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Soundwave on 26 April 2023
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javi741 said:
Kyuu said:

That's because the most powerful system traditionally had a number of real disadvantages (not "excuses"), like late launch and poor design. PS1 had a 2 year headstart vs the N64 which went for expensive (up to) 64MB cartridges, a terrible move that sealed its fate. "Power" isn't the reason the N64 lost. And the low pricetag wasn't enough to mask its inherent disadvantages. Price and power are meaningless without context. Past trends are of little relevance regardless.

PS5 vs Series S absolutely proves that. The Series S shares the same feature set with the X. The Switch OLED beating the Lite does have more to do with features, but features are hardware/price related anyway, they require better hardware and come at an additional cost. Nintendo isn't going to launch the Switch 2 at the same price or $50 lower than the OLED model lol. If they wish to repeat the Switch success, then I think it's best to go with $400 minimum (for the standard "expensive" launch model), which is today's equivalent of yesterday's $300. I think there is an overwhelming evidence that the average gamer is ready to spend more money for more hardware, Nintendo should take advantage of this and not be overly concerned about price being high. Pricing the hardware too low at the cost of specs/features is just as dangerous as going too high.

I too couldn't care less about high resolutions (1080p is perfectly fine, and anything over 1440p is a total waste of resources), but it's up to developers to decide how to utilize power, and since PS5 will be the lead platform for most relevant 3rd party games, even a "powerful/expensive" Switch 2 would only play them at relatively low resolutions. I very much doubt even $500+ Switch 2 would target high resolutions for demanding and AAA games.

The examples you used with the Switch Lite/Oled and Xbox Series X are not good examples that people wanna pay more for higher specs. Both the oled and Series X are more successful because of reasons outside of specs, the Oled is more successful because people want to have a Switch that actually plays games on the go and TV, nothing to do with specs. The Series X is more successful than the S because it has a disc drive which is something that gamers still prefer to have to this day, again the higher specs have very little to do with it.

You also claim that the most powerful system hasn't won because of problems that don't have much to do with specs, while that's partially true for certain consoles, there are powerful consoles that screwed up because a company was too ambitious with the specs that made the system overpriced, take a look at the Saturn and PS3, both overly ambitious when it comes to specs that people don't care much about which led to an unappealing price. Also, part of the reason why the DS was more successful than the PSP was because it was cheaper, same reason why the Wii was so successful against the competition, because people would rather pay less just to play the games.

A better comparison you could've used to see if people would rather pay more for higher specs is looking at the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X sales numbers against the regular Xbox One and PS4, both the regular consoles and upgrades have the exact same features, only difference is that the PS4 pro and One X have better specs and are more expensive.

  1. If it's the case that people would rather spend more for higher specs, then why didn't the One X and PS4 pro outsell the original consoles? Answer is that people don't care to spend a bit more just for higher specs and would rather just get the cheaper model that just plays the same games.

XBox One X was outselling the base XBox One for a while I believe. 

Yes the Saturn happened ... 27 years ago now. I think we can stop referencing products from a quarter century ago now, it's really not relevant. Even PS3 was ages ago at this rate, the industry has matured considerably since then as is plainly obvious the PS5 is having no problems selling through the roof at a high price point. 

The base Switch (non-OLED model) still exists too, but people are opting to pay more for the OLED model. 

We see this trend repeated in multple other products too ... Apple has offered cheaper/budget/smaller iPhone models but the highest end models and most expensive ones remain the best sellers. 

Consumer mentality has changed. People don't want to short change themselves, they want to feel a sense of luxury from the products they buy, because they don't get much of that in other areas of their life. Getting a high end electronics device is a way for a lot of people to get a temporary high. 

YOLO (you only live once) is the mentality rife with the current generation of consumer IMO. The 90s/2000s was a different time, a lot of the household buying decisions were made by people who grew up in a completely different time with a different mind set. Today the people who grew up with a PS2 or N64 or whatever are the head's of the family and their mentality is completely different from their parents when they were growing up. 

The attitude now is if you're going to spend on something ... you might as well go all the way and get the "good" version instead of cheaping out. You only live once, you don't want to look like the loser that bought the cheap model, etc. etc. etc. plays into it. Nintendo is proof positive of it, with the Switch they've made virtually no concession to the budget only crowd. Only the Switch Lite and they won't budge on giving the Switch Lite a dock for TV play (gotta pay the full $300-$350 if you want that even with a 6 year old system), no real price cuts, not even aggressive software bundling either. No price cuts on software. Currently test driving $69.99 for Zelda: TotK. Online? You gotta pay monthly for that now. It ain't 1999 or even 2006 anymore, Nintendo operates drastically differently today. 

Switch 2 is going to be $399.99 minimum. 

Last edited by Soundwave - on 26 April 2023