Topic: Nintendo Switch --OT--

@RogerRoger Unravel 2 has a good port for the Switch.

it's also a bit of a shmup darling now, and you can get Thunder Force IV on it - whether that gives you any mileage for the intended recipient however...

@RR529 @Rudy_Manchego @Ralizah @KALofKRYPTON Thank you all for your replies. I've been able to go over a couple of your suggestions with her and it's really helped. Neither of us are very knowledgeable about Nintendo or the Switch (my own experience is limited to whatever my partner wants to play on his, which are almost exclusively the first-party "big names" like Mario, Zelda, etc.) so to get a wider sense of what's available, without having to wade through the shovelware on the eShop, is invaluable.

I'll definitely be throwing in a Pro Controller for her, because I've found one of those to be utterly indispensable (and double thanks to @Ralizah for the controller compatibility tip, which I've also let her know about). We'll see how she gets on!

@RogerRoger, if you want an idea of what other, notable, publishers are releasing on the system (off the top of my head).

Bandai Namco:
Out Now - Dragon Ball FighterZ, Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2, Go Vacation!, My Hero One's Justice, Namco Museum: Arcade-Pac, Naruto Ultimate Ninja Storm Trilogy (also available individually), One Piece Pirate Warriors 3, One Piece Unlimited World Red, Pac-Man Championship Edition 2, Taiko no Tatsujin: Drum 'N Fun, Tales of Vesperia Definitive Edition.
Coming Soon - God Eater 3, and a couple of the Sword Art Online JRPGs.

Bethesda:
Out Now - DOOM, Skyrim, Wolfenstein: the New Collosus.
Coming Soon - DOOM Eternal, Wolfenstein Youngblood.

Capcom:
Out Now - Ace Attorney Trilogy, Capcom Beat 'em Up Bundle, Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen, Mega Man 11, Mega Man Legacy Collection 1&2, Mega Man X Legacy Collection 1&2, Monster Hunter Generations Ultimate, Okami HD, Onimusha Warlords, Resident Evil Revelations 1&2, Street Fighter 30th Anniversary Collection, Ultra Street Fighter 2.
Coming Soon - Resident Evil HD, Resident Evil 0 HD, Resident Evil 4 HD.

SEGA:
Out Now - PuyoPyo Tetris, Shining Resonance Refrain, Sonic Forces, Sonic Mania+, Valkyria Chronicles, Valkyria Chronicles 4.
Coming Soon - Mario & Sonic at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games, the Official Game of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, PuyoPuyo Champions, Team Sonic Racing.

Square Enix:
Out Now - Chocobo's Mystery Dungeon: Every Buddy, Dragon Quest Builders, Final Fantasy VII, Final Fantasy IX, Final Fantasy X/X-2 HD Collection, I am Setsuna, Lost Sphere, World of Final Fantasy Maxima
Coming Soon - Dragon Quest XI S, Dragon Quest Builders 2, Final Fantasy XII: the Zodiac Age, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles HD, Oninaki.

Ubisoft:
Out Now - Child of Light, Hasbro Family Game Night, Hungry Shark World, Just Dance series, Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle, South Park: the Fractured but Whole, South Park: the Stick of Truth, Sports Party, Starlink: Battle for Atlas (exclusive Star Fox content), Uno, Valiant Hearts: the Great War, Wheel of Fortune/Jeopardy.
Coming Soon - Assassin's Creed III/Liberation.

Then of course you have more niche Japanese game publishers like Nicalis, NIS America (a highlight would be YS VIII), & PQube which release a lot of games, plus the odd release from western studios who don't yet have wide support (Crash N Sane Trilogy, Crash Team Racing, Cuphead, Darksiders: Warmastered Edition, De Blob, De Blob 2, Fifa, Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice, Mortal Kombat 11, Red Faction Guerilla: Re-MARS-tered, Saints Row 3: the Full Package, Sniper Elite V2, Unravel 2).

Of course I'm sure there are important titles I'm missing, but Japanese developers in general seem eager to release anything & everything that can run on the thing, while western devs are still more cautious, testing out the ocassional "core" title, while also seemingly trying to capture that Wii audience (Ubisoft's output really showcases that duality).

@RR529 Wow, thank you! That's a hugely useful list to have, I love how you've presented that! Makes it really clear, especially since my friend is primarily a PS4 gamer, so she's looking to Switch specifically for a wider range of Japanese games (things like Crash Team Racing, Red Faction, etc. she'd get on PS4). Your final point couldn't be more spot-on, therefore!

@RogerRoger, no problem! If they're looking for Japanese exclusives there's quite a few coming out over the coming months in the form of Little Friends: Dogs & Cats (Nintendogs in everything but name), plus the three Nintendo funded exclusives Daemon X Machina (Marvelous developed Armored Core like mech game), Marvel Ultimate Alliance 3 (Koei Tecmo developed, essentially "Marvel Warriors"), and Astral Chain (Platinum developed sci-fi action game).

Also, not exclusives, but I forgot to highlight Koei Tecmo's output, like the 5 Atelier games, Attack on Titan 2, Nights of Azure 2, and a couple Warriors games (not counting the licensed ones, like the Zelda & Fire Emblem releases).

