Question: Why did Nintendo market and position the Switch as a home console that can be taken on the go, rather than calling it a handheld that can be docked, or simply calling it a hybrid?
Answer: It all has to do with game design and expectations.
A dockable $300 handheld console is expensive.
A $300 home console that can be taken on the go is a great deal.
A $60 handheld console game is expensive.
A $60 home console game is normal.
With $60 game pricing rather than $40, you can raise the ceiling of what can be produced for a console.
With the expectation of the games being for a home console, you can have pacing, cinematics, framing, features, controller inputs, etc. that adhere to those standards.
I have seen quite a few people remark about the PSP/Vita, in that, people don’t want console-like experiences on the go. Which is simply false. Looking at emulator usage on android/ios/psp/etc. home console games NES/SNES/PS1/etc. are played significantly more then GB/GBA/GG/etc.
What they are not seeing is where PSP and Vita games differ from those emulated console games. PSP controls did not match many games made for the system, in that, a PS2 port or game of a similar style were often built with mechanics and camera controls that are greatly compromised without a second analog stick and L2, R2.
This hamstrung the gameplay experience greatly for a lot of PSP games that tried some awkward control schemes to even operate at some level. This difference in gameplay experience made PSP games feel like a bastardized version of the PS2 game, even if is was a pixel perfect port in all other areas.
In contrast, PS1 ports played like an absolute dream on the PSP for the most part, as the world of the game itself never needed any analog stick, though moving the L2/R2 to the analog nub was still a marginal hinderance with a few of these ports. In fact, many of the excellent highlights of the PSP library are enhanced PS1 ports.
Non-port games on the PSP were usually designed with shorted play time pacing, cinematics, framing, smaller game worlds, etc. and so they usually (not always) felt like handheld console games rather than home console games in that regard.
PSP sold more than 80 million consoles in a market where Nintendo had a near monopoly since the beginning. In context, People LOVED the PSP for it to do that well, especially with considering UMD load times, UMD drive durability issues, High priced memory cards, much higher price tag than DS and GBA SP, etc.
The PS Vita is a much more sad story than the great PSP. It fixed quite a few issues of the PSP moving from UMD to game card, having now two analog sticks, better ergonomics, better durability, etc. Unfortunately, PS Vita had things that were to the detriment of the user (compared to the PSP). Touchscreen only OS navigation (at launch), forced front and back touch gimmick in gameplay, even higher priced memory cards, 100 icon limit (at launch), save file bloat, shorter battery life, no video out, etc.
PS Vita’s biggest problem was game library. The HD collections were fantastic, quite a few ports were very close to 1:1 console experience (except for L2/L3/R2/R3) these were the best of the PS Vita library, with complements of handheld style games throughout its life. The issue however was the volume of home console type games was dismally less that the PSP had.
Sony pulled first party support away from the PS Vita extremely early in the consoles life, and marketing for the PS Vita basically never existed compared to the PS4’s marketing efforts. With it not being called PSP2, it really needed more marketing and more stage time at E3, etc. to spark consumer interest.
If people see a company neglecting to talk about their new system, they will be hesitant to consider buying it. PS Vita could have done significantly better had Sony invested actual A tier dev teams and A tier marketing. They put to little into the Vita compared to the PS4, the natural effect, the market was cold in response.
Nintendo Switch addresses the majority of all these issues the PSP/Vita had: cheap memory cards, standard charging cable, easy to connect to the TV, Full force marketing, dedicated AAA first party dev efforts, full game control inputs, etc.
As such, the response is much warmer from the market. People are finally getting what they have always voted for: home console gaming on the go, NOT compromised. It makes the world of difference in FEEL of experience as quite a few who own all 3DS, Vita, and Switch have expressed.
