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I mostly enjoyed the Direct, and the fact that the Switch 2 is letting all these companies put their games on a Nintendo console is incredible (we finally get Madden again?) and the specs seem pretty promising.

But some of the game prices are insane, yikes.

Can't want to get a Seitch 2 at some point.

I'm upset about the pricing but not at Nintendo. I just read that 900 auto workers got laid off from just one company due the tariffs, me paying more for games seems paltry by comparison these hundreds of people having their lives torn apart. The pricing sucks and I hate it but I have seen the prices of many things skyrocket recently. I am also willing to deal with it because Nintendo is not a layoffs centric company, I understand it sucks because we all have no money, especially places those price changes are magnified, but games are a luxury to my life and I already have a massive number of digital games I got cheap, so if the options are enable layoffs or pay more I will pay more. Also games always offer the best dollar to time entertained ratio for me, even for shorter games, so as much as it sucks and i don't usually have that in the budget I would prefer doing that to screwing people over or having layoffs.

If it enables them to not layoff people in this trying time even though my heart always goes out people who won't be able to afford it as it certainly isn't fair. I do think they should make DLC cheaper as well to compensate though, because if we are paying that much more upfront then sticking to smaller prices or at least not raising them for DLC would make it feel less painful.

I am really excited about the tech advancements, being able to hit 4k 60fps and HD 120fps will make a lot of people happy I'm sure and it will definitely be helpful in games that require that much precision for me.

Also that was a neat interview, thank you for taking the time Jean-Karlo!

Preorders got delayed because of the tariffs, so it's going to cost even more. Love being an American (at least for another year until I get to NL and renounce my citizenship).

FishLion wrote:

Also that was a neat interview, thank you for taking the time Jean-Karlo!

Thank you kindly! I'm glad you enjoyed it! Nakano was very nice to speak to, I loved his insight. He definitely ranks right up there in terms of my favorite interviews.

What a bummer that the interview went up the week it did with the news it did, I'd hate for such a pleasant chat to get overshadowed. Crying or Very sad

FishLion wrote:

I am really excited about the tech advancements, being able to hit 4k 60fps and HD 120fps will make a lot of people happy I'm sure and it will definitely be helpful in games that require that much precision for me.

I was shocked to hear the new Pokemon game will be 60fps. A welcome change, but shocking. I remember people here a few weeks ago saying expecting 60fps in games was unrealistic or even entitled, but I'm glad the Pokemon devs seem to disagree. I really hope Switch 2 games do not suffer the same performance problem many Switch games did. I also hope Nintendo steps away from that trend they did where they release a game unfinished and then slowly add more to it via later updates.

As for the elephant in the room of the pricing, I'm largely fine with paying more if the game justifies it. The problem is a lot of modern games have become shorter and filled with less content which really don't justify paying 60 dollars for, let alone when 70 became the new standard and now apparently 80 is for Nintendo. Mario Kart will probably be worth the investment as it always was, but anything else I'll hold off on until more info on the game comes out.

TheSeventhSense wrote:

Preorders got delayed because of the tariffs, so it's going to cost even more. Love being an American (at least for another year until I get to NL and renounce my citizenship).

Americans historically have gotten off very easily compared to South Americans, Europeans, and many other markets whoa already had to pay exuberant prices for video games. The Switch 2 is going to cost 3 months rent in Brazil so I think Americans will survive paying a bit more.

Loved the interview! And definitely still excited for the new game. I never played the original, but I'm excited to play this one. Already placed down money for the Premium Edition - gotta keep up my collection of the plushies! - although granted for the Switch 1, since didn't know until the Switch 2 Direct it was going to get a Switch 2 version. But since I'm wagering that's going to be more visual upgrades than anything else, not too concerned on getting the "inferior" version.

I definitely can understand the frustration with the pricing. The price for the console isn't a surprise to me; $450 is about what I was expecting all along, although I had hopes for $400. But I went in expecting $450 since the Switch OLED was $350, so the extra $100 given inflation and improvements felt like it made sense. The games, however... not thrilled with spending $80 for a base game. The SoS Premium Edition I mentioned is $70, but it's coming with physical extras like the plushie, soundtrack, and poster. That content makes it worth the money, but $80 for just a game? I only buy 1-2 games a year as is due to my chosen niche (with this year being 2 because of Pokemon Legends Z-A, which I'm now expecting to be $80 because it's Pokemon), so the cost of games may not hurt me that bad, but for those that buy a dozen or more games a year... that's going to be tough. Very tough. Add in the need to buy upgrade packs for some games, and it'll make some things even worse.

I can't blame people for being so mad at Nintendo for the pricing. Even though I understand why they are doing what they are, as what was said here... it just sucks.

Wack Sage wrote:

Americans historically have gotten off very easily compared to South Americans, Europeans, and many other markets whoa already had to pay exuberant prices for video games. The Switch 2 is going to cost 3 months rent in Brazil so I think Americans will survive paying a bit more.

Americans have to worry about a lot more than now than paying a bit more for a Switch 2. I think sales are going to suffer in non-Japanese markets, but especially the American one.

$450 isn't unreasonable for a console. $12 isn't unreasonable for a single volume of manga, I begrudgingly have to admit. $10 isn't unreasonable for a decent-sized tin of coffee.

What are all of these numbers going to look like in a few months?

- Final Fantasy IX: it's kind of weird how for so long people said FFIX was a financial failure when it originally came out, when it actually sold quite well for a game released on the tail-end of the PSOne, yes, it sold less than VII and VIII, but that was to be expected with the PS2 around the cornerm, though in hindsight, I think Squaresoft should have released the game on the PS2 as well, but cross-generational games weren't as common back then. However, it seems IX has managed to become one of the more popular FF games, with over 9 million copies sold according to Square-Enix's latest sales report. I'd say another reason why the game wasn't as successful, at least outside of Japan, it's because the majority of people who got into Final Fantasy only played VII and VIII and weren't that familiar with the first 6 games in the series, the games that IX was paying homage to. But as you said, I think IX became the sort of inspiration for other S-E games that try to pay homage to the old-schooll, Super NES-era FF games, but one of the main complaints that I have against those types of games is that it seems S-E is kind of reluctant to allow them to be bigger in scope, not saying that those games are cheap to make, but I've seen people who say that games like the Bravely series and teh HD-2D-style games look cheap. I think that's a reason why so many people would love to see a Final Fantasy IX remake with a bigger scope, but as big as the FFVII remake project, just something like the original but with high resolution backgrounds and models, voice acting, faster gameplay, improved gameplay, etc. A FFIX remake was rumored to have been leaked years ago, but we haven't seen anything concrete yet, and seeing how Square-Enix has been going through internal changes, I don't know if it has been put on hold.
- Nintendo Switch 2: I can only say that I am quite satisfied with most of what was shown at the presentation, but as many already mentioned, the price of the games is the biggest problem, although I feel that things are going to get worse in regards to game prices due to the recent tariffs. While I think Nintendo should have been more clear in regards to the prices, I think they and the rest of the industry are in seriou trouble.

This Week In Games wrote:

Too many nerds wanted to keep their hobbies apolitical, but like the man said: if you don't do politics, politics will do you.

Usually when people say keep hobbies apolitical they mean identity politics not geographic or economical politics. Video game developers have zero power to affect how inflation or the economy shifts but they do have the power to decide what kind of content a game has in it. Or on the fandom side asking people to not make communities toxic and a cesspool by doing things like attacking people and causing a scene everytime there's a McDonalds collab promotion.

The Switch 2 system for 450$ seems completely reasonable given what the PS4 cost and it's going to be roughly the same as that. The games are definitely the stinger though..

FinalVentCard wrote:

What a bummer that the interview went up the week it did with the news it did, I'd hate for such a pleasant chat to get overshadowed. Crying or Very sad

It's the content I specifically come here for.

Wack Sage wrote:

I was shocked to hear the new Pokemon game will be 60fps. A welcome change, but shocking. I remember people here a few weeks ago saying expecting 60fps in games was unrealistic or even entitled, but I'm glad the Pokemon devs seem to disagree. I really hope Switch 2 games do not suffer the same performance problem many Switch games did. I also hope Nintendo steps away from that trend they did where they release a game unfinished and then slowly add more to it via later updates.

I have suspected for a while that Legends Arceus and Scarlet/Violet had been developed with the intention to run on Switch Pro hardware - Arceus specifically looks like exactly what happens when you design a game for a specific performance target, then then have to scale the resolution down for an older system to be able to run it. The games came out around that time Switch Pro was all over the news, and then it seemed to have gotten canned from the pandemic.

The pre-orders getting delayed severely re-affirm how much a lot of this is the fault of current events. Realistically, we're probably gonna wanna wait for a Switch 2 Lite to come out, but that better price always comes at the cost of losing some pretty big QoL features. It's wild to imagine that in 2025 it's not just the rampant scalping that's keeping game consoles out of families' hands this winter.

Final Fantasy 9 had been my favorite of them, prior to the release of Final Fantasy 7 Remake blowing away my expectations of what a modern FF game could be. If you are the sort to be enthralled by the unexpected in a Pixar film or cry from something like Toy Story or Up, that's the exact sort of tone that Final Fantasy 9's adventure and characters capture. It's a magical storybook that takes you right back to being a kid again, where your parents are reading you something like the The Hobbit before bed and your mind is alight with seeing the pictures and imagery in your mind. If they were to do a full FF9 remake of the level that FF7R was, I'd be concerned they wouldn't capture that same sort of magic that Disney seems to be squandering carelessly in recent years.

