Nintendo Now that we've seen the Switch's endgame, how do we feel about its library overall?

[crispy4000]

I think its fair to say that the heaviest hitters the Switch has left were likely announced at this show.  We got a whiff of two 2024 games (Peach game, Luigi's Mansion 2 remake).  Metroid Prime 4 still could come, but it would also be unsurprising to see it pushed to Switch 2.

 

So how are we feeling about the system's library overall right now?  Did Nintendo succeed at making Switch its own thing for you?  Or did Wii U ports and remakes compensate for too much?  Keep hardware talk out of it as much as possible, the obvious can only be stated so many times for a 6 year old handheld.

 

As for big 3rd party publishers, were there enough games from them targeting the systems spec?  (ie: Octopath Traveler, Prince of Persia The Lost Crown, etc)

[Bacon]

I liked the Wii U better.

[SaysWho?]

23 minutes ago, Bacon said:

I liked the Wii U better.

O U

[TwinIon]

I'm absolutely in the minority of Switch buyers here, but to me the Switch hasn't been anything special. Having had all the consoles for a long time now and not being interested in handheld gaming made much of the Switch library redundant at best. It also doesn't help that I'm either not interested in or have aged out of many of the core Nintendo properties. I'm not into Animal Crossing or Splatoon and the Pokemon didn't impress me.

 

Tears of the Kingdom by itself makes the console worthwhile, but the only other major sequel entry that impressed me was Metroid Dread. I enjoyed the Mario games well enough, Smash Bros was a solid entry that I just never got much couch time with, and Mario + Rabbids is nifty, but hardly system defining.

 

I've accepted that I'm just at the point where I'll buy a Nintendo console for the few great games that Nintendo puts out that I'm interested in, but it'll sit unused for a year at a time waiting for those games.

[TheLeon]

I dunno. It’s fine. I’m basically with @TwinIon. I never needed much from the Switch. It was always going to be a secondary system for me. 

[stepee]

For me it’s probably the last great console. Overall, this is a good thing, because it just means most games are multi platform these days and there is a pc handheld market now. Before the deck came out, Switch was at least 50% of my play time, more than that some years. It made me get further into combining my tv watching and game playing time. It’s my favorite handheld ever and possibly my favorite individual platform ever. During those first few years especially I was obsessed with the thing.

 

To me it was handheld only the entire time though. I do hope dlss in the next Nintendo system will have me playing their games on the tv again. It’s been nice doing so with TOTK on pc.

 

The deluxe WiiU ports might have be some good fuel for online library wars but I don’t think it affected it in any negative way. It’s a good thing most of those came out so people could play those games. I think the big thing that stands out with them is that we did not get a Switch specific Mario Kart. But at this point it’s so ridiculously expanded. I suppose no original Donkey Kong is a bummer, but I doubt porting TF had anything to do with that.

 

A few other series I would have liked to have seen are Wave Race, Fzero, and Star Fox, and those waits will continue. But we got some things I’ve been wanting like Metroid 5 and a full 3D Kirby platformer and a new game pad based Warioware. And of course finally a return to 3D exploration based Mario. Splatoon continued to be great and finally delivered with a solid single player in 3 and Mario Maker 2 had a legit underrated campaign. Even the Paper Mario game was dangerously close to a return to form. And then some weird new stuff I’ve loved like Arms.

 

Biggest disappointment for me was the lack of a new side scrolling Mario which we get now and pretty much all the sports games. I hope they took some lessons from the critical reception this generation and make significantly beef up the content in those next gen. They only have to do one of each every gen and they contract them out, give them some dough.

 

I can’t wait for the Switch 2 and I’m sure it’ll be great but now that I can play all the same games I play on pc/tv on a handheld or my laptop now, or with ar glasses etc, I don’t think I’ll use any particular device as consistently again. If the Switch 2 has a good display and decent enough power and is light and nice to hold  I could see using it still for indie games again but certainly not for the “impossible ports” and such anymore. That is unless they have thought of something new. They could always trap me with 3D again.

[BloodyHell]

It has some amazing games, just not a lot of them. 
Im absolutely hyped for Mario RPG. 

there’s maybe 15 games I’ve bought for Switch over the years. Most of them were fantastic. Odyssey, BotW, TotK, Dread, Prime, XBC3, Triangle Strategy, Octopath 2, Links Awakening, I love those games.

 

but I wouldn’t call it a great library.

[CastlevaniaNut18]

It’s always been my secondary platform after PC, but I’ve been very satisfied with the library. 

[Kal-El814]

Between most AAA content coming to PC for a while now and the fact that you can bring the thing anywhere, I'd say it's probably the best console since the SNES.

[AbsolutSurgen]

Did I miss something?  Did Nintendo announce a new console?

