Nintendo Switch

[BillLoguidice]

 

What's the other portable Elder Scrolls you have in mind? I know there was a mobile phone thing long ago, a cancelled PSP Oblivion type game, and the collectible card game for modern mobile. None of them are as interesting to me as a real Skyrim to go. Is it old, or is it "classic" at this point?

 

I hope you're right about some third parties. It's been a long time since Atari snagged DOOM for the Jaguar. Nintendo had Batman and Mass Effect on Wii U, and that was it.

 

I was thinking about The Elder Scrolls Travels: Shadowkey for the N-Gage, which I have. I forgot about the J2ME and BREW releases, so I suppose that's more than one previous. Although relatively modest, I still consider the N-Gage game a traditional Elder Scrolls game. It has enough of what makes the series the series. With that said, it IS quite old now, but, my main point was, despite Skyrim already being out and selling to death on a multitude of platforms, it being portable on the Switch is still kind of neat. Whether that translates into anything more than modest interest remains to be seen, though, obviously.

 

In regards to the Wii U third party support, that was like the perfect storm. Nintendo had the right third parties on board, but I think the combination of sluggish system sales, wildly inconsistent ports (there are lots of stories of third parties praising the dev tools on the Switch versus what they had to put up with on the Wii U, so I guess that's not surprising), and obviously poor sales of said ports, doomed it all.

 

In the Switch's case, while I don't think they have quite the right third parties on board as of yet, I think at least the sluggish system sales thing is not an issue here (at least for the short-term). What remains to be seen is with a healthy system, will third party stuff sell well on the Switch. I think combined with the healthy system sales, if there are indications that third party stuff is being well received, then obviously the other third parties will hop on board. That may be preferable to the Wii U situation, where they started out on the platform, but then had to abandon it because it wasn't a viable market. Since they'd only be coming onto something healthy and that will support their games, there's far less of a chance for these third parties to jump ship once actually committing. That would be a good thing and would make me think that the platform can thrive through this and the inevitable incremental upgrades.

[Flojomojo]

Heheh, I remember that. There was a time I really wanted to play it. A game-oriented phone didn't make sense for me back then, and the App Store was years away.

 

 

It reminds me a lot of The Quest, which has recently been redrawn with HD graphics on modern devices. The Quest seems to be about as close to classic Daggerfall as we can expect. It's turn-based but shares a similar aesthetic. Nerdy AF.

 

 

I think the success of Zelda works against the likelihood of Skyrim on Switch doing really really well. It reminds me of the way I felt when the most impressive Jaguar games were Aliens Vs. Predator, DOOM, and Wolfenstein 3D. They were different from each other, but they're all first-person exploring and shooting games. They're not the same, but they will be compared to each other.

 

But yeah, if Switch takes off and creates a big tent for many different types of games, so much the better. I like the idea of Elder Scrolls (even though I can't seem to be bothered to actually play through them) and I'll be getting Skyrim to support more Western RPGs on the Switch.

 

One of the Kickstarter games I backed, Hover: Revolt of Gamers is coming to Switch. I just filled out the survey to choose the platform I want. I assume that ToeJam & Earl will be offered as well. I hope that 90s Arcade Racer comes back from the dead and appears on Switch, too.

[Punisher5.0]

I've never played Elder Scrolls so I might get into it with the Switch release. It'll be nice to not be tethered down for a big game.

[Shawn]

[Tanooki]

I saw that story earlier good on them for double production. We can all speculate all we like but in the end as for now only they know the truth. Coming off that horrid bomb of their final console the WiiU you would assume them to be dodgy and conservative, but to do this? You have to wonder what are they aware of? Is the demand that high? Maybe there is a titanium laiden NDA smackdown in progress on something huge for June at this E3. There must be some serious cards being dealt both in developers by name and game releases to feel that confident to up their FY2017 numbers from moving 8M to 16M units.

