/DS/GBA/GB and a host of other old 8 and 16bit systems all on the Gamepad. Cube game looks and play awesome on the GP and so does every other old SD system. You can patch Wii titles that use ProControls to play on GP and so I can play Wii games like DKC without the dumb wiimote waggle or others like Goldeneye, FE, RE4 which play and look great on the GP. If you have one laying around do yourself a favor, dust it off and mod it, put Nintendon’t on it and have the best GC player you can find. ZombiU, SCell BL, and COD BO2, and ME3 should all be on this top50 list as they were solid efforts that used the second screen creatively which was more than N did most the time. Also the 3 sports ports (Madden, FiFa, NBa2k) were all solid and deserve mention as well.
What a great Oct and end of year for Switch. I mean this month alone we start with Nier (called by many one of the best Switch ports), we get the new Monkey Island game (Niche but much anticipated and beloved by the niche), Then its another impossible port with No Man's Sky.....that slides into Sparks (my most anticipated title being an SRPG fan) and now even after the little VA drama Bayo 3 totally knocks it out of the park. All this on the heals of Xeno3 and then we get Poke (not really my thing) but what is my thing (SRPG) gets Ogre next month and FE in January....with all this top content I have a feeling Switch is going to have another dominate holiday season.
I tried out the remaster on XSX and honestly I liked the old X360 version better on XSX as it got the 60FPS frame boost treatment, so I just preferred it even with the older textures. Good game and might grab it if it goes on a steep discount but just so much other content to play on Switch I can't be bothered with it. Sparks and P5R eating up all my time until new FE arrives in January.
So true my friend.....this month has just been unreal for ports. The library is by far the best on any N system to date. Nintendo's own offerings, some solid original 3rd party games, great ports from current and previous generations, and the best Indy scene in gaming bar none. It has pretty much everything a gamer could want and you can have it on the go or in your easy chair. I have been a gamer since gaming was a thing (started in the arcades in the late 70s and had an Atari 2600 in 81) and Switch is my favorite and most played system of all time. You know N won't waste this momentum. Next Switch will be just like the GBC to GBA or DS to 3DS generation. They will follow with something better but BC and keeping with the same hybrid portable format.
@NeonPizza I agree in that its been a game of diminishing returns on grafx upgrades since the PS3/X360 brought us the first HD leap. I just bought a PSVR kit this year because they came back around and I was able to get the iron man bundle for $250. Hadn't been doing much with my PS4pro recently and hadn't realized that Sony had so much VR content at this point. So far my faves are Moss (fun, that little mouse really hooks you) and the SW Squad game which is just a face melting experience moving in 6 axis in VR. I have been playing with No Man's Sky and Skyrim VR as well and its pretty impressive to see full sized developments like that get the VR treatment. Fingers crossed that N moves in this direction as it would be really nice to have a 'lighter' system that could give us portable VR without the need for cloud streaming. I've been slow to adopt PS5 (mostly because I can't find one without a struggle and PS4pro has still been getting all their major releases) but eventually I'll get one and jump on the PSVR2 as well because we know Sony will give it major support and top line titles.
@PanFriedSoup We have been getting some strong ports recently. Nier and No man’s sky have been getting rave early reviews. Remember P5 was originally developed for and ran fine on PS3 (720p) so I think with the proper effort it should run fine on the little system that could.
Ok to all those worried and claiming that N always has to do something new….ummm not really. Lets me give you multiple examples of successful systems they followed up on with smaller evolutions that were also successful. The NES was followed by the SNES which just improved cpu/grfx hardware and introduced a major improvement to the gamepad. The GB/GBC was followed by the GBA which also improved cpu/gpu and added shoulder buttons and eventually the big add of backlighting. Their most successful device ever the DS was followed by the 3DS which improved screen sizes and added analogue stick and the not much cared about 3D feature. In most cases the ‘next gen’ device strived to maintain BC and was successful but less so than previous device. Even the WiiU was an extension on the Wii just didn’t pop for all the known reasons. VR is the future of gaming as that is the only way to extend immersion beyond the current ‘flat screen’ options. So I predict the next generation system will be Switch VR. It will incorporate a better cpu/gpu architecture using DLSS. It will be BC so to carry forward the Switch’s massive library. It will use a 1440p screen which will make it easy to upscale 720p portable mode games (x2) and have enough resolution to do proper VR. It will have enhanced joycons and come with a VR mask that will use head tracking gyros and N will somehow find a slick way to make the VR mask also act as a dock. It will continue the Switch theme by being able to seamlessly Switch from Portable to TV to VR. Top selling current gen games like MK, Zelda, Mario can all get patched to support DLSS upscaling and/or VR modes. So thats my take. We get an evolved Switch that still allows N to innovate and add a major new feature (VR).
I hope that is sarc as Nintendo should never go cloud. Cloud sucks and is total trash for portable or hybrid gaming. I have a XSX with Game pass. Fast 600Mbit internet and GB LAN. Cloud is still only sufficient for only some forms of games. Your never gonna get arcade games like a Mario or MK8 or Smash to play the same in the cloud. So sure Fire Emblem or even Pokemon might play well enough with a persistent cloud connection but for portable its bunk and no current cloud model can even do 60fps. M$ has the best cloud offering currently in gaming and all I like it for is to check stuff out before committing to a 25-100GB download.
@Krull I”m holding out for Black Friday sales for some of these 3rd party releases ( plus played P5 already and just so many other ‘new’ releases eating my $$$). I think the sad state of physical at retail (since the NWO pandemic) has limited physical copies made and is making it harder to get deals on carts so you may be right on not seeing some of these much cheaper than release price. I know it will go on digital sale at a big discount at some point but I”m an old skool collector so love me some carts.
@Fizza Dude October is just stacked and killing my budget. Don’t forget we get Nier and No man’s Sky this week and reviewers already raving about both ports and Sky is v4.0 which was a huge update. Huge SRPG fan so Sparks will be getting all my time once out but wanting all of these on cart so will likely wait until black Friday deals to see if I can save some coin on some of them. Still chewing on Xeno3 but should be done in time for Sparks….great time to be a Switch gamer and it all rolls into next year which is also setup to slay.
You beat me to the punch. This direct was really packed end to end but so many people complaining about the rumored stuff that wasn’t there. The Prime rumors are about as bad as Switch Pro rumors at this point. Fire Emblem is my second fav N franchise (Zelda) so they had me right out of the gate. I am a big SRPG fan so this direct was a score. I was pumped for Sparks but now we get FE in Jan and Front Mission series as well. 2022 has had a lot of good releases and will finish the year strong. Tired of the Zelda twins port begging. Geez if you need them so bad get a used WiiU. What people don’t seem to get is why trample on their own releases. They just released Splat3, Oct is absolutely packed with Sparks, Persona5, NoMan and Bayo3 I won’t even be sleeping much with that lineup. Then Pokemon which as much as I don’t care about it I must say its looking sweet. I suspect we will see the Zelda HD twins in early spring to pave the way for Tears. As for Prime…if it exists they are likely holding it to release when they get closer to prime 4 date. I don’t mind people being critical but most just nitpick because game XYZ wan’t revealed or dated. This was a little all over the map in offerings and farm sims had their day but overall lots of content and a few good surprises.
