Was Nintendo right to opt out of the graphics arms race?

[Soundwave]

Chrkeller said:

Soundwave said:

Who cares if someone says the Switch 2 performs comparable to a premium handheld device? So what if someone says that? What Bible did you write that makes that impossible to say. Even if that was someone's opinion, so what? Who died and decreed 3 or 4 people on this board get to decide which hardware gets categorized as such? All this gatekeeping bullshit about what can be considered good hardware from self imposed elitists is really tiresome. "People are opposed"? There's like 10 people total that post on this board, lol, it's a sad state of affairs to begin with. 

In my opinion this hardware result is very impressive, well beyond even my expectation and I had high expectations for this device, higher than most on this board. Further to that, I would say this is clearly a different Nintendo era under different leadership and it shows, this is much more in line with what the N64 and GameCube were for their day ... which was very impressive hardware for that time, with caveats made considering the Switch 2 is a portable device of course. 

Regarding generations, I was clearly discussing PC architecture and PC architecture generations, Ampere/Lovelace are several generations removed from GCN 2.0 that was used for the PS4. That's not even considering that Nvidia's architecture is generally considered better than AMD's to begin with (they don't have 90% plus GPU marketshare by random luck). If someone here wants to get their panties in a bunch about that, I frankly don't care. Ampere/Lovelace IS several GPU architecture generations beyond AMD GCN 2.0 from 2013. There's nothing you're going to post or anyone is going to post that will change that. 

I am genuinely and sincerely just trying to avoid another disaster.  You appeared to being arguing against Perma on something he didn't say.  If I am mistaken, that is on me and apologies. 

Not just your opinion, best I can we are all impressed with the S2.  Especially the third-party support, way better than I expected.  The S2 is excellent.   

A 2080 is 2018, a 5050 is 2025.  That is 7 years and multiple generations apart..  the 2080 has 12% better performance.  Fact.  So, being generations ahead does not offset raw power, fact.  We should start accepting facts.  Again, I feel bad about playing a role in derailing a really good thread, so let us get it back on topic.    

I don't even have much interest in PC architecture generations other than to say they do exist, which is not really debatable. Using the 20-series as a baseline can be misleading because the 20-series was a massive leap forward, the leap where DLSS and tensor core usage and all of Nvidia's AI investment really took off in a tangible way. Not every PC generation is going to have that level of a jump, that doesn't mean PC architectures don't exist or are meaningless. There is a significant difference between AMD GCN 2.0 architecture and Nvidia Ampere/Lovelace, again if someone is upset by that comment, fine. 

20-series also ironically is probably the beginning of the end of Nvidia giving a crap about gaming as that level of technology soon started to be eaten up for AI servers creating the modern AI boom and I don't think going forward Nvidia really gives that much of a crap if gamers are going to whine that the 40 series or 50 series or 60 series or 70 series are smaller leaps. They don't care now, why should they, aside from having almost a quasi-monopoly (92%+ marketshare) they make 100x more money from AI companies than they do from gamers. 

Developers can't afford budgets or dev times getting any longer anyway, so you're hitting up against a natural ceiling here to begin with, where both tech producers (Nvidia) and even the content companies (game publishers) have no incentive left to push the envelope that much further. 

But again, none of that has anything to do with this thread's topic and should never have made that much of a fuss to begin with. 

Last edited by Soundwave - on 14 January 2026