$391 vs $449 isn't much difference in today's economy? Why not $399 then if Nin were so focused on keeping in line with inflation?

If it was $399 the hardware would have to be cheaper, making it less capable of running modern games.

I get Shu's point. People have become used to Nin's blue ocean strategy, and so they expect something very different, or different enough from last gen, but it kinda seems like Nin has actually been taking a hybrid approach with their business model for a while now, where they stick with something similar enough, but iterate on it so there's some difference. That would make sense from an outsiders perspective, just looking at the transition from Wii to Wii U to Switch to Switch 2. You can see the steps they're taking.

It's just that Wii was such a major direction change from Gamecube. Switch kinda seemed like that at first, since it felt like Nin was ditching home consoles, but in reality they're just dipping their feet in both pools now with the same product.

I agree though, it would be nice for Nin to have a dedicated home console, since they did have a dedicated handheld with Switch Lite. Thing is I'd guess it's less likely for Nin to create a powerful beast, and more likely they'd just take SW2 hardware and stick in it a home console looking shell. Either way, it would cover all 3 spaces with dedicated hardware, which would be nice.

We all know SNY wanted to charge more for PS5 at launch, but didn't. They also were breaking even within like 6 months of launch.

SW2 wouldn't have required inferior hardware for a $399 launch.

I want to add two things to this discussion:

1) When designing the console, Nintendo surely took into account the fact that console generations last longer these days. A typical console generation lasted for 5 to 6 years back in the 90s and 2000s. But the Switch was Nintendo's primary console for over 8 years and generations in general last longer.

Nintendo is also afraid of hardware transitions as those are the riskiest times in the business: You can go from number one to dead last, from huge profits to bleeding money with every hardware transition in this business (granted, these situations are mostly a company's own fault - see Wii U or PS3 for example - but it is still a risky time). Thus, it makes sense to assume they put at least some extra power into the console to future-proof it a bit.

Nintendo didn't have to include features like HDR, Ray Tracing and 120fps support in a hybrid console in 2025. They could've gotten away with it. But what about 2028? 2031? Longer generations create predictability for Nintendo. With that in mind, it makes sense they'd rather charge 50$ more for the console as this is a long-term game they are playing.

2) The blue ocean strategy is not Nintendo's go-to strategy! They designed exactly one product around this and that was the Nintendo DS. The Wii was a disruptive product, engineered around Clayton Christensen's theory of disruptive innovation. And the 3DS and Wii U were neither disruptive products nor blue ocean business models. 

The Switch 2 however is at least somewhat a disruptive product. Disruptive products are "crappy products for crappy customers", because they are lacking in a certain value metric other, established products on the market are great at. For the Switch family, that would be hardware power: Switch and Switch 2 are both weaker than their home console counterparts and hardcore gamers (which Christensen would call the "upmarket": The part of the customer segment that is willing to pay the most money to get the "best" products according to the stablished value metrics) scoff at them because of that fact. Disruptive products, however, excel in other value categories (for Switch that could be portability, ease of use of the software, etc.) the upmarket (hardcore gamers) don't deem to be important. Hence the comments that say "I don't care about portability, I would only use the Switch in docked mode anyway, so where is the power?". 

However, Christensen's theory also predicts the disruptive companies to move upmarket, so they can get more of that very profitable segment of "premium customers". And that's (at least in some part) what's happening with the Switch 2: The absolute hardest of the hardcore gamers will still dismiss the Switch 2 as not powerful enough, but roughly 80% of the market will say: "Oh, these games look and rund good enough and the console is portable. Why buy a PS5 if I can play most games on the Go on Switch 2?"

The stablished upmarket companies (Sony in this case) can only do two things: Disrupt their own business model (Sony releasing a handheld console instead of a home console next gen, thus catering to the new values hybrid consoles bring to the table) or move even more upmarket (for example, releasing a PS5 Pro or a PS6 which is even more powerful but also more expensive).

To be clear: Christensen talks about disruptive technologies. And the technology here would be mobile chipsets. Mobile chipsets were laughably underpowered compared to chipsets in home consoles and computers some time ago. But thanks to diminishing returns, mobile chipsets can do most of the things most customers expect them to do these days. And this analogy isn't perfect as the Switch 2 is not from the ground up designed to be disruptive. 

But think one generation ahead: If Switch 3 is as powerful as a PS5 Pro... how many people will be able to distinguish between games running on a portable Switch 3 and a TV-bound PS6 with the latest technology? 

You seem to be talking about docked. When sighting S2 being slightly weaker than Steam Deck I was talking about undocked, which if true would be a bit disappointing as the Deck is over 3 years old now... It's true that it launched for a bit more than S2 (at 256GB) though Nintendo will have vastly more bargaining power so should get a lot more bang for their buck due to volume (think the Deck is around 4 million sold, so under 1.5m per year).

Thankfully due to S2 assumed large install base, games will be optimized more than on the Deck, but it would have been nice to have both - Optimization + undocked performance that handily beat a 3yo Deck. Also, for CP specifically, this has been Nvidias showpiece for various technologies so it should run better than vs AMD hardware at a similar performance.

Maybe you have an insight into how much more a node step up would have cost? They'd have saved money from not having to change node mid-gen (if they followed S1 strategy) and they'd also presumably have gotten another year or 2 out of the hardware as it would have delayed the point at which the visuals would be seen as obsolete.

I'm just going from what DF is saying, so if that proves inaccurate then I'll obvs change my position.

Now you're just pulling stuff out of your ass.

Inflation comparisons, especially for gaming, just don't work. The 20gb 360 launched for $399 in 2005. Adjusting for inflation that would be $650. Arguing the Switch 2 isn't much more expensive than the Switch 1 because of inflation is like arguing the PS5 Pro isn't much more expensive than the Xbox 360.

The $599 PS3 was horrifically expensive in 2006, but an inflationary equivalent price of $949 today would be viewed even worse. If you released games at $100-$120 today, equivalent for many n64 titles, you would be lynched.

To be clear I don't have an issue with the Switch 2 hardware pricing, and I think it will be completely sold out this year, but inflation comparisons for the prices of games and hardware just don't work. The Switch 2 at $449 is not going to be perceived as being not much more than the $299 Switch 1 launched at just because of 8 years of inflation.

Perception is beside the point, the simple fact is that things don't cost the same now as they did in 2017 because the value of our currency has degraded.

Expecting a console to cost the same now as it did almost a decade ago just isn't realistic.

Much of this makes sense, but one thing to consider is that Nvidia saying SW2 is 10x performance doesn't mean much right now since anyone who knows Nvidia, knows when it comes to marketing they go way, way overboard with stretching the truth.

Even if SW2 were 6x-8x more performant, SW1 is pretty much all hardware performance, where as SW2 has software performance enhancements like DLSS. That saves money because having to beef up the hardware that much more to meet that 6x-8x target, using only hardware, would cost more. That's why software like DLSS (Nvidia) and FSR (AMD) exist, because they are more cost effective vs hardware.

I think Nin made the right decisions for the most part with the choices they made when it came to SW2 hardware and not being too different with a wild gimmick. I just think they took the price increases across the board a little too far. A $399 SW2 would've led to much less backlash because most would be able to say, 'at least the hardware cost is quite reasonable'.