Switch Me Up: discussing Nintendo's new console on YouTube

This brief article is based upon a response I gave to a YouTube user complaining about the negative sentiment that some people in Italy expresses in relation to Nintendo's new console, the Switch. Our national commenters often manages to be less gentle than the worldwide YouTube average, which prompted a disgruntled reaction from the young Giuseppe (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCjKjHQXGauy8up1BOURZdyw):

Comments to this video are really sad, you're just making excuses of any sort to dump shit on a console that has no issues as of today. I've read some people complaining about "too much stuff to plug in and remove"

That's kinda sad, actually, so I decided to step in and clear things up in favour of a device that is not flawless, as many outlets are pointing out in these hours, but has every right to play a good chunk of the match before being dismissed. Here I go:

I'll tell you, Giuseppe, despite having immediate issues with the Nintendo Switch design choices, I've always been possibilist about it. The Wii had a cyclopean success, while its unlucky successor still has some great games that people should go back and play. Saying that the console is flawless, though, sounds a little bit too defensive in light of the opinions of those who already had the chance to test it and share their experiences on YouTube, as opposed to us. 

Speaking of the manifacturing, the console doesn't sound sturdy at all: I've seen the tablet shaking inside the docking station to a worrying amount, and the joycon's fastening at the sides of the tablet doesn't seem keen on accomodating energic solicitations.

The most sensible thing to do would be sitting comfortably on our sofas and wait for the developers to show us what happens when they really settle on making this pretty little harmless looking console sing 

As far as the autonomy outside of the docking station is concerned, the best observed value amounts to 3 hours and half on the OS interface, with the screen always on (75% luminosity) and no games played, before the console died out. Frankly, it is hard to deem this acceptable, improvements are bound to happen in the next firmware updates, but energy consumption is typically hard to improve on the initial figures, so we better not delude ourselves. 

Computing power: the chinese portal Taobao.com already dissected the console to find a Tegra/Maxwell chipset inside, which includes a 1.78GHz CPU, a 921Mhz GPU and 4 GB of shared LPDDR4 RAM, which lines up to a recent leak from Foxconn. Those clock speeds decreases from 15% to 40% in portable configuration, in a developers defined figure that directly impacts battery life. On the technical side, then, the Switch doesn't even try to come close to its direct competitors, and everyone is free to deem this a valid approach or not, depending on what they expect from a console. 

So, is the Switch flawless? It is not, and that's perfectly physiological for any kind of device. But nonetheless, it's way too early to dump shit on the Switch, when the most sensible thing to do would be sitting comfortably on our sofas and wait for the developers to show us what happens when they really settle on making this pretty little harmless looking console sing.

Instruments Vs. Ideas in the console gaming space

I find the title to this article to be sufficiently effective in typewriting terms, but if Blogger allowed for subtitles, I would have probably gone for a more explicative "... or what people don't get about roles in the gaming industry". As you might have heard, something very interesting is happening in the console space, where Sony and Microsoft are bringing about the latest technological trends (VR, 4K rendering, and the introduction of HDR colour gamma) in pretty different ways - the former by creating an enhanced version of the current PS4, the latter by going generational with a new and exponentially more powerful platform. It's a moment of intense water testing for the companies, and the console market as a whole is poised to massively change its configuration from the next year on. Looking at the social networks output, the general gaming public is not too happy about the situation.

Some complains about companies jumping too soon onto the 4K bandwagon, while forsaking the implicit promise of this generation - true 1080p/60fps gaming. Others, apparently more concerned with a general lack of innovation in game design, are asking console manifacturers to put the technological theme aside, and instead focus on giving devs more ways to express their creativity. The oxymoron here is strikingly obvious: what should manifacturers do other than providing the hi-tech gadgetry needed to flex the software makers' creative muscles (and offering appropriate promotion, of course)? In terms of pure game design, higher resolutions and color depth have next to no impact on gameplay features, but the thing is, every developer is entitled to use the additional power as they see fit. Having a 4K capable machine doesn't mean you have to run your software at that resolution, especially if you plan to have lots of on-screen objects, advanced AI, physics or any combination of those.

That's to say that nowadays, if a team has a really good idea and the talent to back it up, chances are the available machines are powerful enough to turn it into an actual product

That's to say that nowadays, if a team has a really good idea and the talent to back it up, chances are the available machines are powerful enough to turn it into an actual product. Traditional consoles are perfectly good instruments. Paying a little bit of attention, people should be able to realize that a good chunk of the most brilliant gameplay concept of the last decade can be replicated on much less powerful machines than those they were brought on - the demake culture has made a whole point out of this. The problem is, a sizeable part of the gaming audience is neither able to, nor concerned with, assessing the basic relationship between ideas and instruments.