Dude I have to say NO on Nintendo’s primary franchises taking a hit. Which franchises? Mario….Kart8 best selling ever and most content and still being supported with new content. MarioO best 3D mario and great seller. Zelda BOTW totally expanded the Zelda game concept best Zelda seller, Luigi got a great new mansion game, two Kirby games, yoshi game, paper mario game….new Metroid 2D best seller and best Metroid ever. Animal Crossing what over 30M units. They been ‘messing’ with Pokémon a bit but it still sold unreal and the upcoming titles will do over 30M sales. Switch is Nintendo’s first console that will pass 1B units software sales and most of it is first party titles. So sure Switch is getting a bit long in the tooth but N’s franchises are doing better than ever and there is more than ample data both in sales and high critic scores by most of their releases. Everything is fine in Nintendo land and Switch aint done yet as there are still more top franchise releases on the way.
Man I am so tired of hearing Konami say 'Its impossible to ever port MGS4'. First off they could just build a new engine for it on modern hardware (or use the MGS5 engine), then they could update and re-use all the texture and audio assets. Would it be a project....yes....but this game never fully got the love it deserved being tethered to the PS3. I believe it sold around 6M units which was very good for an exclusive but if they ported it x86 then they could sell it to the ps4/ps5/xb1/xbs:x and PC market. Surely it would be worth the effort. Konami in general has just acted stupid in the last decade. The hold some of the most iconic franchises in gaming history and all they can do is put out emulated re-hashes like the Castlevania GBA collection. Apparently they hate money. Why not a new 3D CV game, or how about a full redo of the always beloved SOTN? Whatever they do I have a feeling it will be underwhelming because that's their track record in the last 10yrs.
I think the chip shortage is an easy excuse and agree with others who say there is plenty of available stock in the retail supply chain (at least in the USA). I think the age of the system, market saturation, no mega seller games so far this year, and just the general state of the economy are all factors. PS5 (and to a lesser extend XBX) are the ones facing restricted sales due to chip supply issues. $ony only predicted 12M unit sales for the current fiscal year and they would easily be getting closer to 20M or more if they had the stock. Nintendo often sells 1/2 of its system sales for the fiscal year in the holiday QTR. This year will be strong with a mainline Pokemon title and then other long awaited games like Splatoon 3 (remember that game does well world wide but absolutely slays in Japan) and hardcore niche title Bayo3. Everyone who owns a Switch wants a Super Switch Pro 2.0 U......they best get busy on delivering something next year as that window will eventually start to close and with the next BOTW game and MP4 both coming next year, what better time to release new hardware.
Man does this look good. IS there really any other game in this genre than can match Bayo? Also to all those whose wallets are crying in Oct......just remember the 4th QTR is money time for Nintendo and other game publishers. All these games hitting are to make sure there are lots of options for the big holiday spending spree. Still OCT may be the most packed month in Switch's illustrious history. Now if we could just get ADV Wars 1+2 before years end then all my gaming dreams will come true. It absurd to hold a cartoon war strategy game because of real war in the world. News flash....there is almost always conflict happening somewhere in the world, and if they're gonna wait until this Ukraine mess is over they are likely going to be waiting a long time as if history is any guide this conflict will be going on for years.
Not sure why this is surprising to people. Nintendo's own content coming this year has already been talked about and shown quite a bit. We know we are getting Xeno3 soon, we know that the Pokemon games are coming, we know Bayo3 is coming and Splatoon3 is coming. We know Advance wars is done and being held up because Putin is an a-hole and we know we are not getting Zelda BOTW2 or MP4 this year. People act like this is a crap year yet we already got a new 3D Kirby game as well as a new openish world Pokemon game and the Mario Strikers game. Surely we will see more focused directs on the big releases coming later this year, but the truth is we may not get anything else 'announced' this year and that is fine. So let's just see what we get, sometimes the partner showcases give some big surprises on things we have been hoping or wishing for (Persona). Alas something is better than nothing.
Comments 519
Re: Ubisoft Employee Explains Why Star Wars Outlaws Is A Game-Key Card
@Ogbert
I was gonna say the same to the guy. I get how GKC anger a lot of people but I view it differently. It’s just another option for devs and pubs. The ubi guy just said 64gb cart is $23 that’s insane. Surely the game releases at higher than $59 if on cart. Those costs will come down and hopefully pubs get more size options soon.
I will always prefer the entire game on cart but that ship was already sailing on SW1 with so many big games essentially using 8gb carts as key cards. One upside I see is GKC will allow typical street retail quick and random price cuts like we see with disc published games. I bet by black friday were getting 3rd party games like this on GCK for $20-$30.
Re: Nintendo: "Physical Games Are Still A Key Part Of Our Business"
I know everyone is hating on the game key carts but Doug pretty much made the case. They are going to allow more small Indy releases and then big AAA ones as well. You peeps are just not being realistic about the cost of real carts. Likely 64gb is largest current offering and there are going to be bigger games than that. 128gb is probably currently prohibitive. This is just giving devs and publishers more options to release retail versions of their games. We all have a choice on how to spend our gaming $$$ but if I am getting some ubi or ea game for $20 on black friday I’m not gonna care much if its a key cart. New full price releases hell no.
Re: Every Nintendo Switch 2 Game-Key Card Release
@Exwalmartian
You are correct sir and I was going to make an exception for playstation. Most of their games do mostly install from disc and are playable without an update. Still, usually to get the latest build big updates need to be downloaded. Microsoft is worse in that in many cases an entire new build will be downloaded and very little is disc installed the upside is their servers are the fastest and if you have fast internet you will get much faster installs than from disc. I love discs and still archive some data on BRD. Hell I miss the days of handing someone a mix CD (lol) but discs days are numbered and likely only still exist not to please gamers but to bolster the street retail market. At least publishing discs is dirt cheap. I was really pleasantly surprised all the indie and small dev/publisher games that came to Switch in cart. As said not a fan of keycart but understand it’s need and how it could benefit games that come to retail. It will effect my purchasing but I won’t rule them out as I still see them as a better option than digital.
Re: Every Nintendo Switch 2 Game-Key Card Release
@springer17
Your points and questions are good. I’m trying to decide myself how outraged I feel about it. I’m an OG gamer and collector so I want physical to be physical but this is 2025 and physical as we know it is hanging on by thread. Most discs for console are essentially keys. I will always prefer something playable on the physical media but that has been narrowing for 2 generations now.
