Nintendo Switch Sports (NS) - Review
by Paul Broussard , posted on 23 May 2022 / 4,739 Views
I'll admit that there are days when I don't feel like working. Usually this means doing just enough to appear like I'm not slacking off, but mostly just sitting around putting in as little effort as possible so that I can still collect a paycheck at the end. I've struggled with how to describe these types of days to other people who ask how I'm doing. I've tried everything from calling them "bleh" days, to saying I'm "just not in the zone," to something probably offensive with multiple curse words included, but thanks to the fine folks at Nintendo I no longer need to worry about this anymore. I can just say that I'm going to be putting in exactly as much effort as Nintendo did with Switch Sports and everyone will understand that I couldn't care less about any of my work that day.
It's hard to review Nintendo Switch Sports without mentioning Wii Sports first. Wii Sports was of course a cultural phenomenon back in 2006, and for many people was their first introduction to the idea of controlling a video game with motion controls. It was easy to pick up, simple to control, and a nice novelty. But the problem with novelties is they don't remain novel for long, and as such future Nintendo Sports games had a shelf life comparable to a dissident journalist in a Saudi consulate.
This isn't inherently a bad thing; as I've mentioned before, I think games that put a real effort into refining concepts and mechanics are just as important as games that introduce them. The problem is that the mechanics of Wii Sports are so simplistic that it's very difficult to "refine" them in any meaningful way. There's not too much one can do to the process of swinging a remote to make it more engaging. In short, motion control sports are something of a concept with a short shelf life. Wii Sports Resort tried different sports to switch things up and keep things fresh to varying degrees of success, but even the best lost their luster pretty quickly.
So I came into Nintendo Switch Sports by Nintendo for the Nintendo Switch with relatively low expectations, but even those Nintendo managed to fall flat on with such a lazy offering I feel like I should be insulted. Six sports, three of them copied wholesale from prior installments, with a fourth that plays very similarly to a third already present, for $50. This is the sort of thing that I might expect in a $15-$20 expansion pack, and charging almost full retail price for this is frankly insulting.
But, as the comments sections on these things often demonstrate, insults are often part of reviewing video games, so I grabbed a group of friends and we gave it a try. Bowling, Tennis, and Chambara are all pretty much the exact same as they were the previous time around, although the Joy-Cons seem slightly more accurate in reading inputs than Wii Motion Plus was for Chambara. Badminton is a slight variation on Tennis, and wound up being a little less frustrating to play. Both games don't give you direct control over the movement of your player, but Badminton has less territory that the AI can move around, so there are fewer chances for the game to annoyingly move your character into a position where a shot is hard to return.
Volleyball and Soccer are where the new content is and both are decently fun distractions for a little while. Volleyball plays much how you'd expect, with having to make different motions to bop, set, and spike the ball. The game seems to have particular trouble here reading inputs (particularly the timing), which resulted in us making a variety of different motions to try and get it to understand our commands consistently. Games eventually dissolved into a series of out-of-shape people uncoordinatedly making awkward hand motions, the likes of which haven't been seen since the most recent North Korean military parade.
Soccer (or Football as you European fans call it in your brief moments of lucidity before setting fire to another car) is somehow probably the most enjoyable of the lot, and that's entirely due to the fact that you can actually control your own character's movement. There's a neat little element of stamina management as well; your character has a fairly large stamina bar, but it's also painfully slow to recharge, and knowing when to use it and when to hold off can be the difference between getting a scoring opportunity and not. There are also no goalies, which means that you don't have to wait 40 or so minutes inbetween goals being scored, another substantial benefit over the real world equivalent.
However, again, with the simplicity of these concepts, it's only a (short) matter of time before things get old. Switch Sports runs out of entertainment value a couple of hours in, and at a $50 price point it's a terrible value proposition. Even if Switch Sports carried some of the most amazing gameplay ever designed by mankind, I might balk at recommending it at that price to content ratio. I'm old enough to remember when Metal Gear Rising's DLC got flak for offering a couple of hours of gameplay for $10, and that seems like the steal of a lifetime compared to this now.
Online features do exist, and if this review has convinced you that you desperately need this game in your life, you'll be pleased to know that you don't necessarily need real world friends to actually play it against other humans. You do need them to play it well, however, because the online is Nintendo's usual affair; delay-based netcode that is often laggy and frustrating to play in, especially with sports where precise timing is needed like Volleyball. I won't claim to have the greatest internet in the world, but even if everything I've said so far hasn't dissuaded you on the merits of the game alone, I don't think this is a worthwhile investment for anyone unless they plan on having people over consistently.
From an aesthetic standpoint, Switch Sports is somehow worse than Wii Sports was back in 2006. Maybe Miis just weren't feasible for games where you'd be running around, like soccer (although Wii Sports Resort had Miis with legs), but the weird character designs in Switch Sports just don't have the same simple charm as Miis did. You can, in fairness, create a Mii head and slap it on the body of an otherwise standard Switch character, but it looks frankly bizarre. The general design of arenas and the movement of characters is fine, but nothing inspiring, and the music is pretty unremarkable.