Quote:

Final Fantasy IX gets overlooked a bit, given its throwback nature, its generally-lighthearted tone, and the fact that it's sandwiched between the much-more-dramatic Final Fantasy VIII and the absolute blockbuster and visual powerhouse that was Final Fantasy X.

What? Overlooked by who? I don't often see smoke blown up FFX's arse like this, let alone two paragraphs in a row. Laughing

thecowardlyantoine wrote:

This Week In Games wrote:

Too many nerds wanted to keep their hobbies apolitical, but like the man said: if you don't do politics, politics will do you.

Usually when people say keep hobbies apolitical they mean identity politics not geographic or economical politics.

Usually yes, but trust me, on a lot of forums (even some of these ones) even suggesting tariffs are affecting these prices is a like a trigger phrase that results in at least a few people popping off an immediate "Stop trying to make my games a political thing!" response.

Anyway, I agree with basically everyone that the console price is honestly about what I expected. If they came out and said $400, I would have been genuinely shocked. $80 for games is nuts though. Mario Kart looks good but like... come on Nintendo, we all know you're gonna start charging for add-ons to it eventually, why charge more off the jump. Also I was laid off last week so I know what Jean-Karlo means with that "hard all over" thing. I was already probably gonna hold off buying a Switch 2 until the holidays (if only to hear more people do hands on reviews, including people I know personally) but now it's an absolute fact that it'll be either that if not a 2026 purchase for me.

I'm so conflicted about the Switch 2. I plan on getting it for sure, if only because future Pokemon games will be on it, and I appreciate Nintendo put effort into having it run better than the original Switch and for offering upgrades for Switch games yet to come out on both consoles. I still have attachment to the original Switch, so I plan on getting games that come out on both. I also just found out that Switch 2 games aren't region locked (Thanks, Play-Asia!), so I'm definitely happy about that.

But the pricing for the games are definitely questionable. Thanks a lot, orange manbaby. NOT! What I'm most angry about is the whole Game-Key Card nonsense. Like, if you're gonna make a cart for a game just to wind up being forced to download the game off the internet anyway, you might as well just make it digital only! As someone who has been collecting as many existing physical versions of games, imports included, as possible, I hate this, and I hate that this is apparently the only way to play Bravely Default on Switch 2. It's going to be especially problematic if in the event that the Switch eShop and the Wi-Fi servers shut down, rendering those Game-Key carts useless.

Gem-Bug wrote:

Quote:

Final Fantasy IX gets overlooked a bit, given its throwback nature, its generally-lighthearted tone, and the fact that it's sandwiched between the much-more-dramatic Final Fantasy VIII and the absolute blockbuster and visual powerhouse that was Final Fantasy X.

What? Overlooked by who? I don't often see smoke blown up FFX's arse like this, let alone two paragraphs in a row. Laughing

FFX might have been a whipping boy for a long time because of Tidus being effeminate or the laughing scene, but the graphical leap from FF9 to FF10 alone was a major deal in 2001. And a lot of people nevertheless resented FF9 for sticking with a more "fantasy"-based approach insead of FF7 and FF8 being more sci-fi.

Silver Kirin wrote:

But as you said, I think IX became the sort of inspiration for other S-E games that try to pay homage to the old-schooll, Super NES-era FF games, but one of the main complaints that I have against those types of games is that it seems S-E is kind of reluctant to allow them to be bigger in scope, not saying that those games are cheap to make, but I've seen people who say that games like the Bravely series and teh HD-2D-style games look cheap. I

I remember when Bravely Default came out, people were pitching a fit about it being on the 3DS as if that meant it wasn't good anymore. It was so irritating. Wonder if they'll get it now on the Switch 2...

FireChick wrote:

! What I'm most angry about is the whole Game-Key Card nonsense. Like, if you're gonna make a cart for a game just to wind up being forced to download the game off the internet anyway, you might as well just make it digital only! As someone who has been collecting as many existing physical versions of games, imports included, as possible, I hate this, and I hate that this is apparently the only way to play Bravely Default on Switch 2. It's going to be especially problematic if in the event that the Switch eShop and the Wi-Fi servers shut down, rendering those Game-Key carts useless.

My understanding is that game key cards can at least be swapped around and/or traded in or sold. So in that way, they're a hair more useful than just a code on a card. Consider it an attempt on Nintendo's behalf to add a physical component to the virtual game card business.

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