Here are a few possible reasons why N did it. It is going to level the publishing cost versus disc therefore lowering the threshold for physical releases. This could bring many more small or AA level releases. The Switch got plenty of these on cart but with the key ‘concept’ S2 could get even more. In some ways it may help preserve the retail game market new and used. These games will be downloadable for likely 15+ years if history is our guide. It is better than code in a box because it’s a transferable license for a limited time of many years. I am just not going to pay full price for them. Nintendo and others better not do it for their cart releases if they want me buying their AAAs at launch at full price. I will buy the keycarts at discount and used. I don’t think N is threatened by used market as their games always have best used value and trade heavily yet they still sell 10s of millions of their big games physical. I just think its more a tool to help retain the retail market and I bet it gets used a ton inJapan for local only releases.
So yeah I hate it but it may serve its purpose commercially and financially while still giving the retail customer something better than a code.
Re: Soapbox: Sony's Insane PS5 Pro Price Highlights The Delicate Balance Nintendo Must Strike With 'Switch 2'
I was fortunate to get a slim w/drive spiderman 2 bundle in April for $450. Held off a long time because I have a ps4pro and just didn’t see enough new content for ps5. It was wanting to play FF7 Rebirth that finally moved me. $800 just unreal. I think all it will do is push more people that we’re waiting to upgrade to go with ps5 slim. I don’t really think Sony expects to sell a lot of these, its a Tesla when most of us can only afford a Toyota hybrid.
Re: Video: Early Gameplay Of Sega Revival Projects Leak Online
Color me not super impressed. I mean the original Crazy Taxi on DC still looks impressive (especially if you use VGA cable to an older HDTV). I love how it is taking them like 4yrs to to make a new game. Shinobi looks good but how many Indy companies have churned out great 2D HD platformers that are excellent so do we really need it? I would rather see a Skies of Arcadia remaster/reboot or something like a new Phantasy Star online. I have sort of grown weary of all these remakes of old stuff, for gods sakes why not create new/modern titles in these classic franchises if you want to bring them back to life. Of course I am a veteran (read old) gamer so I played all this stuff once back in the day so maybe I should be kinder to the younger generations out there that never played these classics. Still something like Dead Cells or Mark of the Ninja blows away anything Shinobi ever did.
Re: Talking Point: What Game Should Be 'Switch 2's 'Skyrim Moment'?
@Ryu_Niiyama
I think who stays invested will likely corollate a lot to how robust the hardware is (like can it do capable ports of current and last gen x86 boxes) and how well it sells. Nintendo getting more friendly and courting 3rd parties helped but selling over 20M/yr Switches for like 7 years created a big draw. Some companies did very little regardless (Here is looking at you EA that never brought a Madden or much else other than some old ports). For sure Nintendo now has the best ecosystem they have ever had so hopefully Switch 2 keeps up the success.
Re: Talking Point: What Game Should Be 'Switch 2's 'Skyrim Moment'?
@Reztobi
Yes aware Starfield is currently XBOX/PC exclusive and that M$ owns Bethesda. Still we can dream.....plus M$ has some incentive to bring some of their titles to other platforms as with their large investments in Bethesda and Blizzard/Activision they are not going to be making enough return on investment to justify the cost selling only to 30M or so current XBOX users (especially when 1/2 of them are probably on GamePass). Time will tell but I would be super excited if we could get Forza Horizon 4 or 5 on Switch 2. I think its more likely that Nintendo gets some exclusives than $ony as M$ doesn't see Nintendo as a direct hardware competitor.
Re: Talking Point: What Game Should Be 'Switch 2's 'Skyrim Moment'?
@Ryu_Niiyama
Way to think outside the box. I too like Starfield and believe it will improve with QOL fixes and DLC. It really gets dogged too much and I enjoyed playing the main story, factions, side quests, the base building isn’t bad either. I would like to have it on a portable system especially if they did cloud cross save with xbox;pc.
Also rooting for BG3. They did a quality port of Divinity OS2 on Switch so I believe BG3 could be done. It runs decent on Series S so Switch 2 might be able to pull it off.
Re: Nintendo Direct August 2024 - Every Announcement & Game Reveal From The Indie World & Partner Showcases
This one hit my by surprise as I often find a way to watch them live when they release. I am jazzed for Metal Slug Tactics but it seems like it has been announced for years and bug me that no concrete release date just Fall 2024 which is already upon us. Castlevania Shadow drop is nice but wish it had a turn off map altogether option for full screen play. I have wanted Suiko 1 and 2 refresh forever. Those are two of my favorite games ever. Played them on PSX and then again much later on PSP. I’ll probably give them another go as they were so great in gameplay and story.
Re: Poll: Do You Prefer Fire Emblem: Three Houses Or Engage?
To me Three houses was a similar series evolution to what Breath and MarioO did for those series. Unlike many I liked the school/leveling loop. I played Blue first and developed most characters as intended, but when I played second time as Yellow I tried to work with characters latent skills and take them a different direction. This added a compelling angle to the teaching loop for me. 3H is a classic albeit not a traditional SRPG its more an RPG with SRPG combat. I also liked the DLC as it had a full alternate story though I wish it wasn’t so limited in the other aspects. Engage just hasn’t held me. I get back to games years later so suspect some day I will give it another go but much of it just felt cheesy. The ‘vibe’ just felt off in Engage.
Re: Best Nintendo Switch Remakes And Remasters
This is a nicely compiled list…..there are a few omissions we can all complain about but overall it has a lot great recommendations. My tops are Metroid….a total modernization that adds free look with twin sticks was huge as I hated wii motion controls. Xenoblade DE because it was barely released in the USA and so few people got a chance to play it. Super Mario RPG and Paper TTYD because they were some of history’s finest and then the two GBA updates with Advance Wars and Mario vs. DK. Truly the Switch has birthed an entire generation of remakes/reboots and when you mix that with great new Nintendo content, incredible Indy support, and some excellent 3rd party ports it has the best library of any Nintendo console ever.
Re: Video: Digital Foundry's Technical Analysis Of Batman: Arkham Trilogy
Well peeps it appears we are in the cash grab phase of the Switch's lifecycle for 3rd party ports. Its a shame as there have actually been a lot of good (some quite surprising) ports to Switch in the last 6 years. Much more demanding games like Skyrim, Divinity OS2, Witcher, Nier, No Man's Sky, Red Dead, and Doom16 have shown it can be done if the right team does it. In the end its probably about 50/50 the ports that had the proper care and run well and the ones that are total ass. Some of these quality ports were Gen7 so there is just no reason to blame the hardware when they can't get Gen6 game running properly. Publishers need to just stop with the cash grabs but what they figure is Switch and its 130M user base, even if its a bad job, enough people will buy them regardless. At least Nintendo had a knock out year as 2023 was the 2nd best year for them on the soon to be sunset platform.
