The Sad Truth About Nintendo Switch Cartridges

the Nintendo switch is one of the best gaming consoles in the history of the medium it's fun cool family-friendly and of course it lets us play our favorite games anywhere other than some graphical limitations there's really no downside to the entire system well except for the one dark secret that Nintendo doesn't want you to know about that's right today the gamer is digging into games costing more on the switch and the dreaded switch tax will also highlight the affordability of other gaming platforms in the history of disks and cartridges in game and future pricing models in the industry the gaming industry is still in its Wild West phase and will find new ways to scam you soon that's why this video is an absolute must watch the cost of gaming one of the biggest selling points of the Nintendo switch is that it's one of the most affordable gaming systems on the market with a $300 launch price that's remained pretty constant there's a good amount of truth to that when you consider that the undock Abul switch light only costs 200 bucks the switch quickly becomes a go-to gift for younger gamers or companion device to another console then again if you are a solo switch gamer power to you there are more than enough games across every genre on the switch to keep you busy compared to the other current gen gaming systems the switch is arguably the best value proposition at its launch in 2013 the PlayStation 4 would set a buyer back about 400 bucks which is fair but didn't wash the ps3s $600 launch price out of most gamers mouths the enhanced PlayStation 4 pro premier 3 years after the og ps4 and also cost $400 the Xbox one well that was even more expensive and cost a whopping $500 when it premiered in 2013 however Microsoft decided to cater to his many demographics as possible and released several revisions of the Xbox consoles in the Xbox one s series cost between three and four hundred dollars depending on the models storage capacity the souped-up Xbox one X premiered in 2017 and also costs $500 two years later the extremely affordable Xbox one s all digital edition premiered at 250 but could not play physical versions of the while the debate over which version of the Xbox one is best will rage on for years we can all at least agree that they have really bad mains right complicating things even further is the recently launched Google stadia on the surface Google stadia is pretty affordable and for ten dollars a month it lets gamers play some games on Google devices and Google Chrome however you do have to buy the games on top of the subscription fee and in some cases games cost more to stream on stadia than they would on any other platforms so anyone playing on the stadia is in really saving money in the long term especially if you have data caps in your home internet last but not least we have to bring up Microsoft's game pass for about 15 bucks a month game pass let's xbox of PC gamers play literally any game in its catalogue it's essentially a Netflix for games and offers casual gamers a really affordable way to play a huge variety of titles basically if you're someone with an Xbox or PC and gaming is your main hobby a game past subscription is a must-have okay that covers just about every major way to play games today man if we come a long way since the original Sega Genesis Super Nintendo console wars one thing that we should definitely mention though is that unless there's a sale or something games usually cost the same on xbox pc and ps4 this is usually true for the switch to but not always and the reasons why some games cost more on the switch are actually pretty bizarre switch cartridge costs in the switch tax to keep the system from being too clunky switch games come on cartridges rather than blu-ray discs these cartridges are basically just uniquely shaped SD cards and can fit about 32 gigabytes of data on them while that's significantly less than the 50 gigs that can fit on a blu-ray disc it's just enough room for major games to be ported over to the system however switch cartridges are more expensive to manufacture than blu-ray discs and no it's not because Nintendo sprays them with a bittering agent to keep kids from eating them don't lick your switch cartridges kids the likes aren't worth it blu-ray discs are mostly made out of polycarbonate and that's been etched with the games data it's pretty quick and cost effective to make blu-rays and they're the standard medium for home movies and physical versions of games these days ironically Sony owns the rights to blu-ray technology so Microsoft actually has to pay its competitor time to make a hard copy of the game isn't that crazy switch cartridges on the other hand require more time and materials to produce that's why a lot of multi-platform titles cost more on the switch than they did in the other systems it was more expensive to put the game on a cartridge than a disc you know the old sang-min 10 don't make it easy for companies to develop for their systems okay maybe that's not exactly how the old Sega commercials went but you get the idea poyo poyo Tetris is the go-to example for this phenomenon at launch the ps4 xbox and steam versions of the game cost $30 however the physical and digital versions of the game on switch cost $10 more for T is a shame as the quirky puzzle game meshes well with the switches portability thankfully though this specific kind of price increase is becoming less common today while a single switch cartridge cost more to make than one blu-ray disc they're about the same at a mass production scale now that the switch has sold more than 35 million units all games for the system need to be mass-produced to a level that evens the price to the rest of the industry of course that doesn't stop gaming companies from just charging more for the switch version of the game anyway in the last few years we've seen plenty of switch ports of iconic games Skyrim The Witcher 3 and 2016 s doom all came to the portable system however each of these games cost $60 on the switch despite their original versions releasing years prior and selling for much cheaper since the switch is pretty dissimilar from the other major gaming platforms more work has to go into porting games to the switch in the first place this means that a lot of game development companies feel like they can get away with pricing a port like this as a brand-new game if you ask me that's pretty morally ambiguous and not the best for consumers you know us one thing is for sure though someway somehow some win bethesda is gonna find another new way to sell you skyrim and we'll buy it the history of cartridges and gaming by now you're probably wondering why nintendo would have the switch reed cartridges instead of disks if they're more expensive to make well the answer to that question is because the switch would look like a literal brick if it had an optical drive inside there's actually a fascinating history