it’s very unlike Nintendo to just do a hardware bump with similar form factor
Right, aside from the Game Boy / Pocket / Color line lasting twelve years, and the DS / Lite / DSi / 3DS / New 3DS lasting thirteen years. They almost never just incrementally improve their money-printing handhelds, assuming we’re talking specifically about the three years where the Game Boy Advance got a whole new form factor every eight months.
I suppose you’re trying to be very clever, but you’re missing the point. None of the Game Boy or DS revisions were more powerful. Game Boy and Game Boy Color aren’t the same console (mostly). DS and 3DS aren’t the same console. Game Boy Color was an incremental improvement with the same form factor, 3DS more so.
No one is talking about the Switch 2 being a minor form factor revision with the same power. Obviously we’ve already had those within the Switch line. They’re talking about a new, backwards-compatible console.
Also I was avoiding drawing on examples from 20-30 years ago.
Game Boy Color was an incremental improvement with the same form factor, 3DS more so.
Why did you frame this agreement as if it’s a counterpoint?
The GBC had twice the CPU power, more memory, and a bunch of developer-friendly features nobody normal would care about.
DSi added cameras and microphones.
3DS was a bigger upgrade, ostensibly a whole different console, but even that got the New 3DS as a line-blurring incremental improvement.
Drastic change has been the exception… not the rule. It is very like Nintendo to just do a hardware bump with similar form factor. They’ll milk any portable that’s still selling well. In fact, they only did the GBC because they got spooked by the Neo Geo Pocket, and they only did the DS because the PSP was a massive leap beyond the GBA. In the absence of direct competition they will drag out mere numeric improvements for over a decade. I don’t expect they consider phones and Steam Decks to be direct competition.
Right, aside from the Game Boy / Pocket / Color line lasting twelve years, and the DS / Lite / DSi / 3DS / New 3DS lasting thirteen years. They almost never just incrementally improve their money-printing handhelds, assuming we’re talking specifically about the three years where the Game Boy Advance got a whole new form factor every eight months.
I suppose you’re trying to be very clever, but you’re missing the point. None of the Game Boy or DS revisions were more powerful. Game Boy and Game Boy Color aren’t the same console (mostly). DS and 3DS aren’t the same console. Game Boy Color was an incremental improvement with the same form factor, 3DS more so.
No one is talking about the Switch 2 being a minor form factor revision with the same power. Obviously we’ve already had those within the Switch line. They’re talking about a new, backwards-compatible console.
Also I was avoiding drawing on examples from 20-30 years ago.
Why did you frame this agreement as if it’s a counterpoint?
The GBC had twice the CPU power, more memory, and a bunch of developer-friendly features nobody normal would care about.
DSi added cameras and microphones.
3DS was a bigger upgrade, ostensibly a whole different console, but even that got the New 3DS as a line-blurring incremental improvement.
Drastic change has been the exception… not the rule. It is very like Nintendo to just do a hardware bump with similar form factor. They’ll milk any portable that’s still selling well. In fact, they only did the GBC because they got spooked by the Neo Geo Pocket, and they only did the DS because the PSP was a massive leap beyond the GBA. In the absence of direct competition they will drag out mere numeric improvements for over a decade. I don’t expect they consider phones and Steam Decks to be direct competition.