Re: Doug Bowser: Nintendo Has A "Great Relationship" With Microsoft
@HeadPirate
Interesting info and for sure I like the 'friendly' relationship M$ and Nintendo have formed. I think it benefits both sides. Its funny you would mention a Nintendo Xbox because when I look at the Series S I think it would be a perfect Nintendo home console. Its has a nice form factor, low power consumption (compared to Series X or PS5) and packs a lot of punch for a $300 kit. When you look at what Nintendo can pull off on Switch with an aged Tegra X SoC it would be cool to see what a Zelda or 3D Mario would look and run like on a even a tame next gen home console. More than a takeover I would just like to see more collaboration and maybe some sharing of IPs. COD and other Activision titles may find some success on Switch but what about Forza 4 or 5, on Switch or Mario or Zelda mainline game on Xbox. I doubt that would ever happen unless their was an acquisition. I think how M$ handles the whole Activision/Blizzard takeover will be very telling. If M$ really wanted to entice Nintendo they could give them gamepass tomorrow for cloud play. It wouldn't take hardly any effort at all to put a cloud streaming client on Switch and then sell a cloud only gamepass for say $5 per month. I am not a huge fan of cloud streaming gaming myself but it has improved greatly and some titles can be played that way without too much performance loss. One thing for sure is $ony is definitely a market competitor with both M$ and Nintendo so I think the some of the co-operation is a case of the enemy of my enemy is my friend. One thing you can't deny is M$ is making crazy investments in gaming. The development of the best pay to play service with gamepass, the acquisition of first Bethseda/Bioware and now Blizzard/Activision. M$ is thinking long term and while they may lose the hardware sales competition again this cycle they are well positioned to do well in the future when all these development studios shore up their lack of compelling content issues.
Re: Doug Bowser: Nintendo Has A "Great Relationship" With Microsoft
@HeadPirate
Yes and no….what your saying is mostly true in the USA and to some degree even the rest of the western world. Japan is a little bit different and the government and the companies tend to have a more protective stance about their flag bearing companies. Sure if N wanted to sell things could be worked out but N has always expressed an interest in staying ‘pure’ in their game development and system creation. As for the board and share holders, they might reasonably have concerns about selling to M$. Nintendo has dominated Japan, totally outselling both ps4 and ps5 almost every month since Switch 2017 release. Meanwhile Microsoft has never been able to sell the Xbox brand in Japan. 4 generations and 20+ years and they can’t sell crap. So why would a Japanese company that has largely dominated japan since the 80s want to cede control to a company that has failed miserably in their market? Meanwhile N has done great in N. America whenever they have a hit product. So sure M$ would love to buy Nintendo and get a true foothold in Japan but I doubt it would ever really happen……and hopefully it doesn’t because if anyone ever purchased Nintendo they would certainly effect their creative freedom and then they wouldn’t be Nintendo anymore which would be a true loss.
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
@Znake
Was just mentioning to someone else that if the next gen system sticks with carts they have to find a way to make larger carts available to devs at a reasonable price. Its beyond me why they can't do this as I can buy microSD at retail dirt cheap per GB now so read only cart memory at the quantities that Nintendo can manufacture it at should be cheaper. I only know of one game (Switcher) that even used the 32GB cart size. I hate it when carts essentially become dongles just for launching the game, but most 3rd part went with 8GB carts and did just that, forcing large downloads which is also slower than hell when coming from Nintendo's servers. If it using a newer NVidia SoC with all their latest bells and whistles I think it will be fine power wise, but they need to make sure it has enough system RAM and put in there mind that 32GB carts need to be the starting size and then it will be more viable for current AAA ports.
Oh yeah and in regards to your comment on GC.....you are exactly right cube was actually quite potent rendering wise, far better than PS2 and even on par with xbox....its bottleneck was the mini-DVD drive allowing only 1.3gb per disc, which limited texture size and quality, while OG XBOX was the first system to ship with an HDD. Still that little optical drive was a marvel as the Cube had the fastest load times of any disc based system ever. I am a collector of old systems and games and also a modder. I revisit old systems occasionally when they get new mods and I can say without reservation that the Cube games have held up over time incredibly well.....not even close as most PS2 stuff just looks like dirt and XBOX looks like clunky PC ports. A lot of Cube games had 480p support and on my old 1080p 47 inch LCD (that TV upscaled great I must admit) they look just great even by today's standards. They also look fricking incredible playing on the GamePad on a modded WiiU. Cube was the best of the not commercially successful systems, with the Dreamcast being a hair behind.
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
@Lady_rosalina
Yeah I have to give it to you on that front.....I have been surprised considering their relative level of support that UBI didn't try bringing one of the new AC games over, but I am pretty thrilled (as I am old and old school) about the the new PoP 2.5D game. I was also surprised that in the Batman collection they are bringing the latest game as they always said that wouldn't be possible. It will certainly be interesting to see where the spec ends up on the next Switch but I do think it will be viable for even more ports because DLSS really is quite impressive in what it can do so as long as the SoC can do solid 1080p rendering they will have it looking almost like 4K. More importantly in my mind is they give it enough RAM and assuming they use carts be it a new or same formfactor, that they find a way to make larger cart sizes affordable for devs because you aint bringing these modern 50GB+ games over on measly 16gb carts, and in the entire life of Switch there have been very few games that even use 32GB cart (Switcher).
Re: Video: Mario Vs. Donkey Kong Side-By-Side Graphics Comparison (Switch & GBA)
I thought the overall direct was underwhelming and had the look of a this is the end of life for Switch (and I usually don't complain about directs for the record). But I was excited to see this. It was a favorite back on the GBA, my only regret is I wish they had tacked on an update of the original DK for GB. If any of you are old enough to remember that had the original DK arcade levels but then after that it had a bunch of more puzzle oriented levels that were sort of the start of the Mario vs. DK games. It was an original GB (pre color) title so it would have been a great opportunity to give it a modern makeover....oh well at least its been so long ago since I played this on GBA that puzzles will seem almost fresh......PS was also very exited about the 1K year door remake.....by far the best Paper Mario of all time.
Re: Video: Mortal Kombat 1 Graphics Comparison Reveals Switch Performance & Resolution
@Dm9982
I think devs supported PS4/XB1 longer than anticipated because of the pandemic and how it effected unit availability and sales for more than two years. PS5 should have been selling 20M a year and I heard even thru last year (2022) they were only able to push out about 13M units. Just like the kids and school I think this will sort of be the lost console generation. I threw a 1tb SSD in the PS4 pro and have gotten good use out of it playing Horizon West, new God of War, and other 3rd party which still look and run nice. Just finished the RE4 remake and was duly impressed. I do think the pressure is on to finally abandon last gen as there seemed to be little reason for me to bother buying a PS5 so far. I have sort of been waiting for the KOTOR reboot (in dev hell as it got pulled from Aspyr) and FF VII part 2 as there just isn't enough compelling exclusive content. I did buy an XSX in 2021 because I found one and I like how M$ has promoted BC all the way back to the OG Xbox and how a good number of games got FPS boost to 60, and HDR for X360. I had actually never played Fallout 4 or Dragon Age 3 and they were so much nicer with the FPS and load time boosts. GamePass is truly the bomb.....more content than anyone could play, significant day one releases, PC content as well, and as you mentioned use your old X1 as a cloud player. There is nothing even close to be had for $15 a month and far less if you do a little looking around (on ebay and other keycode sites).
