GAFFER on Switch 2 Welcome Tour:

"Ever since it was revealed, Welcome Tour has drawn comparisons to Astro's Playroom. On the surface, it's easy to see why: the main hub where the dissasembled console resides resembles how Astro's game portrayed the inner workings of the PS5, and the different minigames to show off the new features on the Joy Con 2 are also similar to the way in which the DualSense was flaunted with Playroom. That's about where the comparisons end, though. Even with the tech demo-ey elements of Astro's Playroom, it's still something that's focused on being a game more than an in-depth explanation of how Sony designed the console this time around - like ok you get levels that are roughly themed around key components of the console but if you took it at face value all it teaches you is that the PS5's GPU has a nice singing voice and nothing else.

This is where I'm the most impressed with Welcome Tour, and where the fact that it came from Nintendo of all companies is the more baffling. It was easy to assume before launch that it would be a quick overview of the console with some quick minigames so that people can mess around with the mouse mode a little, but in reality the game goes a lot deeper than that. It already peaked my attention when one of the trailers showed... a DLSS demo? Nintendo, the company that straight up doesn't publish full specs of their HW, doing something like this? Then once it came out I just lost my mind. We have an official Nintendo game explaining random things like why MicroSD Express cards are backwards compatible, the differences between how the Wii U and Switch 2 achieve backwards compatibility and the advantages this has, how the buttons and the mouse sensor work, what a Tensor Core is, and so much more.

Now, I imagine a good chunk of people here already know most of these things, but even if you do there's also insights into the design of the console that are very interesting. Things like how the magnetic Joy Con actually work, why there's a thin gap between the controllers and the unit, why the kickstand is different from the Switch OLED's, why they placed the SD card reader where they did, how they improved the sound even with the same speakers as the Switch OLED, why the Joy Con Grip has seemingly random plastic feet, etc. The Switch's design is unique enough where there's really a LOT they can talk about, so I imagine that for other consoles an equivalent game wouldn't be as interesting but still, it got me thinking about how cool having a little interactive museum explaining design decisions of previous consoles could've been.

It's a bit of a shame imo that the price discourse has overshadowed so much of the coolness of this game to the point that's what everyone talks about pretty much. I'm not here to argue whether that's deserved or not, just wanna spread awareness that there's some really awesome stuff in it and isn't just a collection of random minigames."

If it's on sale I'd get it as a curiosity.

I'm waiting on price drops for the zelda upgrades.

travo said:

I want Nintendo to patch MKW so I can turn off the sound effects and just roam listening to the tunes.

I know right? That music.

Gizmodo actually did an article on it:

https://gizmodo.com/the-switch-2-proves-nintendo-never-misses-on-music-2000615637

Here's a 1hr video of MKW music you can turn down the sound on the tv and listen to this instead.

https://youtu.be/mfsa4x2FHPw?si=OIn6QwWEMA8s_HMw

It's so dumb that you can't own two Switch consoles and have direct access to your entire library on both. That's exactly how it works on PS5 and Xbox.