"Limited time production through Fall 2025 (available while supplies last)"

The Mario Kart bundle is limited, will be sold out long before Christmas, and probably have stock issues before too. Most people will have to pay the $80 RRP, at least until Nintendo likely create a new bundle for holiday 2026.

Indeed. While there are reasons to be somewhat angry at Nintendo, I think first party support is not one of them. For a new system, there's plenty of games to look forward in the near future, and one of them is their heaviest hitter by a mile.

Heck, I don't even understand the third party support complaints. Not only is the Switch getting many modern multiplatform titles (and they are looking pretty good too, so future looks promising on that front) that the previous Switch missed, it also secured an insane exclusive like The Duskbloods.

I still think that the only thing people should be mad about is the price increase on games and specially the fact that they are trying to kill physical media for good. Everything else is looking amazing, easily topping any other console launch I can think of.

And how dismayed people will be. So many folks came to rain on such a great parade, this was one of the shiniest moments for a Nintendo player. Sure the thing is a bit more expensive but we all know now that it will be worth it and extremely successful. I don't understand why people can't let others just have some fun sometimes. Why be so miserable? 🤷

I think the console's price is steep for what is supposed to be a mass-market handheld. It's not bad when compared to similar high-end handhelds, but those are aimed at a smaller audience than Switch is aimed at. The game prices are absurd. That more than the lack of a 3d Mario is where I think Nintendo is shooting themselves in the foot. I do not understand this compulsive need to nickel and dime consumers at every turn they've had for decades. It's the same mentality that made them go with cartridges for the N64, costing them many times more income in lost sales than the piracy they thought they were fighting ever could have cost them.

The biggest question:

Who cares? It's a camera.

A $10 price increase for games was always coming. Absolutely no reason why anyone should expect Nintendo whose games have shown incredible longevity in the software charts should stick with $60 when companies with worse track records have opted for $70. Nintendo wasn't going to leave that money on the table.

Nintendo's attempt at killing physical media for good, as you call it, isn't as severe as it looks at first glance. All Nintendo can do is set an MSRP that isn't binding, so while they say there's an extra 10 for physical versions now, the reality is that retailers across many countries have commonly undercut the MSRP by around 10. We won't see this practice being used widely during the launch window when retailers expect to have their game allocations sell out anyway, but as the generation goes on, we'll revert back to what has been the norm for Switch games. Just that this time around physical will cost as much as digital instead of being cheaper.

If someone doesn't like any of the prices, be it the console itself, its games or its accessories, the choice is pretty easy: Just wait until prices come down or look out for discounts.

Who said anything about them being new releases? I said notable, as in games that sell well or move hardware.

If you think Nintendo is somehow pushing for the end of physical games, I'm not sure you've actually seen what literally every other platform is doing.

Nintendo are still the only platform that regularly has physical retail games that are fully playable out of the box without a necessary download or install. Spending a bit more to get a real product is hardly a great punishment.

Even the game-key situation which originally alarmed me turned out to be a positive step back towards some ownership. After hearing DF break the details down, what the game-keys actually do is mandate that every physical copy even if they're a full game download, must ship with at least a physical cartridge that's tied to that copy of the game. So even when you download that game, the digital copy isn't tied to any one account but the cartridge with the key. It can then be removed, shared or sold just like a regular physical copy which anyone can use.

Of course the publishers that will regularly ship games with only a download key, are mostly still the same bad actors that Nintendo have little control over. Nintendo still generally try to encourage and offer solutions for fully physical games. Cyberpunk 2077 is proof of that.

Nintendo are the only platform holder creating more solutions to protect physical ownership.

Exactly this! Game-Keys are sellable and tradable licenses to games. That's a huge step up from just a one time use download key. Valve, Sony, and Microsoft would have implemented this ages ago if they had any integrity. Steam allows developers to put Denuvo into your games and other evil nonsense. It's not really that hard to create a world in which you can freely buy/sell/trade your digital games and Nintendo is leading the charge.

I also see the game-key card as a positive step for the reason that it's more honest than the previous fake physical games that had a little bit of game data on the card and forced the rest to be downloaded. Now the full size of the game's file is printed on the front of the cover, making it easy to tell instantly what size of an actual game card would have been needed. This will make it much harder for the bad actors on gaming forums who defend the bad actors in game publishing.