Nintendo Switch Catch-All 2.0

I am sure it is coming and I am sure I will buy one. It does feel like it will be hard to get - unless somehow they use completely different supply chains than the PS55 and Xbox Series X.

I'll certainly attempt to grab it day one, but I am very doubtful of my chances. For the original Switch, I just walked into a Best Buy on release day in downtown Toronto an hour after they opened and grabbed one. I will not get that lucky again.

Switch may have been the first console I pre-ordered. Finances and luck willing, I'll be able to pre-order a new model Switch so I can replace my dying one.

farley3k wrote:

unless somehow they use completely different supply chains than the PS55 and Xbox Series X.

The reports I’ve seen say that yes. Sony and Microsoft are using the latest greatest chipsets for their consoles. Switch Pro isn’t. They’ve sourced some not-quite-latest parts that are easily available in high quantities. It’s the new OLED screen that is the bottleneck, and obviously the actual manufacture time.

Keithustus wrote:
farley3k wrote:

unless somehow they use completely different supply chains than the PS55 and Xbox Series X.

The reports I’ve seen say that yes. Sony and Microsoft are using the latest greatest chipsets for their consoles. Switch Pro isn’t. They’ve sourced some not-quite-latest parts that are easily available in high quantities. It’s the new OLED screen that is the bottleneck, and obviously the actual manufacture time.

I thought the OLED screen was chosen in part because Samsung had a bazillion sitting around?

garion333 wrote:
Keithustus wrote:
farley3k wrote:

unless somehow they use completely different supply chains than the PS55 and Xbox Series X.

The reports I’ve seen say that yes. Sony and Microsoft are using the latest greatest chipsets for their consoles. Switch Pro isn’t. They’ve sourced some not-quite-latest parts that are easily available in high quantities. It’s the new OLED screen that is the bottleneck, and obviously the actual manufacture time.

I thought the OLED screen was chosen in part because Samsung had a bazillion sitting around?

I swear that was one of the takeaways in the Bloomberg link when I read it. I'd double-check it but it paywalled me this time and I'm annoyed enough to not bother circumventing it, ha.

Edit: Tried it again and this time the article loaded. I must have read it in a different piece, because it doesn't specifically call out OLED availability in the Bloomberg one.

Certainly could be. It’s not like either (1) I’m some kind of OLED expert, or (2) these rumor reports we’ve been casually browsing for months are accurate. Hopefully things will clear up a bit in just a couple weeks by E3.

I talked my parents into buying a Switch for the niece and nephew. My question is will a mini usb charger for a car work on the docking station, or do I need to buy a specific one?

....charge the dock in a car? What are you trying to do? The dock has an AC adapter, an HDMI port, and a standard USB port to charge controllers that aren’t joycons. If you’re looking for ways to charge the Switch away from the dock, the handheld’s charging port looks like a standard port but is some weird proprietary one with weird voltages that caused many systems to be burnt out by early-era third-party adapters. That’s probably been figured out by now since it has been reverse engineered and posted about, but you’d want to make sure any a third-party adapter is relatively new and specifically designed for Switch.

ccoates wrote:
garion333 wrote:
Keithustus wrote:
farley3k wrote:

unless somehow they use completely different supply chains than the PS55 and Xbox Series X.

The reports I’ve seen say that yes. Sony and Microsoft are using the latest greatest chipsets for their consoles. Switch Pro isn’t. They’ve sourced some not-quite-latest parts that are easily available in high quantities. It’s the new OLED screen that is the bottleneck, and obviously the actual manufacture time.

I thought the OLED screen was chosen in part because Samsung had a bazillion sitting around?

I swear that was one of the takeaways in the Bloomberg link when I read it. I'd double-check it but it paywalled me this time and I'm annoyed enough to not bother circumventing it, ha.

Edit: Tried it again and this time the article loaded. I must have read it in a different piece, because it doesn't specifically call out OLED availability in the Bloomberg one.

Keithustus wrote:

Certainly could be. It’s not like either (1) I’m some kind of OLED expert, or (2) these rumor reports we’ve been casually browsing for months are accurate. Hopefully things will clear up a bit in just a couple weeks by E3.

