Nintendo Switch

[TwiceFriedRice]

But good games are good games. No one is saying that the Switch is the SNES or the PS1 in terms of library (it's only been out for 2 months, how could it be?), but to say that it has nothing to play is objectively false.

It's going to need stronger 3rd party support if it's going to succeed long term, and that will happen if it keeps selling like it has been out of the gate. But, right now and at least until the end of the calendar year, it's got a nice selection of games on the way even without major 3rd party backing.

Unfortunately the gaming public doesn't see things that way, especially when they've seen many of the Switch's games elsewhere before on other consoles. I mean, it's always been something of a rip-off how Nintendo rarely discounts their games, in contrast to every other publisher on the planet that regularly and incremental reduces the prices of their games after launch. It's as Nintendo doesn't believe the value of games depreciates with time, which has no doubt lead to their current third-party problems. A constant supply of new content is needed to maintain interest in a console; Nintendo's own first-party output has never been able to keep up with demand, that's why third-party support is desperately needed by the Switch if it wants to survive.

The gaming public doesn't see things that way?

What rock has this fucker crawled out from under?

[Kintor]

The gaming public doesn't see things that way?

What rock has this fucker crawled out from under?

I see that you haven't actually provided any sort of counter-argument, only a few harsh words. Still, you must concede that the perceived value of games does decrease over time. Only Nintendo is greedy enough to never offer there games at a reasonably discounted price after launch, compared to every other publisher. It's probably part of the reason why Nintendo still obliviously continues onward while never managed to get enough third-party support; Nintendo has never understood the importance of providing games with a steady supply of new content to buy.

[TwiceFriedRice]

The gaming public doesn't see things that way?

What rock has this fucker crawled out from under?

I see that you haven't actually provided any sort of counter-argument, only a few harsh words. Still, you must concede that the perceived value of games does decrease over time. Only Nintendo is greedy enough to never offer there games at a reasonably discounted price after launch, compared to every other publisher. It's probably part of the reason why Nintendo still obliviously continues onward while never managed to get enough third-party support; Nintendo has never understood the importance of providing games with a steady supply of new content to buy.

I've literally been providing a counter-argument this entire time. You've gotta be a troll.

[Kintor]

I've literally been providing a counter-argument this entire time. You've gotta be a troll.

You never bothered to provide any sort of counter-argument in response to the points I raised about Nintendo's lack of discounts and how it can be related to the general lack of games on their hardware. Nor did you provide a counter-argument the second time when I re-alliterated those points in my last post. I can only assume you don't have a good way to defend Nintendo over this one.

[Bluecast]

I've literally been providing a counter-argument this entire time. You've gotta be a troll.

You never bothered to provide any sort of counter-argument in response to the points I raised about Nintendo's lack of discounts and how it can be related to the general lack of games on their hardware. Nor did you provide a counter-argument the second time when I re-alliterated those points in my last post. I can only assume you don't have a good way to defend Nintendo over this one.

Don't think he needs to. Your posts are misconstrued assumptions and present them as facts. It makes it pretty difficult.

[Thief]

Gotta love heated arguments over pointless nonsense—pretty much the internet in a nutshell.

[Hyo Razuki]

To me personally, Sony's approach of making sure the GTAs, CoDs, Fifas, Final Fantasies, Witchers of this world are on the system in the first place, spiced up by the occasional first-party gem like Uncharted, Last Guardian or The Last of Us 2, seems to be more promising than Nintendo's approach of trying to sell the hardware on their strong first-party brands and hoping for third-party support to kick in later.

As for the Switch becoming a success or not, it is still too early to say. Who knows? Maybe Nintendo will indeed find its own demographic for the system once again, like they did with the original Wii.

Comparing them to late 90's Sega is not fair, imho. Sega were already in deep trouble financially and only kept alive by a multi-billionaire patron's wallet (Isao Okawa). Nintendo still have a lot of money in the bank plus their handheld and mobile gaming divisions making good profit for them.

[TwiceFriedRice]

I've literally been providing a counter-argument this entire time. You've gotta be a troll.

You never bothered to provide any sort of counter-argument in response to the points I raised about Nintendo's lack of discounts and how it can be related to the general lack of games on their hardware. Nor did you provide a counter-argument the second time when I re-alliterated those points in my last post. I can only assume you don't have a good way to defend Nintendo over this one.

I'm not repeating my responses over and over again so you can continue to ignore them. I've already done that enough.

I also have no idea what Nintendo's lack of discounts has to do with the original discussion at hand: Nintendo's 2017 lineup.

[Kintor]

I also have no idea what Nintendo's lack of discounts has to do with the original discussion at hand: Nintendo's 2017 lineup.

The point I'm making is that the lack of discounts, a real anomaly compared to every other publisher in the games industry, reveals a certain insight into Nintendo's mentality as a company. Basically, Nintendo (against all evidence to the contrary) believes that games don't depreciate in value. More obviously this results in Nintendo's willing to have product sitting on shelves years after release still at full retail price. However, this also means that Nintendo places less important on supply a steady stream of new content, hence the chronic games droughts that a common site with Nintendo hardware.

[shredingskin]

That's what sparked the whole discussion, how good is nintendo managing it's games to from the start to the holidays to keep always a couple of good games always on front.

[TwiceFriedRice]

I also have no idea what Nintendo's lack of discounts has to do with the original discussion at hand: Nintendo's 2017 lineup.

