It isn't really a secret.

Many people don't realise that to get small install sizes you actually need to sacrifice a goat or two.
This is how Nintendo gets their games to be so small; not them being compression wizards.

There's a lot that can be said about this but ultimately if all 3rd party games goes down this route and there's no 'good' way around it then it's really just Nintendo's fault. They must taken into account of this well before releasing the Switch unless they're that stupid. Lets hope the new Switch upgrade model will have a much larger internal storage too.

I'm still waiting for the update that's supposed to improve performance for NBA Playgrounds and cut file size in half.

The trick is low size assets, lack of voice acting in multiple languages, etc... you know, the type of thing we say AAA games usually have.

Or anyone think PS4 games come with 50-100Gb depending on the game just because the developers are such idiots that doesn't know how to compact data?

Alot of it is art style and low texture sizes for nintendo games.....

WWE 2k18 is going for realism and high quality textures, it ll take up space.

What they should have done is made smaller uglier textures for the WWE 2k18 switch version, so the game didnt take up as much space on it.

I bought a 4Tb external HDD... but only because I know have two PS4 so I can transfer the installed games faster. And since I don't play 10 games at once, having internal space for only 10 games wasn't a problem...

Also considering the tie ratio of games on any console in average is lower than 12 then having internal space for 10 is actually very well dimensioned for most of the market.

But  but but Nintendo listened to the 3rd parties. The Switch isn't a system made only for Nintendo needs.

And then Nintendo fans would call it a subpar port and not worth of buying, would do great.

Also reminds me back of discussion that Nintendo games can't be considered AAA games (not on the quality or fun, but assets used and budget put into it)

I wouldn't object to Nintendo giving some lessons about compression to the rest, yeah. It's kinda insane how ever since Metal Gear Solid 4 developers have got incredibly lazy with blu-rays and just throw the data inside since it can hold it all. It wasn't as problematic back then because digital was barely starting to take off on consoles (and things were starting, so I can understand first batch of games in the generation being experimental with blu-rays sizes), but given the current climate, it's absurd how these games keep pulling massive GBs in size that could dramatically be cut short in some cases.

Nintendo should also give Monolith Soft some lessons as well, to prevent a Xenoblade Chronicles X situation again.

umm....this "better textures and more realistic art style" reasoning needs to stop. Ratchet and Clank is 26.4 gb, knack is 35.6 gb. That argument holds no weight.