This leads to sadly frequent, yet almost comical misunderstandings such as comparing the VR phenomenon with the 3DTV one to prove how the former is actually just a gimmick and it's going nowhere after these days' boom... Believe it or not, some people are actually convinced of that. Instead, they should realize how VR constitutes a new instrument with enormous potential to deliver radically different experiences than what we're accustomed to - new design ideas that stems from VR and makes real sense exclusively in that purview. In other words, it's the manifacturers' most appropriate answer to those concerned with the lack of new avenues for creativity (*): once game creators will have found their footing with it, we can realistically expect them to develop a specialized creative mindset and come up with something really evolutive. And that, sirs, is how the roles really are laid out.

(*) unless Nintendo NX turns out to be something truly groundbreaking, but nothing seems to suggest it at the moment.

#RAPIDFIRE - 5: The Internet overreacts to PS4 Pro

#RAPIDFIRE - 4: Fast engaging characters, how?
 

Speed Oddities: embracing the flaws in Genki games

When we think about racing games, names like Gran Turismo, Forza Motorsport and Need for Speed are unquestionably the most popular in town. Over the years, we saw those series routinely set new standards in terms of polish, accessibility and mass market appeal, their influence bleeding into every declination of the genre's landscape - from hardcore simulations to pure arcade racers. Raising the people's expectations towards the category since the late nineties to such an high extent, though, had both good and not so good implications: on one hand, the overall quality of the products rose accordingly, while on the other, developers that used to do things a little bit differently ended up falling by the wayside somehow, especially in the West, and that includes the japanese Genki.

I've never concealed my appreciation for this studio, born in 1990 and firmly rooted in the racing genre (but they did Jade Cocoon for the PS1 in 1998 too, a lovely JRPG). Awkward logo aside, most people will probably recognize them for the Shutokou Battle racing series, known outside of Japan as Tokyo Xtreme Racer, Tokyo Highway Battle, Import Tuner Challenge or Street Supremacy, depending on the publisher. Born in 1994 on the SNES, this longstanding saga had 10 main releases up until 2006, when it was officially discontinued, and something like 11 spinoffs that dabbled with its core gameplay in interesting ways. Western developers recognized Shutokou Battle's importance by embedding some of its tropes (japanese cars, the focus on tuning, high speed public roads used as racing tracks, especially at night) into hit series like Need for Speed Underground, Midnight Club and Juiced.

Despite sharing some of its elements with the titles we've just mentioned, the core racing dynamics and rules in Genki's products are apart from all of them - so far apart, in fact, that they could even be considered the main factors behind the generally mixed reception of Shutokou Battle in the West during its 10 years run. To better understand why, let's try to sum up the Genki driving experience: racing occurs mainly on the Shuto Expressway, a sprawling system of highways that encompasses four prefectures (Tokyo, Kanagawa, Chiba and Saitama), and is articulated in multi-lane routes with tunnels and elevated roads, all faithfully reproduced in the games but most importantly, blazed through at speeds far north of 186 mph (300 kph).

In Shutokou Battle, the fun emerges as the player becomes more and more aware of how to exploit the game systems' interactions - not by cherry picking and dismissing them for not being as elegant or refined than [insert any big racing game name here]

The extreme speeds makes breaking, cornering or even the basic lane changing maneuver far more dangerous and complicated than they should be, courtesy of some very deliberate vehicle dynamics: straight breaking at 300 kph screws up the cars' weight distribution, making them swerve nervously until the player tames them with equally nervous wheel corrections. Understeer affects each and every single car to various degrees, so the cornering phase has to be set up as early as possible in order to send the vehicle into a state of controllable drift: there's a precise timing for this, but randomized traffic placed in trajectory can make its evaluation pretty hard, so it's easier sometimes to just ram into the barriers and let them do the job.

Power vs hardware design: assessing the Nintendo (NX) way

Following a report by Digital Foundry on what is supposed to be the hardware design of the still mysterious Nintendo NX, gamers have flooded the wide spectrum of social networks - be it forums, sub-reddits, Facebook or anything else - with opinions on whether the company's alleged new design is going to make it or break it. Especially when I read comments about consoles being underpowered, I realize how poor is the general understanding of why they were designed the way they were. In the same way, talks of the NX being either dead on arrival or a godsend sounds a bit silly to me. Internal software library, third party support, functions and price are what defines success in this market space, and the points every new console should be judged upon.

Sure, having 1080p/60Hz out of the box is nice, but it comes just as late in the generation as the WiiU did, with the consequences we've all seen. The NX is relatively close to launching, yet third party support looks sparse and despite the uniqueness of Nintendo's internal offering, its appeal towards an extremely diversified mainstream market doesn't seem particularly strong on the software side. For instance, I'd like to see Nintendo experiment outside of their historical brands' comfort zone, either by creating actual new IPs or better valorising the neglected ones.

Internal software library, third party support, functions and price are what defines success in the console market space, and the points every new machine should be judged upon

What about Nintendo's approach to hardware design? I believe the informations coming through Digital Foundry to be accurate: providing controllers that you can either use at home and interface with a TV screen, or carry outside of your lounge at any moment's notice caters to the same, immense smartphone users demographic that is so engaged with Pokemon GO these days. This could influence the company's home software plans massively, and I'm really interested to see if this is actually the direction Nintendo wants to go for.

