Last night was the last bowling night of my weekly Monday night bowling league, so my wife came along to watch me bowl. I brought my Nintendo Switch along, so that she would have something else to occupy her time as well aside from watching/cheering me on. So, for the first time, I decided to try out the local multiplayer mode capabilities of the Switch. I booted up Puyo Puyo Tetris (which I purchased digitally at release, but have mostly been playing solo through the story mode so far), opened up the kickstand and set the Switch down on the counter top behind our lanes, popped off the joycons and synced them up for 2 player play, and boom... my wife and I were playing Tetris against each other at our local bowling alley. My friend's son saw us playing and after watching us for a bit, we gave him one of the joycons and my wife and I took turns playing against him. After he lost he few rounds, he proceeded to tell us that his mom would beat me in Tetris for sure. Since she was also at the bowling alley (and I know her well since she is the wife of a friend I have known since gradeschool), I said "well, go get her". Sure enough, he did just that. And, he was right, as his mother did proceed to clobber me.
Anyway, it was great fun and an experience that I would not be able to find on another single device. There's just something personal/intimate about huddling around the same device with family and friends that is more fulfilling than anything else. I'm not bashing online play, or denying how much it has opened up gaming. I'm just grateful that there is a company that generation after generation has sought to preserve the concept of family and friends gaming together in person. That's not a gimmick. It's a feature that I hope never goes away. The Switch now brings that out of the living room and opens it up to on the go possibilities, which I have now experience and enjoyed firsthand, and I think that's awesome.