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
@Znake
Hey....I at least got you to moderate your position. LoL. I am gonna agree with you on the carts with huge downloads. That is more on the cheap arse devs and I think the pandemic sort of froze the price of memory from falling as fast as it normally would. Thankfully Nintendo managed to never do that as when a game needed a larger cart, they used one. I was impressed when Switcher came out as that needed a 32GB cart and the dev used it. More and more discs and carts have become DRM dongles which sucks, and it sort of sucks more for Switch because its supposed to be a portable system. Thankfully Switch did use MicroSD which has gotten super cheap (in the US at least) to put lots of storage in for digital or those large 'updates' for carts. Switch ended up getting far more 3rd party support than I ever expected it to. I figured even if it was a success its library would end up more like 3DS or Wii which was great Nintendo games, a few last gen ports, and a few original 3rd party developments. Also agree some of the ports were bad and just cash grabs, but a decent amount were impressive. I personally think they should have gone with an enhanced dock model that had a second GPU and extra RAM in the dock so that when docked it could run higher resolutions. Heck another cheaper possibility would have been to just have it clock up a lot more when docked and added extra thermal solutions to accommodate. Even without those considerations its no problem to push the OG Switch to full clocks docked (I have done it for years with no ill effect) which helps games that use dynamic resolution stay locked at higher resolution, and helps load times as well. Nintendo just always errors on the side of caution with thermals which is why they have never had an X360 Red Ring debacle.
@rjejr
Yeah I think we likely would have gotten a Switch pro if not for the pandemic and the fact that Switch just kept selling like mad all the way until the present day. The Switch v1.1 is using a more power efficient chipset that when modded you can actually overclock to 2GHZ on the CPU, and 1GHZ on the the GPU as well as higher on the bus. I think we would have gotten something like that with more Flash Ram and the OLED screen. Once the window for a true mid-life upgrade passed I think Nintendo starting working on what we will get next year which will be a true leap in what a hybrid mobile chipset system can offer. I hope Switch 2 has BC but I sorta think it won't and that Nintendo will keep Switch v1 around a few more years as the cheaper little brother system. Rumor is it will use different cartridge tech, but heck they could put two slots on it like how the DS had a GBA slot.....I really hope we get an official announcement right after the holiday season (they won't do it before as why kill another banner sales holiday).
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
@ModdedInkling
LoL.....I thought that as well....though I was kina hoping for Super Switch Pro v2.0 myself. Nintendo usually has some quirky feature advancement each generation so what I want is the 3 form factor Switch VR....can be played portable, has a dock for TV, and comes with headgear you can drop it into to play VR....now tell me that wouldn't be cool.
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
@Znake
The tech demo showed off the new Matrix game and that is running on unreal engine 5......you power w***** just don't understand that anything can actually be made to run on anything. The Switch 2 will likely be aiming for 1080p rendering and then use DLSS to push it to 4K. Various demos and tests have shown that combo produces very nice results that to most people are hard to tell apart from higher render rates. I remember people with the same arguments on Switch and they all fell flat as it got many competent ports of current and last gen games. Fortunately Nintendo, Nvidia, and smart devs know more than you do about how to get games running on lesser hardware. The Switch would have gotten non of them if it wasn't a huge commercial success, which is why Nintendo can't put out your dream system.....wouldn't sell 100m+ units if the price point isn't right and isn't getting any 3rd party if it isn't a commercial success.
@Lady_rosalina
I wouldn't be so sure about that....they said the same thing about Switch and how many 'impossible' ports did it get? Quite a few and a they run and play nicely. I think that is why they showed of the Matrix demo which surely will look better on PS5 level hardware but the point was the system will run Unreal 5 and can run (even if scaled back) version of current cutting edge games, also when you have a console that is outselling everything for years that tends to get devs motivated to figure out a way to scale games to it.
@KramersMrMarbles
Never gonna happen if they stick with the hybrid concept. You can't get the same rendering power off of a system designed to run off batteries and you can't get even close (like SteamDeck) without charging a much higher price. Switch was outlandishly successful because Nintendo hit all the right notes with form factor, power, and price (and then their legendary game development)....that's why it is heading into year 7 and has sold over 100M units.
Re: Nintendo Reportedly Briefed Activision On 'Switch 2' Back In 2022
I like the people dogging Nintendo's use of 'old' tech. Its total BS, and ignorant, because the Tegra chipset was not that old when N employed it in 2017, and Nvidia actually created custom dev libraries for it that helped squeeze far more out of it than they were getting with Shield TV. That's why devs were able to put projects on it that no one believed would be possible. GPU is not just about performance, sure the Switch might have had the raw power of a last gen system, but it had modern GPU features and libraries to support it. Same will be true of this next chipset. Its going to use DLSS for near 4K look and word is ray tracing will also be supported. So while the raw rendering will be last gen numbers, it will indeed produce far better results. Also the Switch is a small form factor hybrid that is running on mobile SoC.....that configuration is NEVER going to have the same power as a full home console. Its not possible....Switch runs docked on 30W of power and handheld like 1/3 of that.....Your Xbox X/PS5 is likely pulling more than 200W. What should be lauded is what Nintendo, Nvidia, and great developers have been able to accomplish on such meager specs and power consumption. I know its gonna be a nice kit though I expect the price point to jump to $399 at launch, my only real question now is what will the BC be like or will it even be BC at all. Fingers crossed as wouldn't be great to run Switch v1 titles with patches that give 4K and FPS improvement like we got with ps4 pro.
Re: Talking Point: What's The Best Year In Gaming?
@Elithal
I thought 2013 was strong as well with all you mentioned plus the Tomb Raider reboot which is the best since the reboot IMO and then The Last of Us which was a fabulous swan song for PS3, oh yeah and Fire Emblem got its important successful return with FE Awakening.
Re: Talking Point: What's The Best Year In Gaming?
@sd7232
Yeah hard to top 2006 for hardware with all three majors pushing new systems and those first HDs were a huge jump in what could be achieved. I remember waiting to buy X360 till March of 06 because Oblivion released. A good part of the rest of that year was spent playing that game and all the DLC that subsequently came out,. I know many idolize Skyrim but for me Oblivion far more memorable.
Re: Talking Point: What's The Best Year In Gaming?
@blindsquarel
For most people that is probably true but it only goes back to 85 and gaming started for some of us before that in the arcades in the late 70s.
