The Hate List
Battery Life
Yeah, that portable factor is potentially a game changer in the console market, certainly. The a huge part of that, though, is actually being able to use that portable aspect for an adequate amount of time. This was obviously a question I needed to explore and I came up with a lot of the same answers. The pad, when undocked, can run up to six hours but for a game like Zelda, you’re probably looking closer to two or three hours. Meanwhile, the JoyCons have a battery life of up to 20 hours. The obvious thing that needs to be pointed out is the language ‘up to’. This wasn’t said just once, but numerous times. If I’m taking my Switch on a road trip and I want to throw down some Mario Kart or keep exploring Hyrule, the best I can hope for is ‘up to’ three hours. That’s not really helping me if I’m flying literally anywhere! What it more so sounds like is that for all the effort they’ve gone into trying to sell on bringing the Switch anywhere, you can’t really go much further than in your home. That’s probably not a bad thing as you might not want to lug the whole system around everywhere, but it also kind of undercuts it’s major selling point, doesn’t it?
Price
New consoles are always expensive coming out of the gate, but Nintendo has really shot itself in the foot on this one. It’s US listing price of $299 means it costs $399 in Canada, 280 pounds, or AU$470. Let’s consider this – the PS Pro cost $399USD and Project Scorpio, which is being touted as a next-gen console, is expected to run around $499USD. The switch, which in no way, shape or form, can compete with either of those systems, is being priced in the same ballpark. A large portion of Nintendo’s audience are repeat customers – the people who have stuck with them through the years. Those same people who plunked down $299-$349 for the Wii U and got royally shafted. There’s a lot of jaded Nintendo fans out there and a lot of dedicated gamers who are scoffing at Nintendo’s return to cartridges. Even if it was $50 less, the Switch price would be more accessible. Here in Canada (I did go to the Toronto event after all), people are balking at $399, especially amongst the owners of a Wii U. Nintendo needs their stock to rebound so they’re probably happy analysts are expecting the Switch to move large numbers. They probably could have bumped up day one sales if they eased up on the gouging right out of the gate.
Launch titles and 3rd Party Support
I know it’s a little bit unfair to judge the list of titles at launch as we’ve all had to scrape the bottom of the barrel those first few months when you buy a console out of the gate. But what exactly is coming with the Switch? I know Zelda is supposed to be out the same day, but while I was at an event designed to get me hyped about the system, I noticed a real lack of appealing games. I saw Street Fighter II, Bomberman R, Sonic Mania, and Disagea 5, which are all old remasters that could be run on my iPhone and none of them were even confirmed for launch. There’s the deluxe version of Mario Kart 8, the new games Arms, and the very fun 1-2 Switch, but MK8 isn’t out until April, Arms doesn’t have a date yet and 1-2 Switch doesn’t even have all of its games confirmed. There’s also the negative reaction to potential 3rd party support. The Titanfall guys scoffed at the thought of their game running on the Switch. There also seems to be a lot of hesitation from studios to comment on Switch ports for upcoming title releases. There’s excitement over Skyrim coming over, but it’s unclear if it’s the Remastered version or just a port of the PS3/360 version. It’s also not coming with Netflix or Spotify or any apps like that on day one either. Maybe the stock price shouldn’t have had such a deciding factor on that March 3rd date.
Ultimately, any and all excitement or questions will be answered when the Switch hits the marketplace. Whether or not it becomes a long lasting hit or not is completely dependent on how Nintendo treats the concerns and builds on its hype. I’m still pretty excited about the Switch, but have enough hesitance to not pick one up right away. I’m going to keep a tight grip on my wallet until they offer enough that I’m certain I won’t get Wii U’d.