When it was first unveiled, the Switch showed its capabilities related to motion controls. They joycons are indeed an evolved form of the wiimotes, easily able to work in a variety of ways, just like the original wiimotes were intended to do. However, after the Wii was replaced, motion control gaming became more or less dead in the eyes of the public, with VR being the only exception to the rule. Thus, Nintendo's use of the motion control capabilities on the Switch have changed quite a bit, specially after the lesson they learned with the WiiU and forcefuly implementing gimmicks unto the gameplay.
As of now, almost all of the major games released by Nintendo on the Switch have had some sort of motion control setup implemented in them. The examples I've played are Zelda BotW, Splatoon 2 and Mario Odyssey. Zelda uses its motio control abilities mostly to serve as a way to improve accuracy in some of the more finicky aspects of the game (archery, puzzles, the sheikah tablet powers, photos... basically anything that involved aiming plus puzzles). It serves as just a tool more in your toolbox, nothing more. A ot of people would say that this is the perfect way to implement motion controls in BotW, but I would have liked a more extensive use of it, specially because I'm used to keyboard and mouse for that kind of open world, exploration games. It was a bit sluggish to move the camera around fast enough when I needed to, but I ended up getting used to it. I still would've liked a gyroscope use of the main camera, but I was fine.
A couple of months later, I got Splatoon 2. And oh boy, it was amazing. This is my favourite Switch game so far, even though it's the one I've poured the least hours into. The campaign was fine, but it was the multiplayerand specially the controls that really amazed me. I was really skeptical of a shooter on consoles due to not having the precision that keyboard and mouse really allow. But nope, the motion camera works perfectly here. The gyroscope controls of the joycons together (and I assume the pro too, but I don't have one yet) allows me the precision I need to play competitive at this game. Granted, I've grown accostumed to the roller, because I used it at first back when I didn't know how to play properly, so the meele option was the easiest, but I can play well with others, specially the dualies. This is the kind of motion controls I had always wanted in videogames. They broke the tedious barrier that limited basic movement and exploration, moving around was a breeze, whereas before I had to stop, aim, do the thing I was supposed to, then move again. And it's such a basic thing that it could be applied to every 3rd person heavy game, or even 1st person games. Why not?
And thus, we arrive to Super Mario Odysey. At this point, I was expecting a similar motion controls scheme for the camera, maybe even something like the gyroscope only activates while pushing a button, keeping the precision needed for some of the platforming sections. So I got the game and... it was nothing like that. The motion controls for Odyssey were somewhat similar to the Mario Galaxy games. Only this time, instead of the jumping being tied to the motion, it was Cappy's movement. And I... don't know if I like this. First off, playing with the joycons detached is not quite as good as the regular setup, so by making it the "recommended " control scheme was already off-putting, to say the least. The camera is similar to Mario 64, but the amount of verticality Odyssey has makes me wish there were some sort of gyroscope camera aiming around (other than stop, push the right analog stick, then go into 1s person camera mode). I don't know, after the freedom of movement and precision Splatoon 2's motion control gave me, Odyssey feels somehow sluggish. Which is weird, because it a Mario game, those games have always shone in the control department. Maybe it IS more precise the way they did it, but I still feel that it would've been nice to get the option.
My hopes for the future is that games like DOOM, Skyrim and other 1st and 3rd person action games learn from Splatoon and offer us something closer to it, although I'm fearing they will do it similarly to BotW,and the 1st person shooters not even that. Maybe it's just me coming from PC gaming as my major fix on this kind of big games, but the controler has always felt like the inferior version of the mouse, and gyroscope aiming makes it feel almost as well as mouse controls (not as good, but it gets close enough). Metroid Prime Trilogy proved to me that motion controls is the way to go for some genres in consols, and Splatoon 2 solidified that opinion. I would be really dissapointed if Skyrim and Doom don't allow me to do that, it would feel like a masssive step backwards.
TL. DR. I like the gyroscope motion controls of Splatoon 2 and I wish they'd get implemented in more games, specially adventure games.
What do you people think of motion controls on the Switch? Do you preffer them above the regular control scheme, or do you like a more traditional style of controls? Do they improve games or make them worse? Will companies, specially 3rd parties, implement them in their games?
Essay Pro