@WoomyNNYes
Agree 2017 is the best year for N since 2002. I mean BTW and MarioO alone are all time greats but you forgot Mario Rabbids (big srpg fan here) and then then year was capped with Xenoblade 3.
Re: Poll: What Did You Think Of The February 2023 Nintendo Direct?
I thought this direct was really solid and while a lot of talking heads thought that Adv Wars would be the shadow drop, we get a wayyyy better shadow drop in the rumored but unannounced MP1R.....and we still get a coming soon date for Adv Wars. So much of what was shown is going to be purchases for me. I love Baten Kados and re-played the first one within the last 5yrs. Level 5 coming back in a big way and also good DLC announcements from N. Happy to see the FE DLC will include a story add-on eventually. The first 1/2 of 23 is looking epic with FE already released, Kirby coming, Adv Wars, MP1, Zelda, Pikmin 4 and then continued strong 3rd party support. Probably not as excited about GB/GBA as some (I'm a modder so I just have so many ways to play these oldies) but its nice for Switch to keep getting the legacy stuff. As for the rumors that Tears will be the last 'Major' release for Switch I am calling BS. Nintendo talked about nothing of their own in this direct for 2nd half of the year. Nintendo always does its best sales in the holiday season.....no way they are going to just waste the opportunity to push their major franchises to what will soon be a 120M unit audience. I expect we are going to see MP4 or a new Mario game by years end....put it down....2017 we got both Zelda and Mario and I think we will this year as well. Switch really has become the little system that could when you look at all the incredible content it has gotten beyond Nintendo's always excellent offerings.
Re: Platinum Celebrates Metal Gear Rising's 10th Anniversary Later This Month
@FredsBodyDouble
MGS4 is awesome and for stupid reasons by stupid people it has never been updated and re-released so its PS3 only but highly recommended. MGS5 is one of the coolest third person combat simulators ever made IMO. There is so much weapons customization and all these mechs and vehicles. Its just so fun to prep for and then pull off missions and a ton of base stuff. I haven't played it for years so not sure if the online stuff is still going but the campaign is totally worth it. If you like sneak/combat games check out Splinter Cell BL. The last one made and its a great game that met commercial failure mostly because it released EOL on ps3/x360 and WiiU (best version IMO) and likely because of poor sales never got a ps4/xb1 release.
Re: Poll: What Review Score Would You Give Persona 3 Portable, Persona 4 Golden?
So Happy we now have Persona 3/4/5 on Switch. Many people said ‘Nintendo will never get mainline Persona’ and boom they were wrong. 5R is the best close to a 10 and P4G really hoods up as this game is getting close to a decade old, so a strong 9. P3P is showing its age and was a marvel on PSP but if you played it before pass on a replay IMO. Now we need an updated Devil Survivor 1/2 and Persona Q 1/2 (especially 2)….Those might take a little more work as they would need a remaster coming off of DS/3DS.
Re: Round Up: The Previews Are In For Fire Emblem Engage
Huge SRPG fan and huge FE fan. Liking the direction its taking. Even though it diverged from the previous norms, I really loved 3 Houses. I liked the character development loop at the school and found on my second and third play throughs that it was more fun as I pushed characters out of their ‘preferred’ class paths into other classes which sometimes took most of the run to accomplish. My major complaint on three houses was I thought it was lacking in maps. Most the side quest maps just recycled and the DLC added the 4th house story and some better maps but still not enough IMO. What I would love to see is more ‘depth’ in the environments like XCOM2. It would be nice to be able to use structures as cover that can be attacked and destroyed and have multiple vertical levels. More mini-bosses and large enemies would be nice as well.
The art style choices mean some will love and some will hate but I like it personally. As for ‘previews’ and reviews and such. Previews tend to be ‘positive’ especially for beloved franchises that have strong track records (like most N games). User reviews do tend to run hot and cold as genre preferences tend to show thru more. I like looking at the aggregate scores and what you tend to find on most good to great games is the aggregate critic and user scores are usually pretty close meaning their is agreement that the game is worthy of purchase.
For those that say ‘I don’t really like SRPGs’ will this game make me like them….No probably not. SRPGs are a niche that many people find play too slowly and are too complex. If you don’t like strategy and tactics these games aren’t for you. I would recommend trying the Mario Rabbids games as they to me are arcade SRPGs playing much faster, and generally in fewer rounds. Also they are just more light hearted and silly which is great unless you hate sophomoric humor. For me the rabbids are funny but whats more funny is that Mario and the gang are the ‘serious’ elements to the rabbids inane absurdity. The best part is this popped up without much pre-fanfare and now its coming before I can even finish Sparks.
Re: Nintendo Unveils Fire Emblem Engage Expansion Pass
While I understand people being against day 1 paid DLC, this is Nintendo so I few them a little differently because they generally aren’t going to chop a game just to sell DLC. The game will be full and robust and have plenty of content on day 1. Also no one does more free DLC than N. Games like Arms, AC, Kirby, Mario Tennis and Golf and Switch sports have all had lots of free DLC. This is a season pass which is getting more prominent on Day1. So just don’t but it on day 1, play the game and after wearing it out by the Season pass and play on. As long as those season passes deliver good content across all waves I am fine with it. The DLC from 3houses was well worth the buy in the end.
Re: Video: You Can Improve Pokémon Scarlet And Violet's Performance Yourself
@sanderev Actually several very prominent Switch scene (mod scene) guys have proven that is not true. The Switch SD card slot can hit speeds up to about 100MB/sec which most newer UHS-I cards can accomplish. Meanwhile the internal NAND is capable of 240MB/sec with up to 480MB/sec burst speeds. With games that are decently optimized you really don't see much of a difference, but games that use a lot of small files in their structure tend to benefit the most. There are some famous examples like Lego City which has very long 60sec type loads when coming off SD or Cart but they can be cut to 20sec from the NAND. Another early game BattleChasers NW (great game based off an underappreciated grafx novel) had really bad animation stutter during the battle sequences but when I moved that game to NAND it smoothed right out. The USB ports are only USB2 on Switch but the SD and NAND bus are actually 'full speed'. Looks like this game is just trash, sad that it is selling like hotcakes and fans of the series don't seem to care. Nintendo should definitely step in and demand better from GF and the Poke Co as each generation the tech gets worse, those clowns at GF apparently never learned to code on anything after the GBA/DS.
Re: Pokémon Fans Vent Frustrations Online About Scarlet & Violet's Technical Issues
@Axecon
The devs know the Switch well enough to know what it’s capable of and the engine is likely too ambitious. We’ve seen this too often in the last two console gens with major day1 flops like Fallout76, ME4, Ark, CP2077. Sometimes devs stick with them and games that were unacceptable tech wise are cleaned up and eventually are playable. I like what M$ has done with XBSX as many last gen games got a 60fps boost and between that and boosted cpu and load times its made some games great. Their are generally options for making x86 games run better either with higher end console versions or a beast PC. With Nintendo the options aren’t as great because if it does’t run well on Switch your stuck. Nintendo really should step in and demand a better product from the PokeCo as Pokemon is synonymous with Nintendo and GF putting out subpar products reflects badly on N. Looking at all the great ports and 1st party releases on Switch there is no excuse to put out a technically gimped game.
