Nintendos holiday 2020

[Mnementh]

Cerebralbore101 said:

Not really a good holiday lineup.  Just comparing it to Nintendo's 2018 lineup it is lacking. And 2018 was a fairly weak year for Switch.

Holidays 2018

Smash Bros Ultimate
Torna The Golden Country
Super Mario Party
Poke'mon Let's Go
Valkyria Chronicles 4 Nintendo shouldn't be given credit for 3rd party games.

Holidays 2020

Bravely Default II Nintendo shouldn't be given credit for 3rd party games.
Pikmin 3
3D All Stars
Age of Calamity

Notice, I'm being overly generous to both years here. Rereleases of old games really shouldn't count for much. After all 2018 had Bayo 2, Tropical Freeze, and Treasure Tracker ported to Switch. The facts that we are focusing on the Holidays launch period, and 2018's ports all came outside the holidays puts an unfair hand on the scale. We're accidentally committing the Texas Sharpshooter fallacy by focusing so much on the holidays, where Nintendo's ports all happen have a holidays release date in 2020, and didn't happen to have a holidays release date in 2018. I listed Valkyria 4 and Bravely Default with strikethrough text just to remind people that 2018 had a 3rd party Strategy RPG in the holidays release window. So having a 3rd party JRPG in the 2020 holidays release window shouldn't be impressive. Oh, and since OP included a game which releases in September, I'm including September 2018 games in this comparison too.

Finally, it goes without saying that Mario Kart Home Circuit shouldn't count at all. This should be obvious, but I know a ton of people aren't going to get the context of the conversation. It's an AR Mario Kart game that costs $100 per remote controlled car. There are a ton of other reasons why it shouldn't impress anyone, but I'd be talking to a crowd so dense and clueless that they make Sheldon from Big Bang Theory look socially aware.

The only game with a Nintendo IP, that I'm looking forward to for Holidays 2020 is Age of Calamity. And even that a mild type of looking forward to. If it didn't have the BotW engine, and Zelda BotW Lore, I'd be skipping it. On the flip side, I was salivating at the mouth for Smash Ultimate, and Torna in Holidays 2018.

In holidays 2018 I bought Valkyria 4, Smash, Torna, and Poke'mon Let's Go. In Holidays 2020 I'm going to buy Age of Calamity, Pikmin 3 (for collection purposes. I already own it on Wii U), and Bravely Default II. Personally it's Smash, Torna, and Let's Go VS Age of Calamity.

This does have a small chance of changing in favor of 2020 though. Nintendo could shadow drop more Holidays 2020 games like Poke'mon Snap 2 (with 3x the length of the original), or a new F-Zero game, or a 2D Metroid with AAA quality development.

I think it is generally a bad idea to subjectively decide which games should and shouldn't count. Basically all that matters is: does it sell?

I also think, that excluding 3rd-party is an argument designed to make Nintendo look good. Because if we exclude 3rd-parties, Playstation and Xbox usually look bad. But people have no problem counting Cyberpunk as a big title for them, so we shouldn't make such reservations.

Obviously I cannot tell yet, how well these titles will sell. But I can give my opinion, that the five I mentioned will play a role in shaping the sales over the holidays.

Last: I never said this lineup is better than 2018. I said, it is a worthwile lineup. I clearly even stated, that it misses the big punch title like Pokemon or Smash. But I think the holidays can be filled with a bunch of these smaller titles. And that range and diversity isn't looking too shabby. I think Switch owners will find a game to buy from their holiday money.