[BloodyHell]

15 minutes ago, AbsolutSurgen said:

Did I miss something?  Did Nintendo announce a new console?

No.

[crispy4000]

I've been coming around to the system after a lull in the mid cycle.  Which I'm pretty sure was mainly because Nintendo almost never cuts game prices below 30%.  It's hard for a budget-minded person to care.

These past two years have been incredible for the Switch though, with so many more games that are tempting to pay (close to) MSRP for.  I think its pretty clear that Nintendo front loaded and back loaded the Switch with their best stuff.  Not that the middle is bad or anything.  Just nothing too exciting.

[5timechamp]

Its been a feast or famine machine for me …granted most Nintendo consoles seemingly are but this one is really two-faced

 

It has the best, most content packed versions of many Nintendo series (smash, kart, zelda etc)…. while at the same time it has the most barren, content lacking, lazy version of many of Nintendos subseries (Animal Crossing, Strikers, Golf, Tennis, Party etc)…

 

No clue where Nintendo goes from here but continuity is a must… dont start with a whole new virtual console with a launch release of Urban Champion and Wrecking Crew..

[gamer.tv]

It’s got an incredibly strong library of games. Stacking the top 10 on the Switch vs the last/current gen, the Switch easily takes it.

[crispy4000]

5 hours ago, 5timechamp said:

It has the best, most content packed versions of many Nintendo series (smash, kart, zelda etc)…. while at the same time it has the most barren, content lacking, lazy version of many of Nintendos subseries (Animal Crossing, Strikers, Golf, Tennis, Party etc)….

Animal Crossing got expanded enough eventually, even more with its DLC.  And Mario Aces is plenty packed with content.  It’s that Wii U version of Tennis which is on a whole different level of garbage.

 

I’m very cold on Smash Ultimate.  Their solution to improving the netcode was to make the input lag worse all the time.  I couldn’t stand more than a few hours of that game because of it.  Hopefully we see a Switch 2 port that fixes this.  I’d like to enjoy playing it.  The Wii U/3DS game was already at my limit of what I could tolerate, regressing further from that was a bad move.

[Keyser_Soze]

12 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

Animal Crossing got expanded enough eventually, even more with its DLC

 

Animal Crossing eventually caught up to the content of New Leaf, with the addition of home designer yet still not as good as the previous versions of the game. This was a game they could have kept pumping out content for. It was pretty awesome the first year seeing all the events roll out, but once the game circled around it was the same content over and over. They could have put out annual content to keep the game fresh but they released one last patch and called it a day. Feels like such a waste.

[SaysWho?]

PS4 and then Switch made the past decade in gaming phenomenal. Switch is a beast.

[best3444]

Switch is remarkable especially with it's extremely limited hardware. If you take the top 10 games for the Switch, it's very good. Nintendo will always be behind Sony and Xbox for me, but that’s the beauty of owning everything.

 

I really hope Nintendo just releases a very upgraded Switch instead of coming up with an entirely different plan. The Switch is absolutely genius for it to be a handheld so just keep rolling with that. 

[5timechamp]

7 hours ago, Keyser_Soze said:

 

Animal Crossing eventually caught up to the content of New Leaf, with the addition of home designer yet still not as good as the previous versions of the game. This was a game they could have kept pumping out content for. It was pretty awesome the first year seeing all the events roll out, but once the game circled around it was the same content over and over. They could have put out annual content to keep the game fresh but they released one last patch and called it a day. Feels like such a waste.

 

The value I found in New Leaf that NH lacked was in the pure variety of furniture collections, the various shop upgrades and town projects that gradually opened up over time.. NH lacked variety in furniture replacing it with simple color edits and the progression to everything was accelerated.. game didnt really last..

 

Now everything it added like the DLC and the town editing tools were amazing… but needed the content of New Leaf

[Paperclyp]

Best library of games since the Cube for my money. And if you throw in handhelds just to ruffle some feathers I’ll say it shits all over the 3DS library. 

[crispy4000]

14 hours ago, Paperclyp said:

Best library of games since the Cube for my money. And if you throw in handhelds just to ruffle some feathers I’ll say it shits all over the 3DS library. 

 

I don't think there's any question its better than 3DS's library.  Though A Link Between Worlds is still something very special.

[Paperclyp]

5 minutes ago, crispy4000 said:

 

I don't think there's any question its better than 3DS's library.  Though A Link Between Worlds is still something very special.

 

Agreed. 

 

Somewhat related, I wish they'd port Wind Waker HD already to the Switch. 

 

And if we're gonna get Paper Mario games remade, can I just get a high resolution version of A Thousand Year Door? 

[Derek]

I've been happy with it.

[ShreddieMercury]

I'm surprised to see people say that the library isn't that great.  It's probably in the top three or so best console libraries of all time, and it has a few of the best games in Nintendo's entire catalog.