[Panoramix]

I don't understand the negativity based on technical performance. The thing is supposed to be fun to play, not bring you closer to the limits of what modern technology can achieve. Nintendo has some extremely fun games that I'd rather play very much before an extremely high performance super high HD game that ultimately falls flat.

[cmrdporcupine]

Much of the negativity is related to the fact that the launch game itself does not play well when docked.

And this seems unjustifiable given how well the same chipset does in the NVIDIA Shield, which is capable of driving 4k games just fine.

[Panoramix]

I was not aware of that. Which is strange since I read more than 10 reviews, surely they would have noticed? is this your experience? All I heard was that it runs smoother than in the Wii-U even though it is not optimized for the Switch.

[cmrdporcupine]

Many reviews have pointed out that the 720p tablet run of the game runs smoother than the docked form, which apparently has noticeable frame-rate drops.

See: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z9t2uY91kyg

[aaron-lebo]

There's really no way that you wouldn't notice it and I've seen it mentioned in every review.

[Panoramix]

I guess it's the way I understood it. "Drops frames occasionally when there are a lot of elements moving on the screen" vs "plays poorly". Disappointing, sure, but hardly a deal breaker. I guess I'll wait a bit and judge on my own.

[rasz_pl]

but its the second kind, Zelda drops to 20fps in empty static scenes.

[nstart]

true. And it's bad that it is THE launch game that suffers from that. It's likely to be caused by a poor port. The original of the game I believe runs at 720p. Scaling it up to 900p (it doesn't even go up to 1080p) in docked mode is probably causing it issues rather than the device actually having problems working in docked mode. I feel pretty confident that patches and updates to both the device and games should work these out :)

[andrepd]

The Nvidia Shield, 4k games? Are you sure? I'm pretty sure that can only be true if the games are very undemanding, like simple 2D games...

[cmrdporcupine]

It outputs 4k resolution no matter what, AFAIK. But yes, the Android TV games in general are not that demanding, so it's not a huge challenge. But they look stellar.

[wernercd]

Output isn't the same as render... upscaling a 720 game isn't the same as rendering a 4k game.

[overcast]

It's not graphic fidelity that is the issue, it's the poor performance of what they're presenting. 20fps is NOT acceptable in 2017.

[wernercd]

Apparently it is... people like playing fun games and Nintendo excels at that - at the expense of older harderware.

[overcast]

Well, they excel at the holy triad, Zelda, Mario, and Metroid.

[wernercd]

Their main problem isn't the fact that the use the same ole franchises... its that they don't release often enough in those.

There shouldn't be one game per franchise per platform...

But... they have more than "The Triad". To plagarize someone else:

> Nintendo has Zelda (action/adventure), Xeno series (JRPG), Fire Emblem (SRPG), Mario (Platformer, Kart Racer, RPG, Sports), Pikmin (RTS), StarFox (Dogfighter, on rails shooter), Splatoon (TPS), Kirby (Platformer/Action), Animal Crossing (Simulation), Pokemon (JRPG), Metroid (Platformer/Shooter, FPS), Smash Bros (Fighter).

If they could release those on a regular schedule AND stoke the fires for 3rd party? And damn if being based on Unity won't kick THAT fire... They will own the next few years.

[Too]

Regular schedule? Nononono. The reason those games are such classics is that they are given the time to polish to perfection. Not rushed out one every year with nothing new except skins just to meet the Christmas demand like Need for Speed, FIFA and NHL.

[overcast]

Yes, I agree, they should have at LEAST two per console. What I really wish Nintendo would do is just become a triple A developer for the other consoles. I cry at the thought of Metroid on PS4.

[wernercd]

I just don't see that happening... look at how much innovation has happened - not limited too, but including the Wii, Wii U and arguably is going to happen after the switch - because of Nintendo?

You think they will want to be limited by someone else and give up that freedom? Didn't work out real well for Sega...

[aaron-lebo]

Not asking for super HD super high performance, but there's a huge gap between that and sub 30 fps framerates especially for a game that while stylized isn't super HD.

Sony was hyping 1080p on the PS3 in 2006. Granted, they didn't reach it most times, but when you are releasing a console more than a decade later, people have expectations.

[hashmal]

It's not the first time Nintendo have been criticized for that, and apparently they don't give a damn and focus on making fun experiences. That works well for them, with a few hiccups.

Some other companies (not necessarily related to games) work this way, but it's probably very difficult to overcome the resistance that pushes you towards the tech specs: both the press and investors often just have the thing "on paper" to make decisions and influence the company greatly, and obviously massive tech specs are easier to convey this way than "fun" or any kind of "experience".

[agumonkey]

I think it's an uncanny valley because the system is very appealing yet that tiny lack of computing power and resolution make it miss the 10/10 score. (my 2cts)

ps: I wonder if having a dock will enable Nintendo to palliate perf with future hardware extension or replacements: a "HD dock".

[zeta0134]

The system already does this to an extent; it runs at a much higher resolution with more GPU power when docked. But I doubt an HD dock with some sort of offloading could work without serious modifications to the hardware; the GPU bandwidth alone would complicate matters significantly.

[agumonkey]

What about external PCIe docks with full fledged GPU for laptops ? In theory if the graphic subsystem allow for something like SLI the logic could adapt dynamically... (IANAGD)

[zeta0134]

That works on computer systems because the PCI-E bus is already designed to be external. There's no need to separate it from the system bus because it's already separated in desktops.

In an ARM System on a Chip (SoC) like the Switch uses, the GPU is on the same chip as the main processor and very tightly integrated with the rest of the hardware. It's much more difficult to decouple this from the main unit. I don't doubt that USB 3.0 could handle the raw speed, but I doubt seriously it could keep up with the latency demanded by most applications.

An HD dock would almost necessitate an entire higher power SoC in the dock, and some way to synchronize the state between that and the one in the main system to pull off the system's characteristic fast-docking for which it's named. It's possible, but at that point it's less "offloading" and more "here's an actual high-power console that reads its data from the tablet."

[agumonkey]

I guess you have a point ;)