 

 

I think this year will be a fun ride for Switch owners and fence sitters as well. It clearly more than not by a margin as of yet isnt looking to mirror the WiiU turd shenanigans from multiple aspects. Its not to say they can not fail, they easily could if they started to delay even a single 1st party title for starters, but it would have to be more on a sabotage level than others screwing them at this point and time.

 

I wish I was home right now, on my tablet with a keyboard. Binding of Isaac arrived as planned and I want to go play that little zelda overhead homage mess of a game. I only ever touched the original free flash game and it was cute, and cheap/hard, but I know it got far better and more refined when it got off the web.

[BillLoguidice]

Nice package:

 

[cybercylon]

skyrim is a very in depth game (though I prefer fallout3 over it)

 

BUTTTTTTT

 

it is a pretty old game, so that's not winning any favors

 

And you won't be able to mod it like the PC version.

 

It often shows up on flash sales on Steam, but I suspect most that would have wanted to play it by now have played it. The game mechanics are pretty dated too at this point.

[Tanooki]

Isaac is a very very nice package and that GB sized manual in the NES style format was beautiful and a fun little throwback to read cover to cover.

 

The game is fun, it confuses me a bit, but I think I get it. It's hard. It's like if they put a rogue game together with the zelda 1 format, and then cranked up the difficulty with procedurally generated dungeons on each floor. Maybe I'm still figuring it out but it appears the game just has like 6 stages then a final boss (mom I imagine.) I can get like 4 of those levels down before I croak so far. I've got the flying guy unlocked who hits better and Isaac is handling alright (seems to play better using the d-pad buttons and buttons to fire since the movement and bullets aren't analog.) It's dark, amusingly dark with some wacked out amusing religious undertones and lots of cartoony gore to spare. It's a nice change of pace, should compliment my time around I am Setsuna and Blaster Master 0 well.

 

I never actually played BotW off TV, but as things were earlier it was easier for me to do it on the Switch itself and that screen is pretty darn nice and it was handy laid out on the couch doing that for a time.

[BillLoguidice]

Isaac is a very very nice package and that GB sized manual in the NES style format was beautiful and a fun little throwback to read cover to cover.

 

The game is fun, it confuses me a bit, but I think I get it. It's hard. It's like if they put a rogue game together with the zelda 1 format, and then cranked up the difficulty with procedurally generated dungeons on each floor. Maybe I'm still figuring it out but it appears the game just has like 6 stages then a final boss (mom I imagine.) I can get like 4 of those levels down before I croak so far. I've got the flying guy unlocked who hits better and Isaac is handling alright (seems to play better using the d-pad buttons and buttons to fire since the movement and bullets aren't analog.) It's dark, amusingly dark with some wacked out amusing religious undertones and lots of cartoony gore to spare. It's a nice change of pace, should compliment my time around I am Setsuna and Blaster Master 0 well.

 

I never actually played BotW off TV, but as things were earlier it was easier for me to do it on the Switch itself and that screen is pretty darn nice and it was handy laid out on the couch doing that for a time.

 

Yes, Isaac is brutally hard. I only beat it twice in the normal game and only beat a handful of the challenges (I recommend the "computer" challenge because that starts you off with the most firepower) after playing many dozens of games on several different platforms. In terms of the six stages, every game is different, so that's not really an issue. Some games procedurally generate better/harder/easier/worse stuff than others. It's a crap shoot, and obviously different every time. After you beat it the first time, things do get a bit more complicated. Either way, though, no matter how good you get, it's always a challenge. I make it to the "mom" stage maybe every third game I play, but usually run out of steam by then. Still, I regularly come back for more, and that says something. It's definitely appealing trying another game and discovering new stuff almost every time.

 

(By the way, every platform I play it on, I always use both analog sticks. It just works faster for me than pressing buttons.)

 

I've only played BOTW on the portable screen. I still have yet to find a need to dock the controllers in the plastic shell and play on the TV. As you say, the screen is plenty nice. In fact, I was admiring the size with Isaac versus playing on the New 3DS XL or Vita.

