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Data Storage Nintendo Entertainment Games

Nintendo Delaying 64GB Game Cards For Switch Until 2019, Says Report (kotaku.com) 54

Posted by BeauHD from the technical-difficulties dept.
According to The Wall Street Journal, Nintendo is pushing back the introduction of larger 64GB game cards for the Switch. Nintendo had planned to make them available during the second half of 2018, but has reportedly told developers that they would have to wait. The reason is reportedly due to technical issues. Kotaku reports: As Kotaku previously reported, Nintendo's Switch games keep their size slim, with downloads for Super Mario Odyssey, Arms and Splatoon 2 ranging from 2-6GB. However, third party developers have been releasing bigger, data-heavy games, outpacing the Switch's 24GB of usable onboard memory. The Journal notes that Nintendo has already sold over 10 million Switch consoles, meaning developers could continue to flock to the platform, regardless.
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Nintendo Delaying 64GB Game Cards For Switch Until 2019, Says Report More

Nintendo Delaying 64GB Game Cards For Switch Until 2019, Says Report

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  • The SD standard provides for built in encryption and signing as part of the standard, provided you have enough cloud to have a business they will allow to have the info under NDA. I wonder why Nintendo just doesn't use that, or perhaps add their own DRM layer?

    Even if they only allow their "blessed" rebranded SD cards sold only by them, it would be a fairly easy technology to repurpose.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      I'm curious if it's a read rate issue.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      The switch does support micro SD cards for data storage. I could see there being a lot of confusion if games were sold directly on SD cards. Imagine the situation where you get a buy a game and later need to download DLC for it. The SD card the game came on isn't big enough for the extra data. What do they do? Include 2 SD card slots on the system? Then it might be easy to get your personal sd and your game SDs mixed up. Nintendo's own cards are also much thicker and more durable than SD cards. If you have

    • Nintendo patents every one of their console's media. IIRC even the WII is a slightly off kilter DVD. That way they can maintain control of software distribution using the patent system. Otherwise they run the risk of folks publishing unlicensed games. Normally it wouldn't be worth the effort but Nintendo has been just awful to all of their partners since pretty much day one. The tales of them screwing over people would helped them build their empire are legendary and the industry littered with their corpses

    • The Switch cartridges are much faster, that is all. There is also already a built-in microSD card slot that supports up to 256GB flash cards, but it seems to be reserved for ancillary data (replays, screenshots, etc)

      • The Switch cartridges are much faster, that is all.

        How much faster? Some SD cards are quite fast. But there's the rub; performance varies wildly. What's more, random read performance varies drastically! That's not something I expected, but sure enough, there are huge differences between cards in this regard. I switched from Sandisk Ultra to Samsung Evo because of the random read performance. For cameras, it doesn't matter even slightly. For any kind of interactive use, it's dramatic.

        I could see Nintendo wanting to just avoid this whole issue for game data.

      • A U1 MicroSD card is faster.
        I just got a Switch and look at recomendations on what SD card to use. And I stumpeled over a test. Where internal memory was fastes, then the SD card, and then the cartridges. It was loading time of 1 secund between them. But SD card was faster.
        Also it support up to 2TB MicroSD cards not just 256GB.

  • "The Journal notes that Nintendo has already sold over 10 million Switch consoles, meaning developers could continue to flock to the platform, regardless"

    Uh no. The PS4 has sold north of 60 million consoles and has by far the most titles, exclusives and indie ports. Developers are flocking to the PS4. The Xbone is north of 25 million units sold, making the switch the bastard step child of this console generation. With good reason. I used to buy every console of a generation to always be able to play

    • Re:Skewed article is missing frame of reference (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday December 27, 2017 @08:18PM (#55819221)

      Huh, the Switch has been out for less than a year. The PS4 and Xbone have been out for 4 years. The Switch is selling at the same rate as the PS4 and faster than the Xbone in the same time frame. The Switch isn't really marketed at the hardcore market -- Nintendo abandoned that market after the GameCube. It obviously isn't targeted for you, that's fine but don't let your disinterest cloud your thinking.

      • Huh, the Switch has been out for less than a year. The PS4 and Xbone have been out for 4 years. The Switch is selling at the same rate as the PS4 and faster than the Xbone in the same time frame.

        If the PS4 has been out for four years, yet it's still selling just as well as Nintendo's console which has been out for just one year and which is cheaper, then that clearly demonstrates that the PS4 has superiority. And I say this as a Sony hater who won't consider giving them a dime.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by phorm ( 591458 )

          PS4 has an established lineup of games. The Switch is just getting warmed up there.

          Games and the gaming experience sell consoles, not just fast processors

          • PS4 has an established lineup of games. The Switch is just getting warmed up there.

            It's been out for an entire year and still there's no games worth buying?

            Games and the gaming experience sell consoles, not just fast processors

            Yeah, that's why Nintendo is last. Because of the half-assed gaming experience.

    • where the silent nature of the hardware coupled with the extra screen are big selling points, especially at a console aimed at kids. The Wii U suffered the same problems. It's CPU was underclocked to keep the fan quite so Japanese housewifes wouldn't complain. They compensated by adding a ton of cache ram, which made the thing a beast to program for. Several kickstarters (Mighty Number 9 being the most prominent) put our pretty crappy product and the resources needed to develop for that beast of a console w

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward

      LAWL.

      You belong on some fringe edge of r/gatekeeping. Seriously.

      Switch is going to be killing it with releases in the coming years. Instead of pumping $$$ into mid-range parts in a controlled environment for "next-gen," they pumped $$ into an existing tech and form factor that multiple age groups can enjoy.