Uh, every post must contain 100% accuracy at all times. Otherwise how can I tell you when you're wrong?

The big crunch right now is semiconductors. It's a problem for everyone, which is why you can't easily find PS5s in the wild. Its a result of Covid, but there is an ongoing draught in Taiwan is making things worse (water is needed for industry, and life, in case you didn't know about the latter). Apparently nearly two thirds of the world's semiconductors are made in Taiwan. Other places with manufacturing have had some weather issues recently too so its a, ahem, perfect storm of issues adding up.

Tscott wrote:

For someone who has never played Pokémon in their life, but might be slightly curious about it and has a new switch, is there a version to buy at the moment that gives the typical Pokémon experience, or would the ones being announced for November be something to look out for?

I'm only part-way through, but I've found Sword/Shield to be probably the weakest of the whole series. I've completely bounced off it, which is a first for me with a Pokemon game. It does give you a good showing of the Pokemon formula I guess, but unless they seriously screw something up with the Diamond/Pearl remakes I'd wait for those.

IMAGE(https://cdn.dekudeals.com/images/625b044bad4433e25625de854f54047841cac517/w500.jpg)
A Perfect Metascore? We Play The Switch Game "Better Than Zelda: Breath Of The Wild"
Thanks NintendoLife; I just bought The House in Fata Morgana: Dreams of the Revenants Edition ($40)

For the past month and a half, every now and again, I'd notice that people were prodding us about a House In Fata Morgana review. We don't review every game, because there's not that many of us, and we have to sleep sometimes, but the combined pitch of "people really like this game" and "ROLL UP, ROLL UP, COME SEE THE GAME THAT'S HIGHER-RATED THAN BREATH OF THE WILD" naturally piqued my interest....
...
Anyone who's reading this probably already knows about The House In Fata Morgana, because the fanbase for this game really, really loves The House In Fata Morgana, and you're probably extremely excited to see someone writing about it. Nevertheless, it is my journalistic duty to tell you about it.
...
I entered the world of The House In Fata Morgana expecting... I don't know, really. Romance? Spooky stories? Pale women? Hands? I've been playing for somewhere between five and ten hours so far, and I'm still not really sure what the game is about — or, to be honest, what makes it a 10/10 game.
But I'm not disappointed. Not even slightly. I don't think I've been this intrigued, excited, and utterly confused in a long time...

Please no spoilers here. Just comment such as whether it’s great, terrible, worth or not worth buying. (I even skipped over the spoiler section of that article.)

Huh...

Grenn wrote:

I talked my parents into buying a Switch for the niece and nephew. My question is will a mini usb charger for a car work on the docking station, or do I need to buy a specific one?

Keithustus wrote:

....charge the dock in a car? What are you trying to do? The dock has an AC adapter, an HDMI port, and a standard USB port to charge controllers that aren’t joycons. If you’re looking for ways to charge the Switch away from the dock, the handheld’s charging port looks like a standard port but is some weird proprietary one with weird voltages that caused many systems to be burnt out by early-era third-party adapters. That’s probably been figured out by now since it has been reverse engineered and posted about, but you’d want to make sure any a third-party adapter is relatively new and specifically designed for Switch.

I'm also confused why you'd do this.

Mini usb and micro usb are specific types of USB, so I'm also unclear if you're using that as shorthand for just, well, a small USB-C charger. Or if you're literally trying to use a mini or micro USB cable to power the dock for some reason.

The dock pulls 39 watts from the official adapter, if you want to use that as a reference. Which just happens to be what the USB-C port of the Fantany charger here outputs:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...

And I've successfully used that to power the dock before.

Charging the Switch directly from USB-C is apparently a lot safer/less finicky, so unless you're plugging into a TV in the car itself and that's why you need the dock (the original question isn't clear on that), you can charge the Switch in handheld mode with basically any compliant USB-C charger of decent reputation.

If you are trying to plug that into a TV in the car itself, which seems awkward in a best case scenario, a setup using a DC inverter like:

https://www.amazon.com/Power-Inverte...

And something like the Genki dock:

https://www.genkithings.com/products...

Would probably be the most streamlined setup.

Dicey Dungeons is on sale right now, and it's pretty fun:

https://www.dekudeals.com/items/dice...

