If you are arguing that Nintendo will be vying for sales of third-party games on Switch 2 with the Steam versions, yeah people might choose based whichever platform the games run better on.
If you are arguing that Nintendo is competing with the Steam Deck console (I know you didn’t say that though), I would say Steam Deck is in a different category catering to a different crowd. I have a Steam Deck and a Switch (and will get the Switch 2); my Switch plays Nintendo games and my Steam Deck plays the games that the Switch can’t handle.
My indie library though…that’s where things get interesting. Since getting my Steam Deck a year ago, it cannibalized about two thirds of my would-be Switch eshop purchases because Valve had better prices and/or I knew the games would run better.
Unless the Switch 2 proves to be more powerful than a Steam Deck, more of my digital purchases are going to continue to go to Valve.
my Switch plays Nintendo games and my Steam Deck plays the games that the Switch can’t handle.
The thing about this, though, is - the steam deck plays Switch games too. Better than the native hardware does in fact. If the Switch 2 isn’t a significant increase in beefiness, the Deck is going to play those too. Nintendo finds themselves going up against a product that directly trounced their specific use case and they’re bringing a Round 2 of what got them defeated the first time.
I think the switch, and probably by extension the switch 2 is popular with kids and casual gamers because Nintendo is a household name, but anyone who is looking for a good portable game console and knows what technical specs are is much more likely to still be eyeing the Deck as an investment. Nintendo has famously historically failed to stop the signal on emulation for a single one of their consoles, including the switch, so I don’t see that likely to change now.
I wonder if we’re going to see another Wii U situation.
Yeah, I’m highlighting the expected price versus a Steam Deck.
Software has won. Every game is multiplatform by default, because platforms are an obstacle to consumers. There is no “different crowd” based on who published a game, and that’s all that unites Nintendo games, or Sony games, or Microsoft games. (Admittedly all of Valve’s several titles are shooters. Exclusives are not how they maintain relevance.)
Games are no longer organically for one system or other, so systems become commodified. The dominant factors for customers become value and price - and if this thing costs $400, it’d have to be more powerful than a Steam Deck, for some people to give a shit. That’s not the case at $200. Half is always a big number. Being half as expensive excuses a lot. Like, the Switch Lite is definitely not as powerful as the Steam Deck, and it presumably outsold the Steam Deck ten-to-one last month.
This is deliciously ironic for Nintendo in particular. They’re a toy company. They stumbled into, and then formalized, a “blue ocean” strategy, where they did weird shit to avoid direct competition. This included somehow being the only company to put buttons on a tablet. Even then: those buttons come off, and act as separate controllers, and will apparently add an optical mouse sensor that’s honestly a great idea. Nintendo has enjoyed the twilight of the console war in a way that Sony has not, as Sony forces PSN onto PC ports, desperately keeping PSN relevant. So it’s downright fuckin’ bizarre to think Nintendo went from unifying their home and handheld console lines, to getting caught in a dick-measuring contest with PC hardware.
If you are arguing that Nintendo will be vying for sales of third-party games on Switch 2 with the Steam versions, yeah people might choose based whichever platform the games run better on.
If you are arguing that Nintendo is competing with the Steam Deck console (I know you didn’t say that though), I would say Steam Deck is in a different category catering to a different crowd. I have a Steam Deck and a Switch (and will get the Switch 2); my Switch plays Nintendo games and my Steam Deck plays the games that the Switch can’t handle.
My indie library though…that’s where things get interesting. Since getting my Steam Deck a year ago, it cannibalized about two thirds of my would-be Switch eshop purchases because Valve had better prices and/or I knew the games would run better.
Unless the Switch 2 proves to be more powerful than a Steam Deck, more of my digital purchases are going to continue to go to Valve.
The thing about this, though, is - the steam deck plays Switch games too. Better than the native hardware does in fact. If the Switch 2 isn’t a significant increase in beefiness, the Deck is going to play those too. Nintendo finds themselves going up against a product that directly trounced their specific use case and they’re bringing a Round 2 of what got them defeated the first time.
I think the switch, and probably by extension the switch 2 is popular with kids and casual gamers because Nintendo is a household name, but anyone who is looking for a good portable game console and knows what technical specs are is much more likely to still be eyeing the Deck as an investment. Nintendo has famously historically failed to stop the signal on emulation for a single one of their consoles, including the switch, so I don’t see that likely to change now.
I wonder if we’re going to see another Wii U situation.
Yeah, I’m highlighting the expected price versus a Steam Deck.
Software has won. Every game is multiplatform by default, because platforms are an obstacle to consumers. There is no “different crowd” based on who published a game, and that’s all that unites Nintendo games, or Sony games, or Microsoft games. (Admittedly all of Valve’s several titles are shooters. Exclusives are not how they maintain relevance.)
Games are no longer organically for one system or other, so systems become commodified. The dominant factors for customers become value and price - and if this thing costs $400, it’d have to be more powerful than a Steam Deck, for some people to give a shit. That’s not the case at $200. Half is always a big number. Being half as expensive excuses a lot. Like, the Switch Lite is definitely not as powerful as the Steam Deck, and it presumably outsold the Steam Deck ten-to-one last month.
This is deliciously ironic for Nintendo in particular. They’re a toy company. They stumbled into, and then formalized, a “blue ocean” strategy, where they did weird shit to avoid direct competition. This included somehow being the only company to put buttons on a tablet. Even then: those buttons come off, and act as separate controllers, and will apparently add an optical mouse sensor that’s honestly a great idea. Nintendo has enjoyed the twilight of the console war in a way that Sony has not, as Sony forces PSN onto PC ports, desperately keeping PSN relevant. So it’s downright fuckin’ bizarre to think Nintendo went from unifying their home and handheld console lines, to getting caught in a dick-measuring contest with PC hardware.