      Video games aren't JUST for elite gamers like yourself, you know. Stop taking them so seriously. The games don't care about your preferences. The gaming systems don't give a shit about how "hardcore" you

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by vux984 ( 928602 )

      What reality distortion field are you laboring under? The PS4 is definitely the best selling console this 'generation' but the switch hasn't even been out a whole year, while the PS4 is over 4 years old now.

      It doesn't even make sense to compare total units directly in a situation like this. Under more reasonable metrics the the PS4 is still comfortably out front, and the Xbox has been a success in its own right... but the Switch is crushing the Xbone.

      I admit I was a bit skeptical of it when it was announce

      • I am glad that the Switch works for you, but Nintendo hasn't been a contender for me since the Wii and even then it was clearly a child's toy, not a hardcore gaming system.

        I have been gaming since Atari 2600 days, and have bought and played on most consoles, but the Wii U and Switch both felt way too gimmicky to buy, with poor performance and a weak lineup of games. The last real Nintendo console that was a contender in performance and lineup was the Gamecube and that was competing with the Xbox and PS2 (a

        • It's a different gaming experience. I'm a PC gamer and have the PS4 beat. If performance if that key to you, it's really the way to go. For my gaming systems, the Wii definetley is the one that gets pulled out of storage the most for family fun.

          • I have a PC gaming rig as well, and did a lot of PC gaming when I was younger, but honestly, at this point in my life between career and family, I don't have 2 hours to dick with installations, settings and drivers to get shit to work. When I have 30 minutes to do some gaming, I want to be able to turn on the TV and start gaming within 3 minutes, and the consoles do that for me. The reality is that the PS4 pro and Xbox One X output gaming quality that is virtually identical to a high end gaming PC because

            • I have a PC gaming rig as well, and did a lot of PC gaming when I was younger, but honestly, at this point in my life between career and family, I don't have 2 hours to dick with installations, settings and drivers to get shit to work.

              It must have been a while since you were a PCgamer. I just launch steam and go. Unless I am messing with mods, there is no mess with anything put hitting play and turning on my controller. I launch my console so rarely that it's a good hour or so before I'm up and running with all the firmware and game updates I have to wait for.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by vux984 ( 928602 )

          "not a hardcore gaming system"

          Don't think of it as a weak 3-years-late ps4 alternative. Think of it as a really souped up 3DS that also supports playing on the big screen TV, couch multiplayer, and party games.

          "with poor performance"

          Performance only matters in the games on the system. Breath of the Wild, Mario Odyssey, Mario Kart Deluxe... etc etc all play smooth as butter. Nobody actually playing games is complaining about performance.

          "and a weak lineup of games"

          Agree to disagree. It's had one the best lau

    • Meh... I just buy all three.

      Xbox shot themselves in the foot this generation with *horrible* PR out of the gate, with the focus on DRM instead of games, and an arrogant attitude that pissed gamers off. On top of that, mandatory pairing with the Kinect was a colossal blunder. That being said, they still have the best online service, hands-down, and it's still a solid console for this generation. But I did wait for the Kinect-less version with the 1GB drive. No discs for me this generation.

      I also bought

      • I'm so mad about the Kinect. I had no problem buying the system with it and it worked really well with lots of voice commands. Now, they stripped most of it away.

    • The PS4 has sold north of 60 million consoles

      9 months into the PS4 release it had sold 4 million consoles. By your own comparison the PS4 is a huge failure compared to the Switch which has sold more than double that in the same time frame.

      makes it a crappy, over priced console and a crappy portable...

      Yep and also the best half portable and half console on the market.

  • 2-6GB is "slim" now?

    I give up. Gonna go dust-off the Intellivision...

  • Nintendo has done nothing this year if not prove that game size (in bytes) has little to do with quality. Almost no (if any) 3ds games were more than 4GB, so even 16GB (current max Switch cartridge size) is a big improvement for a Nintendo handheld. Compared to their last console, it is less than Wii U discs, however. Maybe they'll release a 32GB cartridge as a stopgap. Upping that to 64GB would give more capacity than the dual-layer 50GB Blurays that the ps4 and xbox one use for games. Of course, the next

    • Nintendo does offer 32GB Switch cartridges.

      However, they cost more than 16gb, so developers are putting 16gb on the cart and requiring the customer download the rest of the game, pushing the cost of the storage onto the consumer.

      NBA2K18 requires 24 gigs of downloads before you can play. And its saves are five gigs each. (Which is utterly nuts.)

      Doom at least does it sensibly - you can play single-player off the cart, mutliplayer is a free 9 gig add-on download.

      • NBA2K18 requires 24 gigs of downloads before you can play. And its saves are five gigs each. (Which is utterly nuts.)

        The initial download is nuts. The saves are nuts unless they include detailed replays, in which case they seem reasonable.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Khyber ( 864651 )

          Detailed replay is nothing more than recording player movements, which is easily-compressed data. Even detailed replays of races in Gran Turismo didn't need that much space.

          • Detailed replay is nothing more than recording player movements, which is easily-compressed data.

            No. It's got to record the movements of the whole team, because there is an element of randomness to their movements. This ain't 10 yard fight.

  • This Article is misleading (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    I bought a Switch 3 months ago, and bought a 128 GB microSD card along with it. It works fine.

    I have a dozen games downloaded and still have 90 GB free.

    Article is talking about *game* cartridge storage, which is not really a user facing issue at all?

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