First-party Switch 2 games—including re-releases

Nope. That'll be a pass from me Nintendo.
- Oh you’re going to subscribe to Nintendo Pass for $12.99 a month?
- I’ll wait for an emulator
  
  Honestly, I won't bother. I only tried a few Switch games on emulator out of curiosity, and never played long. They don't make anything interesting enough for me to want. I don't get why people feel the need for Nintendo.

I am not in the market for a console (my last one was the Sega Mega Drive which was abandoned after we got a Pentium 1 PC and dialup), but I got to say, I love Nintendo's pricing policy.
It's almost as if they are taking the piss and want to see to what extent their fans are gluttons for punishment.
One possible complicating factor for those games? While they're physical releases, they use Nintendo's new Game-Key Card format, which attempts to split the difference between true physical copies of a game and download codes. Each cartridge includes a key for the game, but no actual game content—the game itself is downloaded to your system at first launch. But despite holding no game content, the key card must be inserted each time you launch the game, just like any other physical cartridge.
This is full on corporate regressiveness.
Nintendo will also use some Switch 2 Edition upgrades as a carrot to entice people to the more expensive $50-per-year tier of the Nintendo Switch Online service. The company has already announced that the upgrade packs for Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom will be offered for free to Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscribers. The list of extra benefits for that service now includes additional emulated consoles (Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo 64, and now Gamecube) and paid DLC for both Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Mario Kart 8.
Wait so you have to subscribe to get access to emulators (which are all open source I am assuming)? And you can't just buy a retro game (ala GOG) and play it to your heart's content? You need a sub to Nintendo online?
- The key card thing is seriously infuriating, both from a consumer standpoint and from a media conservation standpoint.
  Basically you own a game cartridge, but as soon as Nintendo shuts down their servers for whatever reason it becomes a useless piece of plastic. They really don't want us to own anything anymore.
  
  I'm not sure that's how that works. The Switch already had both physical boxes with digital codes in them and cartridges that required mandatory downloads to run. This seems like a physical unlock key for a digital download, which depending on how it's implemented is actually easier to both resell and use offline than the Switch 1 solution to the same problem.
  I don't recommend purchasing either, and I avoided both of those options on Switch 1, but I'm pretty sure this at least does not make things any worse.
  I have major gripes with a number of pricing choices in this thing, but to the best of my current understanding this one is based on a misunderstanding.
- Their emulators have always been proprietary. The waters were a little muddied by the NES/SNES Classic consoles using a Linux OS but the emulators were their own code.
  Their FOSS code is made available when required and is published here:
  https://support.nintendo.com/jp/oss/index.html
  
  I see. I am surprised they didn't simply take existing open source code and go with that.
- Oh wow, that cartridge thing is actually just the worst of both worlds. I'm similar to you, my last console was a Mega Drive but I did get a Switch for my wife and played a couple of games on it which was fun. Not really keen on giving Nintendo more money though.
- So when Nintendo servers shut down, that's it.
- So does this kill used game sales?
  
  I think it kills game leaks before the street date. Even if the data isn’t in the cartridge (which is stupid), you would still be able to sell the cartage assuming the online service is still active.
  Sucks for game preservation though. I’m personally hoping there’s some flaw in the gen 1 hardware that can be exploited for archive purchases.
  (edit: fixed autocorrect)
  
  I am assuming you can re-sell the "Game Key".

I pray it faces record-breaking piracy.
- It probably will. Given the modest spec bump and the high even for Nintendo hostility to switch emulation, it's probably trivial to support switch 2 as well.
- I too wonder if there would be communities, focused on playing these xbox360 era games on pc - after this
  Anyone got links further educational reading on this matter?

Ah yes, let me pay $450 for a console that I have to pay an additional $80 for every game I want to play. What a sound financial decision.
- I wonder if there would be communities, focused on playing these xbox360 era games on pc - after this
  Anyone got links further educational reading on this matter?

Always loved Nintendo, but this will be a hard pass from me.

Fuck Nintendo.

I love having my decision not to buy a Nintendo Switch and stick to PC games validated.
Feel bad for all the Nintendo fans though, I get how you can fall in love with a franchise they make and want their stuff only to have "except it costs a ton" stuck on, so you'll have to skip for financial reasons and feel unhappy. It's a lot harder to abstain from something you actually care about and want, than something you are maybe mildly interested in.
- No Zelda or Mario will hurt. But Nintendo's decided I'm just too poor to be worthy of playing their games any more.
  
  There's a hundred different versions of amazing Mario and Zelda games that you can play already with emulators and on an old switch/computer/steamdeck. Wait till the new one is emulated, don't enable Nintendo to do this shit.
- It's most difficult for me since I want to play metroid prime 4, especially after hearing the music. But I don't want to pay 90 euro for base game. That's incredibly ridiculous
  
  I'm just going to get the Switch version and be perfectly happy with the visuals being slightly less good and using gyro joycon aim over joycon mouse.

I was REALLY looking forward to the 2 ... this leaves such a sour aftertaste, it's very unpleasant.