behind cartridges and discs and gaming and had Nintendo shipped to them ended a lot of the long-standing feuds way back in 1989 Nintendo and Sony started working on a console together can this system would take advantage of the rapidly developing cd-rom technology blast from the past which would store more data than cartridges this would allow developers to create bigger and more complex games and finally make the jump to 3d the two companies even announced this joint venture at the 1991 Consumer Electronic Show entitled their console the Nintendo PlayStation yeah unless you know absolutely nothing about gaming in which case why are you watching this video mom you know that this console didn't come to fruition fearing that Sony was trying to use the partnership to springboard into the gaming industry on their own in Tendo backed out of the partnership instead they partnered with the Dutch company Philips to create the Philips CDI which was an utter failure and responsible for all those nightmare fueled Zelda games you know the ones that look like they were made in a haunted version of mspaint the dumpster fire that was the CDI convinced Nintendo to stick with cartridges for the Nintendo 64 this started the company's trend of using less graphically intense hardware in their systems Sony fueled by spite and now convinced that the future of gaming was disk-based developed the PlayStation anyway that's right a disagreement over cartridges and discs led to the creation of one of the biggest names in gaming this conflict would have wide reaching consequences and burns several bridges in the gaming industry for instance the dev company's square now Square Enix used to release all their major games on Nintendo systems Final Fantasy one through six Super Mario RPG and Chrono Trigger all played major roles in elevating Nintendo's consoles to the top of the market however Nintendo's decision to stick with cartridges for the n64 made square decide to publish the iconic Final Fantasy 7 on the ps1 this created a major rift between Nintendo and Square that lasted literal decades only with the release of Dragon Quest 11s echoes of the elusive age did Square Enix publish one of their 10 pull series on a Nintendo console again it took that long so yeah the gaming industry is pretty much exactly as petty as you think it is even if switched cartridges are more expensive to make and don't have that much storage space they're really helping Nintendo out the switches compact size is key to its gargantuan popularity which has made the console the platform of choice for many indie developers between these new connections and Nintendo's rekindled relationship with square-enix the company is poised to do quite well in the next few years buy that stock even if the increased cost of the switch games isn't great for consumers in the short term there are other concern trends in gaming gamers should worry about a little bit more future cost concerns in gaming while the price bump in cartridge games and these switch attacks is a major bummer it should solve itself out before too long as the average number of switch game sales increases cartridges will be mass-produced in games will be directly made for the switch this one stopped Nintendo and other game companies from ripping people off in other ways though console owners and intend to in particular have heavily increased incentivizing gamers to buy digital copies of the games while digital copies of games do use zero physical resources and are usually more convenient to purchase there's a shady element to that to funds from developer game sales go directly to a game publisher and the platform holder since there isn't a retailer to take the cut digital sales might seem like a better way to support the people who make your favorite games if they also directly lead to the closing of gaming spaces you know how Game Stop isn't doing so hot lately yeah Digital game sales has a lot to do with that furthermore consumers never really own digital games like they do with analog ones a platform holder can pull a game from their library for various reasons and prevent players from read downloading a copy the most famous example of this is how be soft made the Scott Pilgrim vs. the world game unavailable after their license to publish the game had expired so basically when you buy a game digitally you're paying 60 bucks to rent a game until a platformer publisher decides that you can't play that game anymore Nintendo in particular uses some arguably unethical practices to push players towards buying digital games for decades Nintendo has used artificial scarcity to drive up interest in its products the reason you had a hard time finding a Nintendo switch or we at launch wasn't because Nintendo underestimated how popular the systems would be the company intentionally made their products harder to find to increase demand and keep the public interested in them for a longer period of time Nintendo does the same thing with this flagship video game franchises as well after all most people aren't gonna wait until their local Walmart restocks to play breadth of the wilder pokemon sword and shield at launch to buy it digitally which makes Nintendo more money and further incentivizes them to make fewer physical copies of their next big game hello I like money it's a vicious cycle and the only way to break it is to get gamers to chill out about new releases and playing them right away since that's not gonna happen anytime soon though there's not a lot to be done Nintendo may be responsible for filling millions of childhoods with wonder but it's still a massive corporation don't forget that means Nintendo is gonna find new and eyebrow-raising ways to separate people from their hard-earned money whether that be the switch tax cartridge up charges digital purchases or forced scarcity doesn't matter all anyone can do is try to be a smart consumer and try to stay ahead of these kind of scummy tactics what do you think about our breakdown of Nintendo's shady business practices please let us know in the comments section below while you're there be sure to subscribe to the gamer like this video and ring that Bell we've got plenty more videos about gaming industry secrets coming soon and you're not gonna want to miss a single one of them

Channel: TheGamer

Views: 1,495,992

Rating: 4.1715169 out of 5

Keywords: Nintendo, Nintendo Switch, Sony, PlayStation 4, Microsoft, Xbox One, Google Stadia, Microsoft Game Pass, Switch Tax, Switch Cartridge, Puyo Puyo Tetris, Next Gen Consoles, Gaming History, cartridges, video games, games, gamer, the gamer

Id: OeIznF3LxWM

Length: 11min 53sec (713 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 05 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/ChrisRR]

This video takes 11 minutes to say that cartridges are expensive to manufacture and storage is smaller.

It spends the first 4 minutes rambling about the price of PS3/PS4/Xbox

[u/[deleted]]

[removed]