Edited March 18, 2017 by BillLoguidice

[Flojomojo]

I'm hitting the age where I need reading glasses to enjoy gaming on the tablet. On top of not having much time to play! Life is cruel!

[Tanooki]

Hmm guess I'm not doing that bad after all if you're that versed in the franchise and it is that nasty on the learning curve and difficulty. I do agree, because it's a crap shoot each game you go into it, it makes it stay fresh. As long as a need is there to play more, or go another time, that's a win in its book. I like it, Zelda love it no, but it has very little depth and it's more of a mindless 8bit homage killfest basically and i'm cool with that. I'll probably mess with it again tomorrow before I have to go out for some stuff for awhile, if not, that evening. It's so handy having the Switch be a portable that docks because if I feel no reason to flip the dumb TV on I can just break it off the stand and go to town on it with little effort involved in start up or shut down(or sleeping even less so.)

 

Thankfully even at my age now I still have better than 20-20 vision so I can deal with little things like GB Micro screens perfectly well, so something Switch sized is all the better. Even with the inches in size it is, it never feels cramped or small enough to lose quality of detail. Every little maggot crawling around on the ground in Isaac is very visible as is the little squish stain stepping on them.

[Rev]

I saw that story earlier good on them for double production. We can all speculate all we like but in the end as for now only they know the truth. Coming off that horrid bomb of their final console the WiiU you would assume them to be dodgy and conservative, but to do this? You have to wonder what are they aware of? Is the demand that high? Maybe there is a titanium laiden NDA smackdown in progress on something huge for June at this E3. There must be some serious cards being dealt both in developers by name and game releases to feel that confident to up their FY2017 numbers from moving 8M to 16M units.

 

E3 will be fun to watch this year.

 

Will we see a flood of games for switch like original wii had? Who knows.

 

Maybe switch will see big sales and really take off like the Ds did. Is it already happening? Its hard to tell when you are in the middle of it. We'll get a better picture in March 2018. And see the actual 1 year sales numbers.

[Andromeda Stardust]

Nice package:

 

Yes, manual and stickers. I played into the game in a drunken state from green-infused St Patti's Day beer. Not bad but I kinda wish it would save my progress after beating a floor. The stage order is a bit random and it's essentially a different challenge every time I die. I'll have to do some more gameplay (sober) and also read the included manual. The Robotron style gameplay seems an interesting mechanic. One attack button; four cardinal directions with which to fire in.

 

For all the value I got from the Zelda Collector's Edition, the lack of a manual in physical games is an oversight. Nevermind I bought a hardbound guide on Amazon. Issac is a budget title and has a manual so kudos to them..

[Andromeda Stardust]

I'm hitting the age where I need reading glasses to enjoy gaming on the tablet. On top of not having much time to play! Life is cruel!

I'm naturally nearsighted so I just take my glasses off. If my eyes ever get stiff enough so they can't focus close up with corrective lenses, I'll simply remove my glasses and hold the tablet six inches from my face...

[Tanooki]

For all the value I got from the Zelda Collector's Edition, the lack of a manual in physical games is an oversight. Nevermind I bought a hardbound guide on Amazon. Issac is a budget title and has a manual so kudos to them..

 

From what I saw at least with Zelda is a lack of a menu in the least bit which is bs. They didn't unless I missed it, even have a digital one you can throw around within the menus like Wii, WiiU, and 3DS have to offer. Bomberman cheaping it as extreme as possible put the controls in a black and white image along with more bomberman cartoon art on the inside of the cover art, but at least they bothered to offer something. I'm curious to see what Square-Enix does with I Am Setsuna whenever it arrives, even if it will be in Japanese.

[BillLoguidice]

 

From what I saw at least with Zelda is a lack of a menu in the least bit which is bs. They didn't unless I missed it, even have a digital one you can throw around within the menus like Wii, WiiU, and 3DS have to offer. Bomberman cheaping it as extreme as possible put the controls in a black and white image along with more bomberman cartoon art on the inside of the cover art, but at least they bothered to offer something. I'm curious to see what Square-Enix does with I Am Setsuna whenever it arrives, even if it will be in Japanese.

