The Gameboy was a nerfed NES. The GBA was a nerfed SNES. The DS was a nerfed N64 and the 3DS, a nerfed Gamecube. Their handhelds have always been nerfed devices, hence the Switch being a poor-man's PS4. And, likewise, the prices of these handhelds have always reflected as much. I paid under a hundred dollars for a launch GBA. Launch. Not at the end of its lifecycle mind you... this was day one. And that is the sort of price-point we've come to expect from a Nintendo handheld, mostly due to it being so under powered and technologically behind what is currently on the market. But this time, you're talking about something that is only a hundred dollars less than the top of the line launch-PS3, a system that was so expensive, the parent company literally told us we'd get second jobs to afford it... and that machine was cutting edge. The Switch 2 is not. Not even close.

And then you have digital titles coming in at eighty dollars?

Eighty?

Are you kidding me!?!?!

Whether this thing sells or not, it's price-point is too high and will hinder its potential. Whatever it sells, it would have sold so much better had it come in at $399.99 like it should have, with games being $59.99. These aren't GTA 6 games. They do not cost anywhere near what those games cost to develop, so the prices at retail (and certainly digitally) should reflect as much.

None of the handheld platforms were "nerfed [home consoles.]" They were platforms with their own advantages and disadvantages with the console analogues you mentioned. For example, the 3DS had a much more capable GPU (with a much more modern feature-set) and overall more memory than the GameCube. 

The prices didn't "always reflect as much" either. The 3DS cost more than a GameCube, and had a similar price-drop schedule to the GameCube. Even if you account for inflation, it still cost the same at launch ($250 in 2011 ~ $200 in 2001.) The Switch cost as much as (and often due to stock shortages, even more than) a base PS4. In fact I bought my refurbished Switch in September 2017 for more than I bought my brand new PS4 Pro in April 2018 ($377 vs $355), although the Switch did come with BOTW (a game I already beat on Wii U.)  

The Switch (and Switch 2) also isn't a handheld in the sense that the 3DS or GameBoy were anyway. Its power-profile when docked is a tier above handheld platforms (8-15W vs. 0.7-3W at the package level.) 

AND AGAIN YOU ARE NOT ADJUSTING FOR INFLATION. The PS3 did NOT cost only about $100 more than the Switch 2 in 2025 dollars. Your whole argument here is based on faulty (and outright false) premises. 

More gameplay from last night's/this morning's Treehouse:

Adjusting for inflation and the price-point people place on items are two different things. The average Joe does not walk into a store, see an eighty dollar game that was sixty dollars the last time they saw a similar one and go, gee... that's a lot of money... but if I calculate for inflation and carry the one... it's about the same price! They see eighty that dollars and go, fuck that shit! And that's what's going on right now. People are not happy. Hell, during the official stream, there were tons of viewers spamming lower the price over and over again. lol

But hey, if you don't care, if you want to justify it, go right ahead. People that like things justify things. It happens. I don't justify anything. I just look at something and make a judgment, regardless of my bias, and for the first time in my life, I'm seeing Nintendo attempting to out-gouge the rest of the guys which is really, really odd. You don't think of Nintendo as being the gouge-company. You think of them as being the consumer-friendly company. A company that thinks about mass market first. But eighty dollar digital games? That's not mass market. That's just insane, imo.

Oh my the pyshics! When hit by a regular car in traffic, the Blue shell hit making the kart roll over *chef kiss* 

That Knockout mode looks totally awesome.

Given that nominal wages also increased (which is why I originally talked about the relative price of the consoles in terms of their percentage of average salary) perceived affordability is affected by inflation. If you compare to the average wage, the PS3 cost double in % of average 2006 salaries what the Switch 2 costs in 2025 salaries. The Switch 2's price is in line with the Wii and Switch in that metric, both highly successful consoles. 

What you saw with the stream is the same thing we saw with the original Switch. Many people, mostly those who weren't interested in the Switch 2 in the first place or who see the platform as something "lesser" for its form-factor or hardware (like you did in this thread, originally), complained "why would I buy a handheld that costs $350 with a game when the other consoles cost just as much?" Then it became either the first or narrowly second best selling platform of all time. Again, you didn't address the fact that my Switch (which I bought refurbished because I couldn't find a new one) cost more than my new PS4 Pro, within six months of each-other, and even if I found it new without a game, it would've been only $50 cheaper than the PS4 Pro and more expensive than a base PS4 or XBO. 

And no, I don't think if somebody wants to buy the next Mario Kart, Animal Crossing, or any of these dozen million selling titles, that a $20 price increase is going to stop them.  People might buy fewer games over all (and this might affect less popular titles) but the console itself and the big sellers (which are the games being priced this high) are going to sell regardless. 

If you think Nintendo hasn't been the most profit-seeking of the big three, I don't know where you've been. They never take a loss on their platforms (except when they dropped the GameCube to $99), their games never drop in price, they keep features to the bare minimum for their service and networking infrastructure, they have expensive accessories attached to their platform, etc. They haven't been the "cheap" brand since the Wii/GC days. They've basically positioned themselves as a video game version of Disney. Sony and Microsoft, comparatively are more willing to take a loss and subsidize their gaming segments by other products they sell. For them, gaming is a complementary good or service within a greater software/media infrastructure.

You failed so hard in disdaying Switch 2 for being a handheld that flew through your head how handhelds were compared with Sony/MS consoles on that time. 

Playing the current AAA releases on the go plus being Nintendo best hardware on the market is an HUGE advantage over these brick sized consoles. Something you wouldnt see on a 3ds or GBA

Getting round to watching the treehouse footage now. Looks really polished and while the textures and surfaces don't look much improved the lighting, models, image quality and particurly the detail in the distance is a step up.

The points system is a bit weird though. 15 points for first and one point for last means there's multiple positions on the same points.

Kinda hurts that blasting past someone right at the end feeling if you end up getting the same points anyway.

EG right at the end you overtake someone to go from 5th to 4th and snatch the place! Except 4th and 5th both get 9 points so it's pointless lol.

They could have just made first 25 points! It's an easy fix.

It's also going to take me time to see how I feel about driving to the next course counting as the first two laps, then you do one lap of the course before leaving for the next. Basically everything except the first race in the GP is a point to point. Not necessarily bad, just very different to prior games which only has a few points to point races.

The page indicator at the bottom suggests there's somewhere in the range of 73-84 characters which is crazy lol. As you can play as a cow I'm guessing basically every mario character and creature imaginable is playable on this game.