Will Nintendo have a good year in 2021? This is a question I’ve been seriously asking myself despite playing a tonne of switch recently (mostly Bravely Default 2). The thing that really started me off was the pretty awful Nintendo direct.

I went into this direct, that was announcing supposedly everything for this year, expecting to start planning savings for these pricey switch games, and I left thinking ‘maybe I’ll get the ninja gaiden and skyward sword remasters’….this is not how I wish to feel after a huge announcement. My pure feeling was just nothing really, I was kind of angry (which is ridiculous) that tendy give no fucks that they’ve just relaxed fully on the switch being a machine for their main ips remasters and jrpgs. This is fine because I love playing jrpgs on it, but…. I kind of want to feel like I should spend £60 on a game ya know. I was really surprised at the overall lack of anything actually new except a Mario golf game and Splatoon 3 (I know there were others but this is all that really stuck in my mind) both of which I definitely won’t buy….where was the big new surprise? Well strangely that came separately….

Pokémon Brilliant Diamond and Shining Pearl release date – everything we  know so far | Pocket Tactics
Is this Pokemon go????

I thought it was a bit mad that pokemon did their own announcement after, why wasn’t it part of the direct? The little pokemon release (Pokémon Legends: Arceus and the remasters of Diamond/Pearl) had me more excited than anything on the direct and were the only brand new shiny thing I know I’m going to spend my cold hard cash on. Pokemon has become its own entity that just happens to be on switch, don’t ya think? And this is what I’m saying about Nintendo relying too heavily on it’s very old IPs (except splatoon 3) and some ports of games that have been on playstation or xbox for ages….why aren’t Nintendo really doing anything new and exciting in terms of gaming, is it because they’re relying too heavily on toy sales for things like lego mario or the home circuit, and does anyone remember nintendo labo? Fair enough if this is where they’re making the money, and i totally get that a large portion of their audience is a lot younger than I am. But it’s really starting to feel that there’s not a great deal there if you’re a bit more of a mature gamer, especially if you’re like Mike and aren’t a big fan of JRPGs! 

Also is anyone really asking for a switch Pro!? I don’t know why but every time I see news for it I just think whhhy. I think the switch is pretty much perfect apart from being a little hard to see in the sun, I definitely don’t think it needs to be bigger or clearer. Surely it being bigger would make it more difficult to carry around and make it less of a hand held…. 

I still love my switch but some of these odd decisions, in my humble opinion, will mean that switch will become a 3rd favourite console again and not fighting for top spot in the console wars . I’m only really choosing my switch if I’m planning on going bed early and I rarely sit and play a game from start to end (bd2 hasn’t had a look in for a few days). It is great as a retro /fun console that is good for the grind in certain games, but it’s never becoming my aaa baby. Surely there needs to be more on offer for gamers out there? We can’t play JRPGs and mario games all of the time….Maybe I’m wrong and everyone else prefers the way it is, maybe it doesn’t need to be more…Javier out 

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