Forget my two front teeth. All I want for Christmas is a solid online infrastructure for Nintendo Switch!
Add Friends
Can friend codes please go die in a deep, dark, flaming, sulfury smelling hole? Thanks.
There’s no reason that friend codes should still exist. They’re long, impersonal, impractical, and not used in any other modern technological setting.
See Friends
Nintendo has historically been all about the “couch multiplayer” experience, but it’s time those sensibilities were extended to online play. Their preferences don’t excuse them for providing trash solutions over the Internet. When my friend comes online to play a game, I get a little pop-up in the top left corner of my screen… but that’s it! I can’t tap on it, can’t spectate their session, can’t send them a message… nothing. Nintendo could also bring competitive leaderboard features to the forefront by notifying me when my scores are broken by a friend, even before I pop the cartridge in!
Join Friends
It should be easy to play online with my friends, no matter which mode. It should also be painless to make sure we’re on the same Splatoon team, rather than randomly being pitted against each other. Nintendo has always brought friends together, so let’s write the extra lines of code necessary to facilitate that when we aren’t in the same room.
Talk to Friends
Tools. That’s all we need! We just require the tools to speak to our friends, the tools to monitor or restrict that usage for our children, and the ability to use our own equipment. You won’t catch me dead with that horrid squid dongle with a web of cables running every which way… keep it simple.
It shouldn’t matter if we’re playing the same game, either. System-wide party chat has been solved for a couple console generations, so the Big N needs to jump on the bandwagon.
I’m not being too demanding because Nintendo’s competitors have all of this covered already. This is nothing new.
Nintendo starts charging for online play in 2018, and the ramp-up hasn’t looked very promising with how they’ve handled their mobile app and voice chat so far. For crying out loud, Discord has even gone on record saying that Nintendo could contract them to handle this whole infrastructure! There are no more excuses. They have to get this right if they think fans will subscribe to their service.
Scott
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