I woke up at what I call early-ass-o’clock to catch the Switch 2 thing, and even then it took me a while to wake up enough to get to it, so for most of the presentation I was catching up on the stream. Also the video kinda broke so the sound was increasingly desynced and I think at one point the English dub also broke because I was only hearing Japanese for a minute. But the screen was also frozen then, so maybe they had subtitles I wasn’t seeing. Not sure if anyone else was getting those issues.
Long story short, this is more of an upgrade kind of approach like the Sexbox did, down to a similar system UI to its predecessor apparently. Also why do they keep showing off the white theme in screenshots when I swear everyone I know with a Switch uses the dark one? They have two themes and nothing else and they keep showing off the one that I have no idea who uses it in the screenshots.
Aside from the system having MORE POWER and also MORE PIXELS on the built-in screen, it apparently goes up to 120 FPS on whatever games will support that, plus it’ll output up to 4K docked, which I pretty much figured. I’m lacking an ultra high framerate 4K screen myself, though, so it’s not as big a deal to me, and my PS5 experiences have gone just fine with this setup as well.
The controllers are mostly the same, except the joysticks are bigger and we’ll just see if they drift as much or if they didn’t cheap out on them this time. They do also do that mouse thing which will come up for a few games at least, and they lack the IR camera that only a few gimmicky games used, but they do apparently still have Amiibo functionality, even though they didn’t mention it specifically that I saw, there was a mention of Amiibo coming out for the Street Fighter 6 port. And they once again have a pro controller, which looks smaller to me than the previous. Maybe it’s just the buttons and sticks being bigger, or maybe it’s just a bit smaller anyway.
Also now there’s a C button which opens some chat feature, as opposed to the 4 C buttons on the N64 controller as well as a whole C stick on the GameCube. We just get one C now and it’s for a soon-to-be paywalled feature, but at least it’s more useful than that Copilot button Microsoft keeps shoving into stock PCs. It’s also somehow notable that said chat feature does involve being able to actually voice chat on the system itself with a microphone instead of some phone workaround that people didn’t use in favor of sticking with Discord or whatever. They’re also selling a webcam on a stick for the chat thing, which will apparently also work similar to the EyeToy in some games.
So about the games, as in the most important part of any system, I’m not entirely sure here. On one hand, Kirby Air Ride is getting a sequel. That’s all they said about it and that’s really all I need to hear about it. If I get one of these systems secondhand later on, that’s the game I’m getting it for. Between that and the EyeToy camera and also the GameCube online thing which people have wanted for ages, it’s like they’re really going for that sought-after early 2000s period of gaming before DLC took hold. On the other hand, a bunch of questions about a bunch of other things.
To start with, the Mario Kart game from the previous footage is called Mario Kart World, and it involves an open world that somehow connects all the available courses. That’s the chosen pack-in game for system pre-orders as well as if they have any stock left for the stores and something likely to return many times for future shopping holiday seasons. The prices I can find for that game in particular are implying something about the general cost of games for the system, where they’re going with the new industry standard of $70 USD for digital and as much as $80 USD for physical copies. I’m not sure if this additional charge is the result of taxes being pushed on consumers by oppressive governments or just something from Nintendo themselves, but the price difference does seem to apply to multiple regions from what I’ve seen. They probably figured enough people are willing to buy games at $70 at this point, even though the one Zelda game they priced at that much for the classic Switch I got for about half as much through some kinda deal. I’m usually trying to not pay full price for games where I can.
On the note of physical games, there’s a page on the new site for the system that mentions “game-key cards”. Long story short it’s the same deal with several third-party games that had the whole “download required” thing on the package but now with an official name. I’ve nicknamed it the “Activision physical copy” due to that pretty much being how that company specifically does physical copies at this point (even though I’m sure many others are joining in), where there’s no game data on the disc at all and it has to be installed completely from the network. At least that DoesItPlay website won’t run out of material any time soon.
Also about physical games, apparently Switch 2 cards will be the same form factor as the predecessor’s, just colored red because it makes it faster. No word on if they taste different. They just trust that people will be smart enough to know the difference, even though there will still be many cases of store employees being asked if a Switch 2 game will run on the classic Switch despite the signs being posted all over the shelves, next to the signs about how they’re out of stock for the next six months at least and to instead check eBay for units at 1000 times MSRP.