It's not a matter of hardware, really. It's all about vision, strategy and contents - these are the fields where Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are going to clash hard, no matter how (or even if) they'll try to distance themselves from one another.

#RAPIDFIRE - 2: A Game of Timings

 

Time to ditch the console generations paradigm?

There's a very interesting blog post over at Gamasutra (source) reflecting on how the advent of PS4K is going to change the way console cycles are handled from its release on. Author David Galindo speculates on how we might be in for a new, incremental update model that basically erases the concept of "new generation console" entirely, incorporating some tenets of the PC world: manifacturers have all shifted to x64 architectures, meaning that running the same games over multiple hardware iterations becomes much easier than it was before. However, are we really done with cycles and generations?

The so called seventh generation, marked by hugely popular consoles as the PS3, Xbox 360 and Wii, has lasted much longer than the previous six, a situation that had both negative and positive implications: people mantains that improvements on graphical fidelity and complexity of game mechanics have been held back, but at the same time we've seen Sony and Microsoft's online platforms grow bigger and stronger, hosting services and initiatives that shaped them into the viable, attractive environments of today. A completely new gaming market blossomed during the seventh generation by way of indie games, often put under the same spotlight as their AAA counterparts.

As technological advancements slow down their pace, consoles needs to stay around longer and provide the developers with opportunities to make their super expensive games last longer too

Where hardware stood still, the market responded with new opportunities. As technological advancements slow down their pace, consoles needs to stay around longer and provide the developers with opportunities to make their super expensive games last longer too: the era of "enhanced modes" is upon us, driven by (you name it) stop gap incremental updates to existing machines without having to re-release the software entirely. Word on the Web is that programmers are not very happy with what's happening in the console world right now, but their tune may change as soon as they start seeing more revenues coming from their games over time.

What about consumers, then? What will their perception of this new marketing model for consoles be? This is a trickier question, as the masses' idea of what they consider "new" or "progressive" is extremely brand driven: they are not likely to change their equipment until something that is branded as new and progressive comes across. This is what leads me to think that the concept of "generation" is not really going to go away, even with its meaning reduced to a simple marketing hook. But from now on, people will have to think very well through when buying a new console, as waiting for the cheaper model to show up is probably not going to happen anymore.

If you're looking for culprits (and I'm entering pure speculation territory here), VR is probably your best option as the new technology's sudden and unexpected uptake is what prompted Sony to come up with the PS4K idea in the first place, not the will to disrupt the current market setting. The japanese company had no reason to even think about a new console, having an almost 100% sales' lead over its main competitor, but they surely need a stronger base platform supporting their position as the cheapest VR solution provider around - bar Google Cardboard. For once, creating a "just in case" prototype like Project Morpheus turned out to be a very good stroke for them!

Better resolutions and framerates for games may have been the only cascade effects of PS4K, if the vision of a new marketing scenario didn't come along with it.

The Street Fighter V case and the PS4/PC exclusivity

Dear videogames fans, I guess your usual feeds have already filled you in about the waves raised by the Street Fighter V leak. The game was supposed to be one of the megatonic announcements by Sony for its imminent PlayStation Experience, with the PS4/PC exclusivity being the obvious shock factor. And the shock certainly manifested itself in the form of very harsh opinions about the supposed "theft" of such an important title to the vast Xbox crowd. Before investigating, though, another look at the corpus delicti can't hurt:

Street Fighter V Teaser from Laurent LaSalle on Vimeo.

Beautiful, huh? So beautiful that Capcom is scrumbling right now to remove any trace of the teaser, but the damage is done already: except resounding turnarounds, the Xbox One audience will have to wait before getting access to Yoshinori Ono's latest fighting sensation. Sony and Capcom just like Microsoft e Crystal Dynamics, then, but where the Rise of the Tomb Raider deal struck like a bolt from the blue, the japanese affaire doesn't come as a complete surprise.

The jolt lies all in the weight of the game: we're talking about the same Street Fighter V that according to Ono-chin, wouldn't have had a decent budget until 2018. Assuming that Sony has partially funded the game's development in exchange for a timed exclusive, we may be looking at a connotation of the console war where the fight for third parties attention becomes a long term theme of the current hardware generation. As the development costs continue to rise, the software makers are more than happy to evaluate risk-limiting solutions and recoup their costs as soon as possible.

On the other hand, the hardware manifacturers are well aware that an expertly timed release - even if just temporary - can have a huge effect on console sales, even before the actual game's launch. Imagine how many PS4 are being sold right now following the announcement, in close proximity with the year's end holidays. Those are well arranged circumstances from a financial standpoint, and the subsequent disappointment of a large chunk of consumers becomes nothing more than a distraction before higher interests. Immediate advantages: this is the fundamental value of a gaming industry whose internal balance is getting more and more unstable.

To those videogamers worried about this state of things, I would recommend a little bit of optimism. Street Fighter V will come to any successful platform, as it's always the case with Capcom. Victory comes to those who can wait: even the good old Gouken would agree.