What The Early, Hands-On Reviews Say About The Nintendo Switch
Nintendo's highly anticipated new console, the Nintendo Switch, will be released to the public on March 3. Until then, we're stuck with some hands-on impressions of the console until the review embargo drops on March 1. Here's what the early previews say:
The Hardware Is Well Designed
[A] beautifully made slab of glass, plastic, and parts… The tablet summons that giddy feeling I got from Apple's original iPhone, and long before both, Nintendo's own original Game Boy. It's beautiful, it's simple, and it feels a bit like magic.
It's important to note how durable and substantial Switch feels, an unostentatious but strangely beautiful carbon-black slate that's like a blue collar version of an Apple product—all the same "magical" design elegance, none of the pretension
[TIME]
And The System, Well, Just Works
Also in the win column so far, the Switch's UI and interface thus far is wonderfully minimalist and very fast. I would laugh at how revelatory it feels to put in a game card and be able to play it instantly, without installation, if it didn't make me want to shake my fist at the modern console landscape. Bringing up the Switch's home menu within a game is instant, and there's no latency in navigating settings.
[Polygon]
The Detachable 'Joy-Con' Controllers Are Odd But Promising
While odd, the Joy-Cons are clearly part of the Switch's magic. They're Nintendo's most versatile gamepads yet: When connected to the console they serve as solid portable controllers. But when they're attached to the Joy-Con Grip, they mimic a more traditional game controller. You can also use them separately in each hand, which could be useful when you don't have much space to work with. And finally, you can hand one off to a friend to go head-to-head in a multiplayer game. The latter mode will undoubtedly take a bit of getting used to, but a tiny and uncomfortable gamepad is better than none, right?
[Engadget]
The Joy-Con controllers, despite having a rather silly name, are actually impressive – especially the built-in advanced HD rumble motor, which boasts similar levels of precision to Apple's haptic engine. This doesn't only enhance standard gameplay vibrations, but opens a whole new kind of game: in one of the 1-2 Switch mini games we tried, you use the Joy-Con controllers to guess how many ball bearings are inside your virtual box by moving the controllers and feeling the balls 'roll' around…. However, the Joy-Con controllers do have their downside – the layout is a little awkward, especially when playing certain two-player games where each person has one Joy-Con controller each.
In Terms Of Performance, It's Not Going To Compete With The Playstation 4 Or The Xbox One
Has Nintendo managed, for the first time in decades, to get its hardware on a level footing with the PS4 and Xbox One competition? Though you can argue that the unique form factor negates such comparisons, the simple answer is "not quite". The Nintendo Switch is a solidly capable machine, but its internals appear far more power-efficiency focussed than geared towards pure processing grunt; certainly, at its first press event, there appear to be no games challenging the visual fidelity of Sony or Microsoft's consoles. But that's never really been the point of a Nintendo console, with the company far more concerned with innovative gameplay forms than photo-real visuals.
The Battery Gets The Job Done, Unless You're A Big Traveler
Battery life so far conforms to Nintendo's stated specs—I can get about three hours of portable Zelda play on a full battery charge, depending on the screen brightness. The included AC adapter seems to fill about 1 percent of the battery per minute (give or take) when the system is in sleep mode (that mode is very power conscious, incidentally—after eight hours in "sleep," a fully charged battery had only drained to 98 percent).
I can't provide a highly technical, professional stress test, full data point breakdown of the battery life, but I can say from firsthand experience that the battery depleted to half-full in the time it took to watch an episode of The Bachelor — a little under two hours. That makes the Switch ideal for gaming around the house or on a commute.
The Screen Is Great… Unless You Take It Outside
[T]he Switch screen is the highlight of the show here. On its own it feels and looks like a high-quality tablet, only it's been built with gaming at the forefront of design.
But given that portability is a selling point for the Switch, you'd hope the screen would fare better in the sun:
While the display was bright and bold indoors, it didn't fare well outdoors. It was no match for sunlight of any kind, and the screen's high reflectivity was an issue even when it was cloudy. I had a hard time making out anything during dark portions of Zelda, and I couldn't see myself actually enjoying the game even when I could see what was happening. This is one issue that could really hurt the Switch: Nintendo is selling it as a console that you can take outside to play with your friends.
[Engadget]
And The Lack Of Games Available Is Concerning
I think the hardware may drive initial sales. Folks may buy it because the concept is so interesting, which may drive publishers to develop more games. But if Switch can't get a good jump out of the starting blocks, its paucity of games may be its biggest hurdle.
[WIRED]
And the lack of Virtual Console games at launch probably won't help:
It's disappointing news for anyone who hoped that Nintendo's impressive slate of classic games might help fill in the blanks between big Switch releases like Zelda and Super Mario Odyssey. Given the lack of details so far on the Virtual Console—and given Nintendo's history—it's fair to expect the worst, despite our brief optimism that they might get things right this time.
[Kotaku]