Re: Best Wii U Games
WiiU had a great library but was what baffling is that N didn’t support the dual screen concept better. Some of the best use of the GP was 3rd party titles. Missing from this list are Mass E3 which used the GP for real time map which no other system had, also Splinter Cell BL which was a great game with best version on WiiU. The fact it never got a real SRPG is baffling as GP was made for it and yet no FE, no AdvWars, no Starcraft or Xcom. Thankfully Switch has become a SRPG powerhouse. The biggest miss by N was never bringing CG to VC as the damned system runs GC natively. Honestly modding the WiiU makes it about 3x better. It becomes the ultimate Nintendo BC machine allowing you to play WiiU/Wii/GC/N64/SNES/NES/DS/GBA/GB and a host of other old 8 and 16bit systems all on the Gamepad. Cube game looks and play awesome on the GP and so does every other old SD system. You can patch Wii titles that use ProControls to play on GP and so I can play Wii games like DKC without the dumb wiimote waggle or others like Goldeneye, FE, RE4 which play and look great on the GP. If you have one laying around do yourself a favor, dust it off and mod it, put Nintendon’t on it and have the best GC player you can find. ZombiU, SCell BL, and COD BO2, and ME3 should all be on this top50 list as they were solid efforts that used the second screen creatively which was more than N did most the time. Also the 3 sports ports (Madden, FiFa, NBa2k) were all solid and deserve mention as well.
Re: Review: Bayonetta 3 - A Stunning Return For An Icon, And The Best Game In The Series
What a great Oct and end of year for Switch. I mean this month alone we start with Nier (called by many one of the best Switch ports), we get the new Monkey Island game (Niche but much anticipated and beloved by the niche), Then its another impossible port with No Man's Sky.....that slides into Sparks (my most anticipated title being an SRPG fan) and now even after the little VA drama Bayo 3 totally knocks it out of the park. All this on the heals of Xeno3 and then we get Poke (not really my thing) but what is my thing (SRPG) gets Ogre next month and FE in January....with all this top content I have a feeling Switch is going to have another dominate holiday season.
Re: Grab Your Torch, Alan Wake Remastered Is Out Now On Nintendo Switch
I tried out the remaster on XSX and honestly I liked the old X360 version better on XSX as it got the 60FPS frame boost treatment, so I just preferred it even with the older textures. Good game and might grab it if it goes on a steep discount but just so much other content to play on Switch I can't be bothered with it. Sparks and P5R eating up all my time until new FE arrives in January.
Re: Grab Your Torch, Alan Wake Remastered Is Out Now On Nintendo Switch
@Ryu_Niiyama
So true my friend.....this month has just been unreal for ports. The library is by far the best on any N system to date. Nintendo's own offerings, some solid original 3rd party games, great ports from current and previous generations, and the best Indy scene in gaming bar none. It has pretty much everything a gamer could want and you can have it on the go or in your easy chair. I have been a gamer since gaming was a thing (started in the arcades in the late 70s and had an Atari 2600 in 81) and Switch is my favorite and most played system of all time. You know N won't waste this momentum. Next Switch will be just like the GBC to GBA or DS to 3DS generation. They will follow with something better but BC and keeping with the same hybrid portable format.
Re: Random: Hideki Kamiya Echoes Every Nintendo Fan's Wishes For The Switch Successor
@NeonPizza
I agree in that its been a game of diminishing returns on grafx upgrades since the PS3/X360 brought us the first HD leap. I just bought a PSVR kit this year because they came back around and I was able to get the iron man bundle for $250. Hadn't been doing much with my PS4pro recently and hadn't realized that Sony had so much VR content at this point. So far my faves are Moss (fun, that little mouse really hooks you) and the SW Squad game which is just a face melting experience moving in 6 axis in VR. I have been playing with No Man's Sky and Skyrim VR as well and its pretty impressive to see full sized developments like that get the VR treatment. Fingers crossed that N moves in this direction as it would be really nice to have a 'lighter' system that could give us portable VR without the need for cloud streaming. I've been slow to adopt PS5 (mostly because I can't find one without a struggle and PS4pro has still been getting all their major releases) but eventually I'll get one and jump on the PSVR2 as well because we know Sony will give it major support and top line titles.
Re: Persona 5 Royal Switch Development Is Being Led By Sega
@PanFriedSoup We have been getting some strong ports recently. Nier and No man’s sky have been getting rave early reviews. Remember P5 was originally developed for and ran fine on PS3 (720p) so I think with the proper effort it should run fine on the little system that could.
Re: Random: Hideki Kamiya Echoes Every Nintendo Fan's Wishes For The Switch Successor
Ok to all those worried and claiming that N always has to do something new….ummm not really. Lets me give you multiple examples of successful systems they followed up on with smaller evolutions that were also successful. The NES was followed by the SNES which just improved cpu/grfx hardware and introduced a major improvement to the gamepad. The GB/GBC was followed by the GBA which also improved cpu/gpu and added shoulder buttons and eventually the big add of backlighting. Their most successful device ever the DS was followed by the 3DS which improved screen sizes and added analogue stick and the not much cared about 3D feature. In most cases the ‘next gen’ device strived to maintain BC and was successful but less so than previous device. Even the WiiU was an extension on the Wii just didn’t pop for all the known reasons. VR is the future of gaming as that is the only way to extend immersion beyond the current ‘flat screen’ options. So I predict the next generation system will be Switch VR. It will incorporate a better cpu/gpu architecture using DLSS. It will be BC so to carry forward the Switch’s massive library. It will use a 1440p screen which will make it easy to upscale 720p portable mode games (x2) and have enough resolution to do proper VR. It will have enhanced joycons and come with a VR mask that will use head tracking gyros and N will somehow find a slick way to make the VR mask also act as a dock. It will continue the Switch theme by being able to seamlessly Switch from Portable to TV to VR. Top selling current gen games like MK, Zelda, Mario can all get patched to support DLSS upscaling and/or VR modes. So thats my take. We get an evolved Switch that still allows N to innovate and add a major new feature (VR).
Re: Japanese Charts: Splatoon 3 Retains Its Crown, Surprising No One
@blindsquarel
I figured but had to use any opportunity to rail against cloud gaming….LoL.
Re: Japanese Charts: Splatoon 3 Retains Its Crown, Surprising No One
@blindsquarel
I hope that is sarc as Nintendo should never go cloud. Cloud sucks and is total trash for portable or hybrid gaming. I have a XSX with Game pass. Fast 600Mbit internet and GB LAN. Cloud is still only sufficient for only some forms of games. Your never gonna get arcade games like a Mario or MK8 or Smash to play the same in the cloud. So sure Fire Emblem or even Pokemon might play well enough with a persistent cloud connection but for portable its bunk and no current cloud model can even do 60fps. M$ has the best cloud offering currently in gaming and all I like it for is to check stuff out before committing to a 25-100GB download.
