The future of major third party Switch games will be mid-budget

As you know, this generation is winding down in the spotlight, come next year, the 9th gen systems will make their debut. Sony's already blown the lid on specs for PS5, and everything they've listed sounds very impressive for next gen, and we're still waiting to see what Microsoft plans on doing with Scarlett. One common fear is that because next gen systems will be arriving, that means that the Switch will somehow suffer a mass exodus of third party support. Now it'll be a generation and a half behind the two main consoles, so it's most likely to receive even less AAA support than it was getting before, if it even gets any of those games at all. Now, that's most likely going to be true, the Switch is a tablet at the end of the day, and mobile technology still has limits as to what can realistically run on it. So no, Switch won't be the place to play the latest Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed titles with high end visuals.

But, I don't think that's bad. More specifically, I don't think not having the power for next-gen AAA games is really going to hurt the Switch that much for major publishers, because there is a market, for which games can be developed on a smaller, medium sized budget for all available consoles, and that's honestly, what I think the Switch's future will be in terms of major support, outside remasters and ports. We already started seeing seeds of this last year. Switch got games from Valkyria Chronicles 4, to Mega Man 11, to Starlink: Battle for Atlas same day as the other versions. Along with exclusives like Octopath Traveler, and even late ports like Crash and DBFZ. All of them did as well as, if not better than their PS4 and Xbox One counterparts, and they're games that are generally easier to downscale to Switch vs. the more AAA ones. This year, we have more games like Samurai Showdown, Crash Team Racing, Dauntless, Ninjala, Daemon X Machina, Oniaki, Ninja Box, Gods and Monsters, I'd even argue Mortal Kombat 11 to an extent that fill a niche between AAA and indie and as tired as the statement has become, are perfect for Switch.

That's where I think the future of the Switch will be for Major third parties. Sony and Microsoft have the AAA space locked down, but Capcom, Ubisoft, and the like can still make less demanding games that can run everywhere, and its more viable than its ever been. Game engines and graphical fidelity has progressed so much to the point where you can make a decent looking and solid game with about 30-40 people, run it on low end hardware, and still have it do pretty well. And with AAA games going to need even more resources and development time next gen now that 4k will be standard, the need to do less demanding projects will be greater. That, on top of remasters, Nintendo's own games, and the mountains of indies, the Switch should have more than enough support even going into next gen. And they wouldn't even need a "Pro" revision to do it, though it would certainly help.

Indie games and ports of old games that's all they will get once the new generation rolls around and a Switch Pro wont change much either since there are no sub 20w SOC's out there that are that much better than what it already has even the Tegra X2 has the same Cuda core count just higher clocks which won't be enough to get a single port from 8+ TFLOP console.

Current generation games are already pushing the Switch to its limits... A next generation MK or Doom wont work on the Switch at all or a Switch Pro.

Nvidia hasn't really developed new low powered SOCs for the Switch to get a substantial upgrade.

And you completely ignored reading my post. Yes, the Switch won't likely get the next gen AAA games. But it will get plenty of mid-budget titles that already run on even low-spec devices. Samurai Showdown, Crash Team Racing, Dauntless, Ninjala, Daemon X Machina, Oniaki, Ninja Box, Gods and Monsters, among others are where the Switch's real third party strengths will lie.

@TheMisterManGuy:

Those aren't mid budget games... Those are low budget games.

Games even the mid budget ones scale with each generation of hardware because the standards go up and the technology advances and trickles down... So again a next generation MK, Samurai Showdnown, Dauntless, Crash Team racing will have hardware targets 10 times the power of the Switch or even teh Switch Pro with its Tegra X2 chip that is still weaker than a X1.

• Games made for it
• cross gen low budget games
• indie games
• 2D games
• Japanese games - those guys seem content with 360 graphics anyway but can't optimise to save their lives

Mid budget?... No and the reason is pretty obvious.

Mid budget games will look as good as current high budget games next generation and therefore will require a lot more power... Now its fine for current generation low budget games to be ported because it requires little effort and cost but for next generation low budget - mid budget game to be ported all the way down to Switch levels the developers would need to create new textures and settings like in Doom and Witcher 3 and company making a low-mid budget game doesn't have that time, staff, and money to do.

You can hope all you want but what you think goes against logic.

X1/PS4 is 1.4-1.8 TFLOPS with 8GB RAM and a horrible CPU = Switch can get ports and they look like absolute a**

X4/PS5 8+TFLOPS with 16GB RAM+ and a 8 core 16 thread CPU clocked at 2.5+ = Switch is not getting anything developed for these specification's

It's simple, want third party support? buy third party games but if you see the sales list for software for the Switch, top 10 is all Nintendo, and just in top 20, there are 2 third party games, Mario + Rabbids which basically is a Nintendo game and Octopath Traveller but they are way too far from the numbers of the big sellers of the console; And if that not change then it will get less third party support because it won't be profitable.

They are mid-budget. Not many indie studios could do the production values of something like Gods and Monsters. In any case, yes, the graphical ceiling will go up next gen, but the graphical floor won't raise. The vast majority of mid-budget games can run on low-spec PCs, which the Switch isn't that far off from.

And you're logic about them requiring more power next gen doesn't add up. As graphical fidelity increases, so do development costs. Mid-budget games looking like today's AAA games doesn't make sense unless the costs for those graphics go down somehow. It defeats the whole point of being mid-budget.

And again, low-mid budget games are often made in Scalable engines and often scaled to run on low-spec PCs. If they can scale down to that, then they can scale down to Switch. You'd have a point if the Switch was some custom, specialized hardware like the Wii U was. But it's not. Tegra is based on PC hardware, and engine developers have been including a lot of support for platforms like the Switch, so down-scaling would be easier to do in UE4 on Switch than otherwise.

You seem to think that because the ceiling for graphical fidelity will rise, the floor will too. That hasn't been the case for years. The floor for graphical fidelity is very low actually, and most modern engines are designed to scale down to it.

What exactly are you trying to prove? I mean yes, of course the Switch isn't going to get anything with the PS5 and Xbox Scarlett as the floor specs. But the amount of games and developers who will even be targeting those specs as a minimum is probably going to be very little, mostly AAA developers.

Again, most developers these days work with scalable tools, and most engines have extensive support for low-powered devices like the Switch. Downgrading a low-mid-budget game probably won't take nearly as much as you think because of this. It also helps that the graphical floor is very low among a lot of developers as well. You don't have to target the highest specs if you don't want to.

You don't need to out Nintendo, Nintendo to do well on Switch. Third party games have sold very well on it. They're not evergreens like Nintendo's games are, but they still sell well.

2D and indies seem the best fit for a switch anyway.

By the time the next gen consoles come out the Switch will be almost 4 years old. Nintendo consoles traditionally last 5-6 years. The Switch will be fine.

considering there are tons of low-tech games and AA's that I consider are better than most AAA big budget titles I couldn't care less.

Hell... my most anticipated game this year is World of Warcraft: Classic ... switch games look better than it!:

Sometimes you just have to realise how cancerous this forum is, and that keeping up with graphics is the LEAST important aspect of gaming.

Millions are still playing this:

This forum has always been backwards.

Putting a number to low-budget, would you say the range is anything $20m or less? Higher/lower?

And what is AAA/high-budget nowadays? While R* spent $500m on GTAV in total, a significant chunk was clearly put into marketing. Is high budget $50m+ minus marketing?

Every game on switch is already low budget.

There is not a single high budget game on switch.

The TC has no idea what a high budget game is.

And getting the worst ports of old games in 480i-720p doesn’t count as a high budget game. Sorry to tell you that Skyrim and Witcher 3 are not high budget games on the switch.

All of Nintendo’s games are low budget cartoony Wii u ports or rehashes. 3rd party games are all ports and severely crippled.

Can you honestly name a single high budget game for switch? I can’t!

lol even AA studios is considering skipping nintendo as usual

That future is already here and the Switch is flagging so I disagree.

People want game changing performance out of their hardware and something they've never seen before out of their software ... and going all average with budget and everything doesnt get there...

Even though the games are pl pl paltry by todays standards SNES era etc those were costly endeavors with big chances, I think thats important honestlh.

What's also important is not to actually take a big chance, it's go big but not go careless or brainless.

@ajstyles: are you serious, Clark?

He's always serious lol.

Smart phones are kicking the Bait & Switch butt and it's not even close. What a flop. lol :P

lol

No they're not.

How about giving an actual arguement instead of pulling shit out of your ass?

The Switch can handle almost any modern game in terms of the actual gameplay. The graphics just have to be scaled back. Big deal.

This. When Mortal Kombat 11 can be the best selling Switch game in April and have toned down graphics, then that shows the keyboard warriors what they know regarding Switch third party ports. Who cares if its not as pretty. It's portable, you can take it with you, and it still looks fine on its own. If you don't care about mobility with your consoles, well that's on you.

Imagine thinking you can talk about anything intelligent here. Look at the people in this thread and other threads. They're either trolls, stupid, or both. This is what's left of the forum. That's why I don't talk about facts or anything like that because this forum doesn't deserve it.

Cows are the most delusional bunch on here. They don't want to have discussions on games or the industry based around facts, they want to talk conspiracies and they're always wrong. They live in a world where everyone is out to get them. These paranoid people will pick fights or derail threads. They are obsessed with lems and Microsoft. They discuss Microsoft and Phil more than lemmings. This is what cows have turned into. They're a joke.

Lems have been attacked by cows so much that they sunk to their level. It would be a thread about Microsoft's studio future (which is interesting), but they would let cows derail the threads and sink to their level instead of reporting and ignoring them. It's like they feed on each others negative energy.

Hermits used to be the most intelligent people by staying above the fray, but Epic ruined them. Now they're just as paranoid as cows are about Tencent using the Epic Store to take over the world; yes, these sad people actually believe this shit. Though on the bright side, they're still my favorite people because trolling them about the Epic Store is comedy gold. I'm almost tempted to make a Resetera account just to do that.

Sheep are aggressive and want revenge for the people who trolled them during the Wii U years, particularly cows. Any discussion that could be intelligent from them, quickly turns sour once a cow enters the thread. They're like lemmings in that way.

@luxuryheart: mate, you make some fair points, but it's not fanwars.

@luxuryheart: you must have not been here long

Herpty durpty, my argument is there hiding in plain sight but you're so triggered you must have missed it. lol

Also...

:P

.

Budget does not seem to correlate to quality, so I'm not worried if the budget is a result of its power.

@SecretPolice: LOL you don't have an argument. Saying phone are beating the Switch means nothing if there's no context or reasoning.

Well, seeing as though mid-budget games are usually the best games anyways, that's just fine. Very seldom is there a AAA game that is everything I hoped it would be and more.

Hmm..... frankly, I'm ok with that. I bought my Switch for indies and Nintendo games anyway.