 

I'm actually OK with no manual in this case. In fact, for many games, I'm OK with no manual. Modern games usually do enough where you're able to learn the controls and get the story in-game. With that said, there are definitely games that would benefit from a manual. For those instances, I'd love to see exceptions being made. However, that's obviously less and less likely.

[BillLoguidice]

I'm naturally nearsighted so I just take my glasses off. If my eyes ever get stiff enough so they can't focus close up with corrective lenses, I'll simply remove my glasses and hold the tablet six inches from my face...

 

I'm doing the same thing, I'm afraid. When playing the Switch, it's now glasses off. I'm usually OK when playing with contacts.

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

I'm doing the same thing, I'm afraid. When playing the Switch, it's now glasses off. I'm usually OK when playing with contacts.

I'm not old enough yet (37) that my corneas have hardened, but my fiance is in her 40s and started wearing progressives a couple years ago. I've always been nearsighted such that my eyes can't focus farther than a foot from my face without glasses. It actually made playing 3DSxL a bit of a pain as the sweet spot has you hold it further away from the face than what I'm accustomed to. This is partially remedied with the N3DS autotracking but it still needs a certain distance away from the face to work.

 

= = = = = = = = =

 

Very bizarre thing happened Friday night with the sticker sheets in Binding of Issac. We went out to celebrate, and I was somewhat drunk and intoxicated from St Patti's Day green beer imbibing, so when I got home, I started playing the game on slot one and I didn't realize the game never autosaves. I made it to the 2nd level dungeon once before expiring and it just restarted me on the first floor. Additionally, after I put the game away, there was still nothing on the first save slot. Later on I leafed through the manual on Saturday and learned you have to manually save the game by pressing the plus menu.

 

But that's not the bizarre part. When I opened the game case, I found the manual and the single sticker fell out onto the bed before I started playing. I had looked at the photo Bill posted using my Wii-U browser, and wondered where the other sticker sheets went, but I didn't think anything of it. After playing it on my Switch, getting nowhere fast with random dungeons (because I didn't read the manual and learned you have to manually save progress), I put it away. Saturday morning I went searching for the missing sticker sheets, and found what was left, torn into little bits at the side of my bed. I recovered most of the pieces and taped it back, but suffice to say the stickers are ruined.

 

 

I asked my fiance the following morning if she knew what happened, and of course she denied it, saying she would never deliberately destroy something of mine, and I can't imagine myself doing something like that, drunk or not. Possibly we have a poltergeist lurking underneath the bed, either that or perhaps she or I possibly laid on top of the sticker sheets resulting in irritation, then tore them up thinking it was trash, and did not remember it. The shards were found on the floor on my side of the bed, but I can't imagine why either of us would have knowingly done it. And I'm not blaming her as I have no proof. I think this game is demon possessed or something.

 

At any rate, don't drink and game, friends...

[Osgeld]

Modern games usually do enough where you're able to learn the controls and get the story in-game.

 

Too much for my tastes, drives me bsc when I cant skip a tutorial level after already having played the game

[Tanooki]

I still can't seem to get beyond the 4th level of basement hell in that game before expiring, but it doesn't stop me from trying another 5-10x before I flip it off. Definitely NOT a good game for a longer than a 30-60min sit, but if you have a little time and want something that'll keep you aware and moving it's a solid one to definitely mess around with. Even if it doesn't save, it does in some ways as I noticed the donation box kept growing and once I hit I think 20coins it leveled up the shop to Lv1 and it had 3 items instead of 2. The thing is I rarely buy anything, seems kind of counter productive so I'll just keep donating, or if it's a crazy game I know you can unlock someone having around 50-60 in your hand before you croak.

[Austin]

Heheh, I remember that. There was a time I really wanted to play it. A game-oriented phone didn't make sense for me back then, and the App Store was years away.