As far as game upgrades from the classic Switch, there seem to be two approaches, which work for both digital and physical versions. The first is some kind of “pro” patch for Switch games to unlock framerates and resolutions on supported hardware, and those are free. The second seems to only be a paid option and has the game run more “natively” as it’s been said for similar cases, and can vary from something as simple as “looks better runs faster” to “actually adds content”. The first type of upgrade I’m going to call the “Activision upgrade” because that’s just what they do for their “cross-gen bundles”, charging about $10 extra to play the game looking a little better. Therefore I’m ballparking the upgrade cost for Switch games to the sequel system around the same price point. Plus, those games often cost $60 without discounts, so that would make the difference up to the new industry standard. No idea if third parties can offer their upgrades for free or if a payment is mandatory. On the PS5, the upgrades are either free or paid for PS4 copies, and I’ve gladly installed any that support the free path on the newer system, and in some paid cases they specifically redirect to the later-released remaster at a discount where available.
Given that this new system is going to be downloading a bunch of stuff regardless of whatever game formats are chosen, how much space is in there? About 256 GB apparently. They excitedly claim it’s 8 times the space of the stock classic Switch (which means 4 times as much as the later 64 GB OLED models), but don’t mention that it’s a quarter as much as the Sexbox or even the PS5’s oddly numbered advertised space, given there’s system stuff that takes up a chunk of the internal space anyway. So therefore we’re back on microSD cards. But not just any microSD cards, it has to be this recently developed standard called “microSD Express”. I’ve done a quick price check and they seem to go for about twice as much for equivalent space as non-Express cards, and they aren’t stocked in as many places, but that’ll change soon if stores want to keep pace with Switch 2 users. This is also similar to the M2 drive thing for the PS5, where it’s an existing format and they have to meet certain specs to be compatible, and how those weren’t as common at stores until later by the time stores actually had PS5s in stock.
So back to the actual games after getting sidetracked about how games work on there, in addition to Mario Kart and Kirby Air Ride, what’s on there that’s not just racing? Donkey Kong Bananza seems to be the system’s Odyssey, with the redesigned expanded dong breaking terrain and fighting bosses through a number of worlds. To show off the mouse capabilities, they have this tech demo-looking game about wheelchair basketball, as well as mouse aiming for Metroid Prime 4. Also about tech demos, they once again decided to make their obvious gimmick system intro game a separate paid thing. Can’t wait for it to get an inexplicable sequel called Everybody Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour featuring Horse Head Meme Man or whatever.
For third-party, which we’ll see how long that lasts this time for big games making it to the system in a functional format, it’s a lot of catch-up including FF7 Remake 1, Cyberpunk 2077 (which I’ve recently been playing on PC), Yakuza 0, Elden Ring of course (yet no ability to smell Peach’s pits going by that one joke trailer that also featured Elden Ring), Star Wars Outlaws because Ubisoft still wants to get sales on that, and some other things like Street Fighter 6 as mentioned earlier. For newer stuff, there’s the new part of Deltarune happening, Silksong allegedly happening, EA Sports and 2K being all “we swear we’ll actually put more games on it this time”, Borderlands 4 existing, Human Fall Flat apparently getting a sequel, and the next Tony Hawk combined remake getting brought over and also involving some Spongebob level because they had the license sitting around. Also FromSoft is back on their shit with Souls-like games, except this next one has guns so therefore it’s more of a Bloodborne-like. Also it’s apparently more multiplayer and exclusive to Switch 2. Regardless, I’m not interested in that one. It might be another decade or more before another Armored Core, but I can wait.
And of course there’s the GameCube online collection thing. The starter games are apparently Wind Waker, SoulCalibur 2, and F-Zero GX. They also showed the intent to bring over Mario Sunshine and Chibi-Robo and some other classics, for those wanting to not pay a big wad of cash for each game and a capable system all up front, or do that one free thing Nintendo keeps trying to block by taking down sites that host things that aren’t ISOs.
At the end of it all, they want to sell this thing on its own for $450 USD, which is higher than my guess, and for an extra $50 USD on top of that, it includes the new Mario Kart mentioned as a pack-in. So in general I’m not picking this thing up anytime soon, between having a bunch of games I’m already playing and also having recently gotten a used PS5 as well as a number of PC upgrades. I’d maybe give it a year or more, and provided there’s enough of a society left and secondhand prices have gotten lower to where I feel up for it, I might get one and play the new Kirby Air Ride, ideally also finding a copy of that for a deal.
Of course the classic Switch will still be getting games into the sequel’s period, and they were holding out some of the best for last, given there’s both a new Rhythm Heaven and Tomodachi Life on the way. Now those I feel like I’ll want to check out sooner. Especially if they kept the advanced Mii editor from the Miitopia re-release for Tomodachi Life. I could spin off into another discussion about Sims-type games and whatever I’ve seen about inZOI (apparently how that’s capitalized) being the one announced that actually came out somewhat, but maybe later.