First of all... I'm not being passive agressive. I'm just saying that some of the games you listed are either not good at all or have limited importance for the matter we're discussing. If we count digital only games, the Switch have a crap ton more games than the Gamecube on its first year. But I'm not gonna mention all the 1-2 dollar games we can find on the eShop. Just as you shouldn't mention things like Spiderman or Road Gage just because they belong to popular franchises.

Second, I think it's fantastic you're in your early 30s (or maybe more) and you know so much about videogames history. But don't make a fool out of me (and now I'm actually being passive agressive BTW): sports games were sports games. There were some critically acclaimed sports games before and there are some now (though due to microtransactions it got worse from 2016 to now). Sports games were important then and are important now. They sold then and they sell now. Gamers on Europe buy millions of FIFA then and they do it now. Don't act like those games were considered some kind of must have games for the system where they were sold for other than sports fans. It just wasn't that way. I was there. I read my videogame magazines back then. You're just being a liar right here.

Thrid, Gauntlet Dark Legacy launched first on the Playstation 2 (a year earlier to be exact). Medal of Honor launched first on the PS2, as did some other titles on your list. If DOOM doesn't quite fit for you, those shouldn't either.

Fourth, If you think Road Gage was a big deal... think twice Mr. I Was There, I Saw It All. The game was garbage. Luckly for us, Hit and Run happened.

I have nothing more to say to you. Have a nice day/night

It's hilarious that you're saying this while bringing up games like Snipperclips while i'm bringing up games like Resident Evil Zero, Star Wars Rogue Squadron, etc. You replied to me trying to prove that the Switch had similar output  to N64, Gamecube, and Wii ... which was my entire point. Those consoles' first years ARE comparable. I pointed out how your arguments were faulty but that we are on the same wave length.  You got more mad at that reply even though I'm saying we are in agreement. And whether or not you thought those games launched "first" on a system they were still games that were recent brand spanking new releases, compared to something like Mario Kart 8, or FAST RMX. Doom should count I agree.

Road Rage literally sold 3.6 million copies on Playstation 2 alone and 1 million on Xbox. It didn't sell as well on Gamecube but it's hardly surprising because that's generally the case with Nintendo consoles. When I say it was a "big deal", I don't mean it was good. I said that the exclusives I picked were based on how much acclaim or importance they have, not the multiplat games.  I said this because I didn't want to be that guy who picked that obscure Chinese exclusive game no one's played to make a console look better than it is. 

You're way too upset considering that we are literally agreeing. The only thing my comment was meant to show was that Switch's first year is comparable to many Nintendo consoles, not just the Wii's, because ... it is. Getting defensive and trying to downplay the first year of other consoles is not the answer, because I wasn't attacking the Switch. Also, if you think that I need to have "been there" to make the very obvious conclusion that recency bias is a huge reason why the Switch's first year is being praised as if it's not comparable to almost any other commercially successful system ... then I don't know what to say, because you basically agreed with this when you set the Switch's benchmark as consoles that recently released (PS4, Wii U, Xbox One etc) and not ones from before then.

I disagree. The value of content released for the Switch in 2017 is unparalleled for any year on any console in Nintendo's history.

Being an oldie, I have been around for just about all of them; over 30 years of Nintendo. (I am also including international releases, I had a fire converter growing up! *cough*AndAlsoEmulators*cough*)

Pivoting back to topic before I get into a rant on "da good ol' days"

2017 launched the Switch with Zelda, and a number of interesting nostalgic feeling indie titles - particularly Blaster Master and Shovel Knight. It was barely any time later when we got the first major RPG with Disgaea and also Mario Kart for multiplayer - which had people going nuts at the office, every fucking lunch hour for about a year, and half to most days throughout 2018. Splatoon, Rabbids, and ARMs made for some good lighter summer games, and then there was the surprisingly great Golf Story, and Stardew Valley, then Xenoblade Chronicles 2 later in the year, along with Super Mario Odyssey. There were even games I didn't have time for, like FE Warriors.

What lows do you mean exactly? There wasn't time for lows!
I can't be the only one here who needed most of 2018 to finish up with 2017 games =D
And I can't be the only one who foresees themselves picking up 2017 games to play regularly to semi-regularly from time to time for the next 2-3 years to come.

I'm sorry, I can't agree with you on this one.
2017 was a phenomenal year for releases, of the likes that we may not see again for quite some time.

I am a huge fan of playing console games on the go.  So for example, Valkeria Chronicles 4, Ys VIII, Dragonball FighterZ, South Park, Wolfenstein 2, Warframe, Fortnite, Paladins, Crash N Sane, Starlink, Okami HD, NBA 2k19, Dark Souls, etc being portable gives me plenty of reasons to play on Switch rather than PS4 or X1.

That is not even getting into games like Pokemon, Smash, Octopath, Xenoblade Torna, and the Octo expansion or any of the WiiU ports most gamers missed out on.

Now overall, I still say 2017 was better than 2018.  But by no means was 2018 a truly "bad" year in general.  You can say that YOU did not find much, but to imply that there was not much to offer as a whole is just insane.  The Switch offered a lot this year overall.

I have to disagree with the overall premise of the post. 2017 was the system launch year. It had Splatoon 2, Arms, Zelda, and Odyssey. For a normal year that is light. For a lunch year that tops almost every launch year in Big games throughout History. I agree overall 2018 has a bigger selection. But we cant downplay 2017 because it laid the ground work for Switch success. And most Launch years are history abysmal for new systems. 2019 will def be the best year so far game wise.

Well, I suppose if you're looking more for 3rd party and indie games, I can see why this year seems better than the last. Your OP doesn't seem to really convey that though. It seems you sort of contradict your opinion, saying things like 3rd party still being mediocre or not being console moving games, as well as it coming down to quantity vs quality. I'm not really convinced after reading your OP and I still think 2017 was really excellent.

What I'm saying is that, I don't mean to discredit 2017 too much, it certainly had stellar titles and helped get the Switch to where it is now. My point was that people may be overrating how good 2017 was a bit. 2017 was only as good as it was because Nintendo made sure there were 4 big system sellers on the Switch as early as possible, but take those away, you have a deceptively lackluster year compared to 2018 and soon 2019, mainly due to third party support just not being there for most of the year. It was largely up to Nintendo to prove the Switch's worth and they managed to do so with flying colors.

2018 would see less big titles from Nintendo, however, it made up for it by having more Nintendo published games released in the year, plus, third party support was much better by the Switch's second year vs. launch window, with more and more relevant games being confirmed for the platform. This is what I mean by quality vs quantity. You have a choice between a smaller number of games, but with most of them being massive AAA games. VS. a quieter year with less big releases, but overall a larger and more diverse library of still solid titles. Hope that clarifies things a bit. 

2018 was much better in terms of overall support, it just lacked 1 or 2 1st party mega sellers in Q1-Q3.

Agreed. I didn't find last years line up amazing but I right feel the op made a convincing line up. 

SO... how are you defining what a good year?  What makes one year better than another, and why?  Is there an objective criteria we can use?