The point I'm making is that the lack of discounts, a real anomaly compared to every other publisher in the games industry, reveals a certain insight into Nintendo's mentality as a company. Basically, Nintendo (against all evidence to the contrary) believes that games don't depreciate in value. More obviously this results in Nintendo's willing to have product sitting on shelves years after release still at full retail price. However, this also means that Nintendo places less important on supply a steady stream of new content, hence the chronic games droughts that a common site with Nintendo hardware.

All that it means is that their games have legs. Their games remain at full price (physically, they do digital sales all of the time), because people are still willing to buy them at full price three years later. Whether I agree with it or not, it's business.

It has absolutely no correlation with their philosophy of release schedule. Nintendo releases 10-20 games a year across both of their platforms. That's far more than any other AAA developer/publisher. Your theory that Nintendo doesn't care about a strong library for their system is completely illogical in the first place, but is made even more laughable by that fact.

[Kintor]

All that it means is that their games have legs. Their games remain at full price (physically, they do digital sales all of the time), because people are still willing to buy them at full price three years later. Whether I agree with it or not, it's business.

It has absolutely no correlation with their philosophy of release schedule. Nintendo releases 10-20 games a year across both of their platforms. That's far more than any other AAA developer/publisher. Your theory that Nintendo doesn't care about a strong library for their system is completely illogical in the first place, but is made even more laughable by that fact.

The fact is that Nintendo consoles lack third-party support. Now many conversations just leave it at that, as one of the constants of the universe: water is wet, the sun is hot, Nintendo doesn't have many third-party games to support their hardware. However, it's worth discussing Nintendo's mentality as a company to discover how this unfortunate situation has evolved over time.

Because when you get right down to it Nintendo is a strange company: Nintendo regularly askew technological innovation by avoid online gaming and sticking with cartridges longer than anyone else. Nintendo doesn't reduce the price of their games even when discounts would ultimately yield greater profits. Nintendo under-produces product lines, leading to consumer frustration and scalpers profiting from the lack of supply.

The lack of third-party support is also related to these bizarre business practises. A lack of standard technology like CDs and online infrastructure pushed away third-party developers. Expensive games stalls the grow of Nintendo’s user base, again pushing away third-party developers. While the general frustration caused by Nintendo’s apparent supply chain problems means that few third-party developers want to waste their time with Nintendo when they’re no guarantee Nintendo hardware will even be on store shelves where and when it’s needed.

[Hyo Razuki]

The fact is that Nintendo consoles lack third-party support.

This has been somewhat true for Nintendo consoles from the N64 onward, even for the orignial Wii. No need to go into gaming history details here, everyone can read up on that if they like.

Then again, only the Wii-U was a complete desaster for Nintendo, even the Gamecube which was considered a failure sold like 30 million units, if my memory is correct. However, as for the Switch, I think it is invalid to assume the Switch won't have third-party support because the Wii-U didn't have it. Maybe publishers will have a bit less confidence in Nintendo because of the Wii-U's failure but that's about the only effect the Wii-U could have on the Switch.

That said, that doesn't mean there are no serious liabilities as far as the Switche's attractiveness to third-party publishers is concerned: Potential extra development costs for the "seamless handheld transition" feature, storage space, expensive physical medium, 60 miollion PS4s already installed on the market, which are more capable than the Switch performance-wise and so on and so forth.

We've discussed the Switche's liabilities 100 times already. Not going into detail again.

Long story short, next year in March, after the Switch will have been out for a year, we should be able to see a tendency where this is going.It's too early to celebrate but also too early to cry over another Nintendo failure.

[Bluecast]

Gamecube sold 22 million just behind Xbox 24. Still more successful than Xbox as Xbox lost MS 1 billion. What is crazy is PS2 lost Sony a lot of money. Sony didn't see much in the way of profit until 2011 and in that time only Nintendo was making money. The most important factor is it made profit. Wii U even at 13 million sold,made profit. Why Wii U didn't do a Dreamcast and quit early. It had about a 5 year run,so nearly a full run. Only Nintendo system that was a an utter failure that they gave up early was Virtual Boy.

As for the above poster. Switch carts only cost 2.50 cents to make. A Blu Ray disc costs 2 dollars to press. I can't remember the company name Nintendo uses for carts but they esp made these to cost less and hold more storage. Switch id far less powerful but uses a modern chip set even more modern than PS4..just not as powerful. Uses a great API in Vulkan and OpenGL 4.5. Something many devs use now. Plus only takes a single button press for developers ot get Unreal Engine 4 games running on it.

That said you're very correct in that we need to ask the question if Switch is a bonified hit or a Dreamcast in March of next year. If I had money to bet..I'd say this system will be one of Nintendo's most successful. Not Wii levels but NES levels in sales. Still that's a guess and we just don't know yet. Bringing up Nintendo's past failures I do get the logic. Thing is when you look at this thing as a whole. Nintendo not using their own API. Didn't design the hardware in house. Actually going to developers and indies and asking for games and advice on the hardware and tactics show Nintendo is trying. Inti said recently that Nintendo is slowly becoming more like Sony but have a ways to go. That's encouraging but is it too little too late like Dreamcast? We just don't know.

[Raithos]

^ This was on Reddit (can't find the thread right now) and several known developers confirmed that this data is pretty much spot on. Carts and Blurays cost more than $2.50 and $2.00 to make. Roughly 15% is licencing fees (lowest tiers) the rest is actual manufacturing costs.

Just look at games like Rime and Puyo Puyo Tetris for Switch vs the PS4 versions. The developers of Rime have publicly talked about how it is costing them almost $10 more a piece to release a game on Switch (using the higher memory cart, most modern titles will have to) than it does on PS4. Thus the price difference at retail. The difference is a lot more than fifty cents.

https://miketendo64.com/2017/05/13/edit ... u-3ds-wii/