The Switch 2 Will Crash and Burn. Calling It Now.

1. The Game Lineup is Weak

You have basically two to three games on this system that would appeal to you. For most people, that’s going to be Mario Kart World, and then one or two smaller series that you enjoy. If you like Donkey Kong, that’s Donkey Kong. If you like one of the other franchises, that applies to that too. But there’s really nothing here that is going to get anyone talking about this console, unlike the original Switch, which sold thousands upon thousands of units off the back of Breath of the Wild alone. The game lineup is weak.

What about Mario Kart World, you might be asking? Well, I’m not impressed. I don’t think most other people are impressed either. This feels like a “Smash Ultimate” of Mario Karts, true, but Smash Ultimate got people talking for months at a time. Since two to three days after the Switch 2 and Mario Kart World reveal trailer, I haven’t had a single conversation about either with anyone in real life. This is completely counter to the Wii and Switch eras, where at the game store, with gamer friends, with other people who are even casually interested in video games, there would be discussions going on about the upcoming games. This just doesn’t have that kind of strength to it.

I don’t just chalk this up to weak games. I chalk this up to the fact that everyone expected a new Switch 2 was coming, and that killed the hype. There have been rumors for years about a Switch Pro, and this is basically exactly what was expected, so what’s the surprise to be excited about?

2. The Price Point is Too High

While I am generally not friendly to the notion that companies trying to raise profits equates to greed, I do support the notion that pricing a product higher than what most customers will pay for it is a bad way to sell that product. I assume that Nintendo has probably cut costs as much as possible in the face of recent inflation and possible tariffs, to reduce the cost to the consumer as much as possible while maintaining their plans for a stronger Switch. I don’t doubt that in five to ten years’ time, there will be insiders talking about the corners that were cut and the losses that were taken to make the Switch 2 as affordable as possible. Having said that, $450 is still way too much for most people, and they’re going to lose their bread-and-butter casual market because of that.

The fact of the matter is, Nintendo’s consoles have always succeeded not by capturing the hardcore gamer market, who are willing to spend $450 on a console, but by capturing the more casual market of people who want gaming to be interesting, but not in the same way that a hardcore gamer expects their games to be interesting. The hardcore gamer like myself looks at this console and sees it as the newest Nintendo console, and so as a hardcore gamer he must buy it. The casual gamer looks at this console, sees it as an unnecessary expenditure because they already have a Nintendo Switch that looks curiously similar to it, and why would they want to spend $450 on something they already own? Yet there are far more casual gamers than hardcore ones, so losing that demographic at the price point results in losing that sale and all subsequent game sales entirely.

I do find it very likely that, just like many Nintendo consoles and handhelds that have come before it, within about two years’ time we’re going to see a price decrease for the Switch 2. Either Nintendo is fully anticipating and expecting that the Switch 2 will be to the Switch what the Wii U was to the Wii and are pricing that in, or they’re going to find that out soon enough and realize that they have to lower prices if they want to squeeze out any more profit from this console.

The Silver Lining

At the end of the day, Nintendo is a profit-making enterprise. They don’t make games out of kindness, nor do they sell consoles because they love you. They’re trying to raise profits because they are a company, and companies try to keep their people employed—at least, Japanese ones do. (American companies… not so much). So if Nintendo feels like the Switch 2 being more of a premium product that appeals to hardcore gamers is the best way to make profit for the next few years, so be it. It wouldn’t surprise me if this was the same strategy as the Wii U, which is to buy time until the next innovative hardware idea can get fully researched, developed, fleshed out, and then put to market.

Of course, I see all of this as good news. Many of Nintendo’s best intellectual properties were developed on the GameCube and Wii U, which were abject failures. Pikmin, Splatoon, Animal Crossing—to name a few—were all developed on failed consoles but built a fan base large enough so that subsequent releases on future successful consoles catapulted those titles into the spotlight. Maybe it’s the fact that that console was a failure that took away from of the “sales pressure” from the top so the devs could get more creative than they otherwise would.

They’ve had a lot of up years for a long time, so it’s not the end of the world that they’re going to have a few down years ahead of them. Of course, if this does really poorly… maybe they’ll just go put everything on Steam.