The characters you unlock play differently enough to keep things interesting, although right now trying to use the Witch is just kicking my ass. I can't figure out how to use that particular class effectively, as it seems more vulnerable to the whims of RNG than any of the others.

Keithustus wrote:

Please no spoilers here. Just comment such as whether it’s great, terrible, worth or not worth buying. (I even skipped over the spoiler section of that article.)

I've heard of it, and maybe saw a trailer of it, but never looked into it. I'm actually completely unaware of the high rating for it, though I wouldn't be surprised if that's in part due to having fewer reviews and those reviews it does have belonging to niche publications where such a game is going to hit big. Meanwhile, everyone and their mom is going to review Breath of the Wild, and there's no guarantee the reviewer (or their mom) will like it.

Still, I'll keep it on my radar.

Keithustus wrote:

IMAGE(https://cdn.dekudeals.com/images/625b044bad4433e25625de854f54047841cac517/w500.jpg)
A Perfect Metascore? We Play The Switch Game "Better Than Zelda: Breath Of The Wild"
Thanks NintendoLife; I just bought The House in Fata Morgana: Dreams of the Revenants Edition ($40)

For the past month and a half, every now and again, I'd notice that people were prodding us about a House In Fata Morgana review. We don't review every game, because there's not that many of us, and we have to sleep sometimes, but the combined pitch of "people really like this game" and "ROLL UP, ROLL UP, COME SEE THE GAME THAT'S HIGHER-RATED THAN BREATH OF THE WILD" naturally piqued my interest....
...
Anyone who's reading this probably already knows about The House In Fata Morgana, because the fanbase for this game really, really loves The House In Fata Morgana, and you're probably extremely excited to see someone writing about it. Nevertheless, it is my journalistic duty to tell you about it.
...
I entered the world of The House In Fata Morgana expecting... I don't know, really. Romance? Spooky stories? Pale women? Hands? I've been playing for somewhere between five and ten hours so far, and I'm still not really sure what the game is about — or, to be honest, what makes it a 10/10 game.
But I'm not disappointed. Not even slightly. I don't think I've been this intrigued, excited, and utterly confused in a long time...

Please no spoilers here. Just comment such as whether it’s great, terrible, worth or not worth buying. (I even skipped over the spoiler section of that article.)

I keep forgetting to pick this up on a bazillion different platforms.

ccesarano wrote:

I'm actually completely unaware of the high rating for it, though I wouldn't be surprised if that's in part due to having fewer reviews and those reviews it does have belonging to niche publications where such a game is going to hit big.

VNs definitely get, let's say, scored on a curve.

Sorry for posting so often lately, had to share this...

IMAGE(https://preview.redd.it/lhr1xql6h3271.png?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=3001b109957c106bb7d827a8af47dffa4b3625ea)

https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwi...

Keithustus wrote:

Sorry for posting so often lately, had to share this...

IMAGE(https://preview.redd.it/lhr1xql6h3271.png?width=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=3001b109957c106bb7d827a8af47dffa4b3625ea)

https://www.reddit.com/r/NintendoSwi...

I’ll be buying the ACNH version of this.

Needs moar "Featuring Dante from Devil May Cry" and "Funky Kong Mode".

*Legion* wrote:
ccesarano wrote:

I'm actually completely unaware of the high rating for it, though I wouldn't be surprised if that's in part due to having fewer reviews and those reviews it does have belonging to niche publications where such a game is going to hit big.

VNs definitely get, let's say, scored on a curve.

That's that the case for most games, let's be honest here.

ccoates wrote:
Grenn wrote:

I talked my parents into buying a Switch for the niece and nephew. My question is will a mini usb charger for a car work on the docking station, or do I need to buy a specific one?

Keithustus wrote:

....charge the dock in a car? What are you trying to do? The dock has an AC adapter, an HDMI port, and a standard USB port to charge controllers that aren’t joycons. If you’re looking for ways to charge the Switch away from the dock, the handheld’s charging port looks like a standard port but is some weird proprietary one with weird voltages that caused many systems to be burnt out by early-era third-party adapters. That’s probably been figured out by now since it has been reverse engineered and posted about, but you’d want to make sure any a third-party adapter is relatively new and specifically designed for Switch.