Then you have the myriad of much more niche stuff from various publishers such as Blade Strangers, Code of Princess EX, Disgea 1 remake (can't remember what it's called), Disgea 5, Gal Gun 2, Happy Birthdays, Labyrinth of Refrain, the Lost Child, Moero Chronicle H, Penny Punching Princess, the Princess Guide, Sayonara Umihara Kawase Fresh, SNK Heroines Tag Team Frenzy, and YS VIII (this is great), but I know this doesn't cover it all.

@RR529 Sorry it's taken me so long to reply, but I just wanted to thank you again; this was hugely helpful. You really know your games! My friend took delivery of her new Switch earlier in the week, and she's been researching some of the titles you've called out that she didn't even know existed before. Hopefully she'll find some really great stuff in there!

Opened up my import copy of Onimusha Warlords today! It's just the standard release, but it has a reversible cover and a little folded up instruction pamphlet, which are nice touches. As far as the game itself, I played up to the point I was able to save after the first boss fight, and while it is a bit dated in places, I like the setting and have been finding it pretty fun so far.

I also finished up all the single player levels in Boxboy+Boxgirl this morning, including "a Tall Tale", with all goals met. That was actually pretty good and worth the $10.

@RogerRoger, no problem. A few that slipped my mind last time are the Batman Telltale games, pretty much every LEGO game released since the launch of the console, Classics Collection: Arcade Classics (a Konami arcade collection), Classics Collection: Castlevania Collection (coming soon), two different Fate/Stay games (I think they're Warriors like games based on an anime), Katamari Damacy Reroll, Super Dragon Ball Heroes (I believe exclusive), The Walking Dead Telltale games, The World Ends With You: Final Remix, and Yu-Gi-Oh: Legacy of the Deulist (coming soon).

Again, the list isn't everything though.

@RR529 Awesome; I'd completely forgotten about Katamari Damacy Reroll myself, need to recommend that to her immediately! Thanks again!

She's been playing it all weekend and has gotten hooked on two of the three games I got for her (Mario Kart 8 and Pokémon Let's Go! Pikachu). She's recently completed the DLC for Assassin's Creed Odyssey and Shadow of the Tomb Raider, so is wisely mixing things up before playing The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild. Nobody wants to suffer open-world third-person action-adventure burnout!

Also, one thing I will give Nintendo credit for is that their hardware always works really well right out of the box. No issues, no problems, super-fast set-up. It's always been my experience and I hear very few horror stories when compared to Sony and Microsoft.

@RogerRoger Mine is super silent compared to my ps4 which sounds like it is gonna take off.

@JohnnyShoulder Yeah, there's that bonus, too!

Saw a video of Astral Chain and it looks pretty awesome.

@WanderingBullet It does look awesome. I'm really eager to see more of it at E3.

I hope the battle system is intuitive, considering you're technically controlling two different characters at the same time.

@Ralizah Would love for it come to the PS4 (if it's good) but I doubt it'll happen.

@WanderingBullet Yeah, it's probably at least console exclusive. It could pull an Octopath and go to the PC, though. For some reason, the concept of exclusivity goes out the window when it comes to the PC. Which is awesome for me, as, despite it being old and not terribly powerful, my PC still runs circles around my PS4.

Just completed Onimusha Warlords tonight!

It's a bit rough around the edges in spots due to age, but it honestly had me hooked & had me wanting to go back for more every time I had to put it down. It had a fantastic atmosphere (I actually really dug the detailed pre-rendered environments, and I felt that with few exceptions, they still looked pretty sharp, at least on my 32" 720p TV), while the combat wasn't flashy by today's standards I found encounters with regular enemies to be engaging, it was nice to break up the action with the light puzzling elements (really, I quite enjoyed the whole "Metroidvania" structure of the game itself), and while the story is pretty standard, playing it in Japanese (with subtitles) really helped to bring me into it, given the theme. The only disappointment was that, aside from a couple exceptions, I wasn't too fond of the bosses (this is where the aged camera work really came into play). Still, I didn't find any of them too troubling (the last two maybe, but I had managed to find all health upgrades & stockpile the best medicine, so I was able to power through them), so not much of an issue in the end.

@WanderingBullet @Ralizah Nintendo is the publisher of Astral Chain and as such owns the IP, according to Platinum themselves.

@Knuckles-Fajita Sigh... oh, well.

Thanks, btw.

@WanderingBullet General rule, if it uses a Nintendo IP, outside of things like Starlink which was added after the initial development, or is published by Nintendo in all regions with no other platform in sight, it's exclusive.

Interesting the interview also noted that Platinum and Nintendo very much like working together. Then again, Nintendo is very clearly paying the bills. Platinum makes what they want, Nintendo pays the bills to do it.

@Knuckles-Fajita Thanks. I'm just surprised how games Platinum Games's working on. There's Granblue Fantasy: Relink, Babylon's Fall, Bayonetta 3 and now Astral Chain.

@WanderingBullet Platinum is surprisingly big. As we now know however, they arent working on Granblue anymore.