So that's Switch Sports. Just like the crown prince of Nintendo's newest investor, it's short, unengaging, and isn't nearly as impressive as it thinks it is. The price point is unreasonable, the games on display don't have nearly enough new content, and what is new has some charm but ultimately lacks staying power. Now all that's left is for me to hope that unlike the aforementioned individual, Switch Sports won't send assassins to kill me because I didn't like it.
VGChartz Verdict
3
Bad
This review is based on a copy of Nintendo Switch Sports for the NS
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That score does not reflect the review, all you kept saying it was simple and limited by what can be done with motion controls, and you personally found it only entertaining for a short time, but a 3 out 10 would indicate a complete train wreck no matter who played it and to avoid it at all costs
In my experience, the review scores here actually use the entire scale. When reading the review, I was expecting a 4/10 so I wasn't far off.
I think "below average" is the most accurate way to describe the game. I have it. I play it sometimes daily for half an hour or an hour. It's fun. I recommend it. But I wouldn't disagree with the review from a critical standpoint.
There's 6 games for now. The score comes from a value to cost ratio I think. I bought it digital so only paid 40. Maybe that's why I feel a little better about it. On the other hand, I don't regret the purchase. If I stopped playing it now, I would feel like I got what I paid for. But I expect I'll play the game for 50 or 100 hours.
It just comes down to expectations. I feel like they accurately portrayed the game prior to launch. There wasn't a bait and switch or anything. So if the score is low, it's only a little low.
I'm rambling, but the game has limited content and if it isn't what someone is looking for, it results in the low score.
I said it before and I’ll say it again. As soon as you see the name of this reviewer, don’t even bother reading further. It's a waste of your time.
This review was embarrassingly bad. My dear God. Lol. He called the Wii sports' mechanics simplistic, lol. There is certainly more than one area that this game can and should be criticized on. But dude, the mechanics, really?
"Games eventually dissolved into a series of out-of-shape people uncoordinatedly making awkward hand motions, the likes of which haven't been seen since the most recent North Korean military parade." Man, that really made a giggle lol.
I foresee another title that harcore gamers hate, and a lot of 'normal' people like a lot. But I am also one of these weird guys thinking not every game is for every gamer (something that enrages people if suggested in the context of Elden Ring or other From Games, because they complain that if the game isn't for everyone, it isn't worth made).
KAREN!!!
what were expectations here?
I'm speechless.
From the same author of the review of Brilliant Diamond / Shining Pearl (verdict: 2.5), we now have another text that immediately makes clear the author's bias and ill will towards the reviewed game. I don't know if the intention is simply to cause controversy (something like "talk bad, but talk about me"), but I'm already bored with this type of supposedly iconoclastic review.
Why do some people think only Europeans call it football? Everywhere except in the US, Canada and I think Australia too it's called football.
It’s clear in the opening sentences VGChartz hired the wrong guy for the review. This is professional writing 101 - “know your audience.” This guy not only failed to understand the the audience of the game, but failed to understand the audience of VGChartz. So, who’s this for? This review is as pointless to publish as “Chrono Trigger 3/10, I hate RPGs with no action.”
Perhaps VGChartz should stay out of the game review business, this isn’t the first time this has happened. I suspect most of the longtime VGChartz community expect more than a site that promises reviews, and instead hauls troll feces for clicks.
I haven't played Wii Sports before, but from a technical point of view the controls feel pretty precise. The only point I'm missing (besides a few more sports) is an online tournament with scores. Or compare scores with your friends. Mario Tennis Aces made everything right in this case.
A 3? I've been taking my Switch to every social gathering I could lately to play this with different groups of friends and every single time this game was an instant hit.
"Simple"? "Limited"? You need to understand what this game was made for. It's very easy to pick up even for people who hardly played a game in their lives and they have a blast. This is a ultimately a party game, and it excels at it. I could never call this game bad becaues it simply isn't bad. Not a masterpiece by any means, but it is a game that knows what it's meant to do and does a very good job a it.
I will be the first to admit I'm not into Wii Sports or Nintendo games like this but this guy constantly has the worst reviews. Like he would be better off doing troll reviews for slant magazine. Same guy who shat on Nier and Lost Judgment but funny enough gave Xenoblade a lower score because it was a JRPG. Some of the worst takes. Please get a new reviewer for this website. This is legit one of the worst game reviewers I have ever seen. Worse than IGN or Polygon.
What a bizarre review. The bias of the author is clear when he basically says he came into the game expecting to not like it. Hard to like a game you've convinced yourself to dislike before you've even played it. Why would vgchartz have someone who knows they don't like this kind of game review the game?? By doing that this review doesn't help anyone actually get an idea of how the game is.
From what I can tell Nintendo could have and should have put a lot more effort into this game, but its still basically Wii Sports with online on the Switch so you know it's gonna be a ton of hours of fun (despite the reviewer saying it runs out of entertainment value after a couple hours lol....how many dozens of hours did I play Wii Sports for ...hmmmm, a lot of dozens of hours).
Seems like the main disappointments are you still can't control your player in tennis, we have to wait for golf, there's no boxing, and they didn't bother adding any depth to the gameplay beyond what was in Wii Sports, so it remains just a simple but very fun game that'll offer many hours of fun even though it doesn't perhaps build that fun into a deeper experience.
The fact there's no boxing is what baffles me the most. Bowling and golf were the two games that made the original Wii Sports engaging at first, but the sport with the most staying power was definitely boxing.
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