I look forward to playing these for free in a year or two when an emulator that works on the Steam Deck is released.
- 4 real when Zelda was released on the switch is ran at like 1080p 30 fps. The emulator version was 4k @ 60 fps…
- The reason the switch 1 was emulated so fast was a hardware vulnerability on nvidia's part. Presumably we won't see that again.
  Also: While switch games DO run better on a steam deck, they don't run great. And I think estimates put the switch 2 at closer to a PS4 than PS3 in terms of power? But even PS3/360 games don't run gerat on a Steam Deck.
  Not to mention nintendo's lawyers putting the fear of mario into the emulation community.
  So in a few years? I could see MAYBE some proof of concepts. But I doubt we'll actually be able to properly emulate switch 2 games until at least 2030.
  
  Well, then I look forward to playing games for this retro console for free in six years when an emulator drops for the Steam Deck 2.

SteamDeck it is.

The only game I want to play is that new Donkey Kong game. Paying €520 for playing just one game is ridiculous. I’m gonna wait till Nintendo releases more games. I’m not gonna spend €450 for it to collect dust like my PS5.

I’m the dude in that meme looking at the other girl, and she is my icon collections in Steam, GOG, even Epic, etc. Icons with native Linux versions get slight preference.

Gaming market as a whole seems to be going through a correction of sort and this is the time when Nintendo decides to raise the price? Good luck with that Nintendo.
I along with just about everyone here probably has a massive back catalogue of games on Steam to ride out whatever is currently happening in the gaming industry. Maybe I’ll just chill over by the corner and watch the gaming market craters itself into the ground.

Just like their prices, Nintendo will never change.

Arrrr!

Ubisoft's The Crew 3: Super Mario Horizon

Canadian here: What's the difference? /s
- For you it'll be $120 Wilfrid Laurier bucks..

I buy pretty much every console there is, but I'll pass here. Maybe there will be a price-cut OLED model and a new "Best of Switch 2" Series of games with cut prices (like on GameCube or Wii). Also I want to wait and see if the Joy-Cons 2 get drifting issues.

I never ever saw the point of paying premium for re-released games. Those are the kind of games where I will wait almost any time for them to drop so it is a favorable price. And with the specs of the Switch 2, the price points being asked of from those games, do no warrant it. They are best played on other platforms.

Am I the only one who doesn't care about this? We'll wait for the 33% nintendo sales and fill the rest of the year with 3rd party 80% sales like always
- Or get it second hand for cheap lol, it's not a big deal to me at least.

Aren't consoles and their new game always ridiculously expensive on launch? I know Nintendo stuff often doesn't drop in price that much but I'd be surprised if they stay this expensive for long. Plenty of other games to play in the meantime!
- These are the top 5 sellers on Switch:
  Mario Kart 8 Deluxe
  Animal Crossing: New Horizons
  Super Smash Bros Ultimate
  The legend of Zelda:Breath of the Wild
  Super Mario Odyssey
  These links take you to a price tracker with a chart showing historical prices. The RRP of each of these has been static, and discounts are short and infrequent.
  In a break from form Nintendo hasn't released a budget "Selects" label for older titles this generation.
  
  Fair point, but I still can't imagine they'll be double that price for long. The only GBP price I've seen for a Switch 2 game is the MKW bundle which is only £30 more than the console on its own.
- It will only stay as high as the market and customers allow it
  If it sells out, expect a price drop in a few years
  If it fails to meet Nintendo's expectations (3DS at launch) expect a price drop a few weeks or months (3DS at launch)
  
  If it sells out, expect a price drop in a few years
  Switch sold out in 2017, and now the same basic Neon model is selling for the same price in 2025.

This is an unpopular opinion, but y'all are forgetting about inflation. $60 in 2017 is $78 in 2025. $300 in 2017 is $390 today.
My ex always mocked me for the prices of Nintendo switch games. She even got me into playing games on my PC. But except for trackmania, I always gravitate back to the Switch. And I'm definitely in a priveleged place so take this with a grain of salt, but I'm buying the Switch 2 pretty much no matter what. To me it's worth the cost.
- Tell that to the people making the same amount of money in 2025 that they were in 2017.
- Yes, inflation happened, and purchasing power has not grown or stayed the same with it. People can't afford as much, so rising prices on entertainment are going to sting even more.
- General inflation doesn't quite translate directly in all cases and is just a reference. In video games, costs have increased, but revenues have increased primarily through micro transactions and a growing market/sales. There's virtually no marginal cost to produce additional units with software, so the revenues become a balance of price, demand, and supply (for hardware). They are expecting that the price increase won't result in a significant drop in demand so that revenue increases. If they're wrong, this will be a huge business mistake. If enough people purchase anyway, like you, then they'll increase revenues and this will be considered a great business decision
  
  Yeah, I have rejected increased cost games for this very reason. But Nintendo is one of the few companies I believe would do it to cover their costs instead of just preying upon general apathy towards inflation since covid to jack up profit. They are too rich for my blood at the time, but if I had the income to splurge this would be one of a vanishingly small number of places I would be willing to put up with it.
- Its cool, your choice, you spend your money as you see fit.
  I personally would never spend 60 usd on a game in 2017 and will never spend 80 usd in 2025. Its just too much.
- Also, even disregarding the inflation argument, video gaming is still one of the cheapest per hour hobbies.