It was a neat game, severely hampered by an extremely sluggish framerate. Shame it never got a conversion to the DS. It probably would have handled much better there.

 

I think the success of Zelda works against the likelihood of Skyrim on Switch doing really really well. It reminds me of the way I felt when the most impressive Jaguar games were Aliens Vs. Predator, DOOM, and Wolfenstein 3D. They were different from each other, but they're all first-person exploring and shooting games. They're not the same, but they will be compared to each other.

 

I think it's unreasonable to think Skyrim even has the chance of doing really, really well to begin with. It's a game that's old by this point, and is available in different forms across a wide array of platforms. The portable nature may give it a small shot in the arm and it may have modest sales as a result, but anything comparable to a typical brand new, AAA releases doesn't seem logical to me. Maybe if it was a new property or entry in the series, but it's not. Either way, it will at least be nice to have the option to play it on the Switch.

[Flojomojo]

I don't think we know what it even means to do really well on the Switch -- I would think that even 1:1 sales with the hardware (which is prob what Zelda got) would be a drop in the ocean compared to the 6 prior versions of Skyrim. That's the other part of why it reminds me of DOOM on Jaguar.

 

I guess all it really needs to do is make its development money back, right?

[BillLoguidice]

I still can't seem to get beyond the 4th level of basement hell in that game before expiring, but it doesn't stop me from trying another 5-10x before I flip it off. Definitely NOT a good game for a longer than a 30-60min sit, but if you have a little time and want something that'll keep you aware and moving it's a solid one to definitely mess around with. Even if it doesn't save, it does in some ways as I noticed the donation box kept growing and once I hit I think 20coins it leveled up the shop to Lv1 and it had 3 items instead of 2. The thing is I rarely buy anything, seems kind of counter productive so I'll just keep donating, or if it's a crazy game I know you can unlock someone having around 50-60 in your hand before you croak.

 

I beat it on my sixth regular game tonight (I played the previous five regular sessions on other days). It's funny, because that sixth game I also ended up with tons of coins, bombs, and hearts, which unlocked a bunch of characters and other stuff. A lot of it is luck of the draw, really, especially with power ups and other helpful items that get generated in a particular game.

 

Again, I recommend trying the Computer challenge for a while. That's a good way to rampage through a lot of the game relatively easily, although it can still be a challenge to finish.

 

Anyway, yeah, definitely feed the machine, although you'll likely still need to occasionally buy new items, like hearts or power-ups. In the games on other systems, I've gotten it to hundreds of coins, which does give rewards after certain points like you've already experienced.

 

I printed this today, by the way (the model is from Thingiverse; obviously, I have some post print clean-up to do still and should have probably printed at a higher resolution):

Edited March 20, 2017 by BillLoguidice

[BillLoguidice]

I don't think we know what it even means to do really well on the Switch -- I would think that even 1:1 sales with the hardware (which is prob what Zelda got) would be a drop in the ocean compared to the 6 prior versions of Skyrim. That's the other part of why it reminds me of DOOM on Jaguar.

 

I guess all it really needs to do is make its development money back, right?

 

While I don't expect it be a blockbuster or system seller, I certainly expect it to do well. If it doesn't sell well, then that would kind of be a disaster.

 

As for Zelda, last I saw, it has something like a 90% overall attach rate. That's not surprising considering there's really nothing else of significance out for it (everything else I would think splits fairly evenly depending upon consumer taste), and this one is especially sought after, regardless. It makes you wonder what system and game sales would have been like if the Wii U version wasn't siphoning off at least some of the potential interest/must-have nature of this title from those who already have a Wii U.

[Flojomojo]

Does anyone know how the Wii U Zelda BOTW did, especially compared to Switch? I would think that the vast majority of Nintendoheads who care about Zelda would buy it on the Switch or wait until they had enough money to do so.

 

Numbers would be nice. Wii U is supposedly a big flop, and Switch off to a good start, but I'll bet there are a lot more Wii U's in people's homes than Switches.