I'm also confused why you'd do this.

Mini usb and micro usb are specific types of USB, so I'm also unclear if you're using that as shorthand for just, well, a small USB-C charger. Or if you're literally trying to use a mini or micro USB cable to power the dock for some reason.

The dock pulls 39 watts from the official adapter, if you want to use that as a reference. Which just happens to be what the USB-C port of the Fantany charger here outputs:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0...

And I've successfully used that to power the dock before.

Charging the Switch directly from USB-C is apparently a lot safer/less finicky, so unless you're plugging into a TV in the car itself and that's why you need the dock (the original question isn't clear on that), you can charge the Switch in handheld mode with basically any compliant USB-C charger of decent reputation.

If you are trying to plug that into a TV in the car itself, which seems awkward in a best case scenario, a setup using a DC inverter like:

https://www.amazon.com/Power-Inverte...

And something like the Genki dock:

https://www.genkithings.com/products...

Would probably be the most streamlined setup.

I've never owned a Switch so I assumed a car charger didn't come with basic setup. Do I need to buy one?

Eleima wrote:
*Legion* wrote:

VNs definitely get, let's say, scored on a curve.

That's that the case for most games, let's be honest here.

I mean, I guess.

I just know that, when you look at the Steam reviews database, and sort it by raw scores with no curation, the top scoring games are industry-defining AAA titles, landmark indie games... and highly questionable visual novels.

House in the Fate Morgana is certainly considered at the apex of VNs. That much I know.

IMAGE(https://media.tenor.com/images/24798304cbf0df42202c2fead69bc658/tenor.gif)

garion333 wrote:

IMAGE(https://media.tenor.com/images/24798304cbf0df42202c2fead69bc658/tenor.gif)

The fact that people predicted a specific day, and the day after a(n American) holiday at that, for the announcement has me skeptical it's happening this week. I feel like the number of "It'll happen this day!" predictions has been wrong more often than they've been correct.

Nonetheless, listening to Remaster's March episode where they were discussing the rumors and predictions, and Shahid, who worked at Sony during the PSP and Vita years I believe (I forget the specifics), brought up a good point: moving on from old hardware to new hardware might make sense if production costs are cheaper for the newer hardware. Given that Samsung had a bunch of those OLED displays sitting around doing nothing, it and other hardware factors could indicate a new Switch model would be cheaper to keep producing than the current model with increasingly outdated hardware.

Regardless, I'm trying to keep myself skeptical of an announcement this week, but I cannot help but hope for one.

Nintendo's E3 conference will be Tuesday, June 15th at 9am PST. The typical Nintendo time -- they do love their Tuesdays.

https://twitter.com/NintendoAmerica/...

Tune in for a #NintendoDirect with roughly 40 minutes of info focused exclusively on #NintendoSwitch software, mostly releasing in 2021, followed by around 3 hours of gameplay in #NintendoTreehouseLive | E3 2021.

Dicey Dungeons is worth buying on sale, but a lot of the content is the challenges and higher level episodes, which become *purely* luck.

Even the best strategy means you'll be losing 90% of the time on the higher difficulty levels. You'll roll all 1s, and the AI will roll all 6s. You'll have abilities that can only be activated with even numbers, and you'll only roll odds for three turns, and the AI will, again, roll all 6s and kill you. If it at all felt like the AI was rolling the same odds as you, maybe that wouldn't be as frustrating.

But even if you mathetically plotted out the AI rolling exactly what it needs 80% of the time makes sense, the AI also receives abilities that ALWAYS activate when they roll those die. Unless you want to get really save scummy, by quitting the game and restarting when the AI kills you in 1-2 rounds before you can even really react, then it doesn't really matter if the odds are accurate. It's just not fun when that happens.

If you're the type of person who wants to unlock every level and character, it becomes an exercise in frustration.

I'm not against chance playing some factor. I mean, it's dice. But the way the designer chose to scale the difficulty chance becomes way more important than any sort of strategy or skill later in the game. Which I think is stupid.

Fun art, interesting game mechanics, but the above issues make it a C+ game overall for me. A+ for the first half, D or F for the second half.

Those were/are exactly my problems with Dicey Dungeons too.