Re: New Persona 5 Royal Trailer Highlights Slick Switch Gameplay
@Krull
I”m holding out for Black Friday sales for some of these 3rd party releases ( plus played P5 already and just so many other ‘new’ releases eating my $$$). I think the sad state of physical at retail (since the NWO pandemic) has limited physical copies made and is making it harder to get deals on carts so you may be right on not seeing some of these much cheaper than release price. I know it will go on digital sale at a big discount at some point but I”m an old skool collector so love me some carts.
Re: New Persona 5 Royal Trailer Highlights Slick Switch Gameplay
@Fizza
Dude October is just stacked and killing my budget. Don’t forget we get Nier and No man’s Sky this week and reviewers already raving about both ports and Sky is v4.0 which was a huge update. Huge SRPG fan so Sparks will be getting all my time once out but wanting all of these on cart so will likely wait until black Friday deals to see if I can save some coin on some of them. Still chewing on Xeno3 but should be done in time for Sparks….great time to be a Switch gamer and it all rolls into next year which is also setup to slay.
Re: Talking Point: What Did You Think Of The September 2022 Nintendo Direct?
@Wexter
You beat me to the punch. This direct was really packed end to end but so many people complaining about the rumored stuff that wasn’t there. The Prime rumors are about as bad as Switch Pro rumors at this point. Fire Emblem is my second fav N franchise (Zelda) so they had me right out of the gate. I am a big SRPG fan so this direct was a score. I was pumped for Sparks but now we get FE in Jan and Front Mission series as well. 2022 has had a lot of good releases and will finish the year strong. Tired of the Zelda twins port begging. Geez if you need them so bad get a used WiiU. What people don’t seem to get is why trample on their own releases. They just released Splat3, Oct is absolutely packed with Sparks, Persona5, NoMan and Bayo3 I won’t even be sleeping much with that lineup. Then Pokemon which as much as I don’t care about it I must say its looking sweet. I suspect we will see the Zelda HD twins in early spring to pave the way for Tears. As for Prime…if it exists they are likely holding it to release when they get closer to prime 4 date. I don’t mind people being critical but most just nitpick because game XYZ wan’t revealed or dated. This was a little all over the map in offerings and farm sims had their day but overall lots of content and a few good surprises.
Re: Nintendo Switch Is No Longer The Best-Selling Console Of 2022 In The UK
@ChipBoundary
Dude I have to say NO on Nintendo’s primary franchises taking a hit. Which franchises? Mario….Kart8 best selling ever and most content and still being supported with new content. MarioO best 3D mario and great seller. Zelda BOTW totally expanded the Zelda game concept best Zelda seller, Luigi got a great new mansion game, two Kirby games, yoshi game, paper mario game….new Metroid 2D best seller and best Metroid ever. Animal Crossing what over 30M units. They been ‘messing’ with Pokémon a bit but it still sold unreal and the upcoming titles will do over 30M sales. Switch is Nintendo’s first console that will pass 1B units software sales and most of it is first party titles. So sure Switch is getting a bit long in the tooth but N’s franchises are doing better than ever and there is more than ample data both in sales and high critic scores by most of their releases. Everything is fine in Nintendo land and Switch aint done yet as there are still more top franchise releases on the way.
Re: Rumour: New Metal Gear Solid Remasters Reportedly Incoming
Man I am so tired of hearing Konami say 'Its impossible to ever port MGS4'. First off they could just build a new engine for it on modern hardware (or use the MGS5 engine), then they could update and re-use all the texture and audio assets. Would it be a project....yes....but this game never fully got the love it deserved being tethered to the PS3. I believe it sold around 6M units which was very good for an exclusive but if they ported it x86 then they could sell it to the ps4/ps5/xb1/xbs:x and PC market. Surely it would be worth the effort. Konami in general has just acted stupid in the last decade. The hold some of the most iconic franchises in gaming history and all they can do is put out emulated re-hashes like the Castlevania GBA collection. Apparently they hate money. Why not a new 3D CV game, or how about a full redo of the always beloved SOTN? Whatever they do I have a feeling it will be underwhelming because that's their track record in the last 10yrs.
Re: Nintendo Reports Drop In Sales For Q1- Should We Be Worried?
I think the chip shortage is an easy excuse and agree with others who say there is plenty of available stock in the retail supply chain (at least in the USA). I think the age of the system, market saturation, no mega seller games so far this year, and just the general state of the economy are all factors. PS5 (and to a lesser extend XBX) are the ones facing restricted sales due to chip supply issues. $ony only predicted 12M unit sales for the current fiscal year and they would easily be getting closer to 20M or more if they had the stock. Nintendo often sells 1/2 of its system sales for the fiscal year in the holiday QTR. This year will be strong with a mainline Pokemon title and then other long awaited games like Splatoon 3 (remember that game does well world wide but absolutely slays in Japan) and hardcore niche title Bayo3. Everyone who owns a Switch wants a Super Switch Pro 2.0 U......they best get busy on delivering something next year as that window will eventually start to close and with the next BOTW game and MP4 both coming next year, what better time to release new hardware.
Re: Bayonetta 3 Trailer Confirms Launch For This October
Man does this look good. IS there really any other game in this genre than can match Bayo? Also to all those whose wallets are crying in Oct......just remember the 4th QTR is money time for Nintendo and other game publishers. All these games hitting are to make sure there are lots of options for the big holiday spending spree. Still OCT may be the most packed month in Switch's illustrious history. Now if we could just get ADV Wars 1+2 before years end then all my gaming dreams will come true. It absurd to hold a cartoon war strategy game because of real war in the world. News flash....there is almost always conflict happening somewhere in the world, and if they're gonna wait until this Ukraine mess is over they are likely going to be waiting a long time as if history is any guide this conflict will be going on for years.
Re: Nintendo Direct Mini To Air Tomorrow, June 28
Not sure why this is surprising to people. Nintendo's own content coming this year has already been talked about and shown quite a bit. We know we are getting Xeno3 soon, we know that the Pokemon games are coming, we know Bayo3 is coming and Splatoon3 is coming. We know Advance wars is done and being held up because Putin is an a-hole and we know we are not getting Zelda BOTW2 or MP4 this year. People act like this is a crap year yet we already got a new 3D Kirby game as well as a new openish world Pokemon game and the Mario Strikers game. Surely we will see more focused directs on the big releases coming later this year, but the truth is we may not get anything else 'announced' this year and that is fine. So let's just see what we get, sometimes the partner showcases give some big surprises on things we have been hoping or wishing for (Persona). Alas something is better than nothing.