Tonight, or should I say tomorrow morning in Japan, Nintendo will finally tell us what we need to know about the Switch. Oh yes, that console, which will release in March, will finally be unveiled to the masses in detail, and the online gaming community is hyped.
I for one, am passively excited. As cool as the Switch looks to be, I’m wondering if Nintendo can really make the machine what it needs to be. Will it sell at the correct price, or will it be too expensive? Will people be able to figure it out, or will it confuse the hell out of the masses much as the WiiU did? Will it enjoy a long life, and be played constantly, or will it collect dust on someones shelf? Will there be enough to go around?
Awe hell, we already know there aren’t going to be enough.
Like I have said before, I don’t go hunting too much information, but I do catch rumors here and there. I’ve heard that accessory developers are very optimistic about the Switch and 3rd party software developers seem to think high of the console. If true, those are somewhat good signs, but then again, that’s how it was originally for the Wii, and that eventually just sat around collecting dust.
I’ve heard the price point is going to be about $250 American. If so, that means it will be cheaper than the WiiU ever was, and considering the hardware of the system, that’s a damned fine price – almost too good, which somewhat makes me think something is up. Nintendo produces good build quality hardware, however, so, I guess we will see once actual units are out and about how the machine physically is.
The announcement itself also needs to go well. Nintendo has a history of really odd, and sometimes downright bad announcements for products, and such an announcement can haunt a product for years. People are finally just realizing the Xbox One is nothing like what it’s original announcement said it would be like, 3 years after the fact.
Nintendo can’t afford to fuck up the Switch announcement. They need to keep focused on the raw facts of what the console can do, how it does what it does, how you use it, and what their focus is; which quite honestly had better be games, games, and more games, and that’s it. No motion controls, not stupid gimmicks, just practical ways to enjoy traditional gaming.
There is a reason the DS hardware has been some of the best selling gaming equipment of all time, while the Wii collected dust and the WiiU rotted on shelves. Conversely, rumors say the Switch is going to be super rare at launch. What do you expect, though, from a company that didn’t produce anywhere near enough NES Classic’s to go around?
Don’t get me wrong, I like Nintendo, but as I have said before, if you take the fanboy glasses off and look at them in retrospect, they are not at all the same company they were in the 90’s, and haven’t been for a very very long time.
By the way,https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwitch/comments/5mg38d/everything_you_need_to_know_about_the_switch/ here is a reddit entry about the Switch announcement and the like: