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(Never Posted)2018 Will Make or Break the Nintendo Switch

The following article was written August 2017 but never posted. The Switch has come out of the gate swinging with some seriously heavy hitting games.  Splatoon 2, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Super Mario Odyessy and, Xenoblade Chronicles 2 are all major intrests for me.  (some people would have included ARMS onto this list but I can't say that game was worth it's asking price) More games are on the way.  A new Smash Bros will have to make it sometime, Super Metroid 4, Pikmin 4, a mainline Pokemon RPG, and finally, the enevitable virutal console. With all of these awesome first and second party offerings, it is easy to forget what is missing from this lineup. A strong lineup of major 3rd party games that will come to other consoles.  While some people say that 3rd party games aren't THAT big of a deal for a console, I couldn't disagree more.  Fanboys buy for only Nintendo games, but a casual consumer wants a console that has the ability to play all the game...
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Fortnite for Switch Gets Motion Controls...SAD!

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Fortnite for Nintendo Switch is the first and only version I have played up until this point.  I have an iOS device but the thought of touch controls makes me uninsterested.  I have a PC but leaning over the keyboard hurts my back over time.  I really wanted a version I could play with physical controls on the recliner and in bed.  The Switch version of the game finally gave me that and it has been hard to set down. The Switch version of the game has a...reputation of sorts.  As with the mobile ports of the game, the game is harder to control than other versions.  This comes from a large part of the player base using Joy-Cons for their go to way of play.  Either because they are playing in handheld mode or because they are just using the standard grip that came with the system out of the box to play in TV mode.  They Joy-Cons have a glaring issue that I’m sure any veteran Switch player could tell you.  The right thumbstick, which is used to...
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Design Choices Make Splatoon 2 eSport Ready

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This weekend I found myself playing the "Splatfest" demo of Splatoon 2.  For those of you that dont know, "Splatfest" is the name of the in-game celebration of the Splatoon series where you pick a side and face off against the enemy team.  Sometimes they can last for a full day, whereas this one was considerably smaller than that at 4 hours.  In that short amount of time, it became strikingly clear the change of tone that Nintendo was trying to strike in this game.  They really want it to be an eSport, and I think they might just have a hit on their hands. Competitive play has been around for decades in video games.  While not widely publicized like they are today, tournaments for competitive games have been a cornerstone of gaming.  Within the past 5 years or so, the phrase "eSport" has been thrown around.  While it is very possible that the name was made as a catchy marketing buzz word, I think that it took on a meaning of its own. I...
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The Smaller “New 3DS” Just Got Discontinued. Why?

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This debate is one that began with the Switch announcement video in October.  Does the Switch being a better all around handheld spell the end of the 3DS line?  Will the entire dedicated handheld line at Nintendo slowly mesh with the home console line?  I think there were quite a bit of people on either side of the fence.  I was so close to making a final prediction before, but today, the answer became more clear than ever. Nintendo is phasing out their New 3DS from production in Japan.  To clarify, the New 3DS XL and the New 2DS XL are both still going to be produced, but the smaller form factor version is getting phased out.  This is a signal that the Switch is their new handheld in a couple of ways. First off, let's get the obvious one out of the way right now.  Discontinuing any product in a platform is a sign of a shift in focus within that platform’s ecosystem. It signals a shift in focus by the manufacturer.  They are using the reso...
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NBA Playgrounds is FINALLY a Good Game on the Switch

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NBA Playgrounds released to all current-gen platforms on May 9th, 2017.  The game includes a pretty bare-bones single player mode and an online ranked mode that was typically regarded as the main selling point.  Switch owners had to wait 62 days until they got to play the online mode like all the other platforms did.  The publisher is offering a free Switch game (Shaq-Fu, coming later this year) to all Switch owners that bought the game during that 62 day period, but having a half-finished game for that long was a real downer.  I wanted to say the game was fun, but it lacked content and what was there felt mailed in with little creative spirit or passion.  I later found out that the developers were behind the scenes trying their hardest to get features and bug fixes to my console, but were severely delayed by Nintendo. You have probably read this elsewhere by now, but the devs didn't sit on their hands doing nothing.  They were trying their harde...
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How Promotions Can Ruin Community Created Content

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The following issue is something that I have seen in a number of different communities.  It seems that tech and gaming communities are the easiest to exploit though.  The problem that I am speaking of is promotional content.  Sponsored videos or articles in exchange for free products, prerelease coverage, promotion, and exposure.  No matter how much people can say that free product won’t affect their review, most of the time it does.   This issue really came to a breaking point for me whenever I was watching YouTube and an ad played.  This ad was for the Samsung Galaxy S8 but it was different than others that I have seen before.  The video ad was a compilation of YouTube videos of people giving glowing reviews of the Galaxy S8 phone.  It was a cherry-picked compilation from content creators that were undoubtedly sent the phone early and for free in exchange for a review.  They also might have been made aware that if they reviewed the phon...
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How Nintendo Could Accidentally Kill the Switch

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After this latest E3, I think that we are all starting to realize that the Switch isn't getting broad "Triple A" third party support like we were all hoping for.  It seems to be getting individualized ports of games that are made specifically for the system or not getting "multi-plats" at all.  Huge system sellers like Call of Duty or Battlefront aren't getting Switch ports at all and even some smaller games like "South Park: The Fractured But Whole" aren't making an appearance on the system.  Nintendo can say that they can't anticipate what third party developers are going to do, but when they are given a system with a tablet SoC (system on a chip) to run home console quality games, they are going to be very constrained.  After all, they are trying to turn a profit and if they have to burn a ton of man hours to make a special port for the system, they will probably not take the risk.  So the system isn't getting broad Triple A su...
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