Portable optical media was almost-sorta-kinda a good idea, when flash media offered dozens of megabytes. (And even then, should’ve used a mouse sensor and software tracking instead of a laser assembly.) Download-only would (1) increase costs of a system that was frankly overpriced even before The Idiot’s economy-tanking tantrums and (2) require Nintendo’s online infrastructure to lurch forward by about fifteen years.
It has an SSD sized on the assumption that games go in the slot. It has an SSD that’s the price of a game, and will only hold a dozen. And they could probably get away with less, thanks to focusing on the negligible cost of a hole and some pins.
Nintendo is only now figuring out that Virtual Console purchases should be transferable… at all. They are not qualified to handle a digital-only console. I think the idea of deleting a game and re-downloading it, for free, was a recent surprise to some of these people. The same way Sony’s still trying to repeat the PS2, Nintendo’s been trying to repeat the Famicom Disk System.
Kinda crazy that Nintendo is still supporting cartridges in a brand new console in 2025…
Not everyone has a stable or unmetered internet connection.
And yet it’s the way every other platform is still doing things.
So because everyone else is doing it, it’s ok?
I didn’t say anything resembling that.
You certainly implied it.
I certainly did not. I made an observation.
As opposed to what?
Portable optical media was almost-sorta-kinda a good idea, when flash media offered dozens of megabytes. (And even then, should’ve used a mouse sensor and software tracking instead of a laser assembly.) Download-only would (1) increase costs of a system that was frankly overpriced even before The Idiot’s economy-tanking tantrums and (2) require Nintendo’s online infrastructure to lurch forward by about fifteen years.
As opposed to what literally everyone else is doing?
What? If anything it would decrease it because there’s no slot needed for the media.
I don’t see how that’s a bad thing.
Have you priced SSDs, relative to… slots?
Bad, no. Hard, yes.
It…already has an SSD? Have you contemplated the costs of slot + game cards + shipping + third-party sales fees vs. SSD?
It has an SSD sized on the assumption that games go in the slot. It has an SSD that’s the price of a game, and will only hold a dozen. And they could probably get away with less, thanks to focusing on the negligible cost of a hole and some pins.
Nintendo is only now figuring out that Virtual Console purchases should be transferable… at all. They are not qualified to handle a digital-only console. I think the idea of deleting a game and re-downloading it, for free, was a recent surprise to some of these people. The same way Sony’s still trying to repeat the PS2, Nintendo’s been trying to repeat the Famicom Disk System.
I mean they’re one of the most profitable companies in the business. There’s no reason they couldn’t become qualified…
They could.
They haven’t.
They won’t.
Well I never tried to speculate what they were going to do…