Stop. Do you hear that? It’s a siren in the night. But not the ambulance kind. It’s the sexy babe kind. Except this siren doesn’t look like a babe at all because it’s actually the Nintendo Switch 2.
Dammit, I knew this day would come. I’ve bought a new turn table. I’ve bought a DAC. I’ve bought new records and CDs. I’m trying to create a positive change in my life, to take back my time from Big Tech’s algorithm-driven matrix. And now the siren’s call beckons me in the night. The new Nintendo Switch 2 just dropped and it looks sexy indeed.
I’ve always been a Nintendo guy. After all, it was the Playstations, X-Boxes, and PCs that turned men into basement dwelling pizza gobling incels. The Nintendo was different. It was was bright, honest, safe enough for kids.
Nintendo franchises like Mario and Zelda provide an entertaining diversion without stealing your soul. When dinner’s ready you have a fighting chance of turning off these games before the food gets cold. This seemed to be true with most of the Nintendo games I had tried. But this built-in safety feature was rendered obsolete once older games previously unavailable on Nintendo consoles started being ported over to the Switch.
After beating Zelda Breath of the Wild on the first Nintendo Switch I wanted more adventure. I saw Skyrim, a game from the Playstation 3 generation, on the Nintendo eshop. I decided to give it a try. After all, I knew it was a classic that many feel is the best game ever made and it was now available to play on the Switch.
Holy moly had I been missing out.
Video games made for grown ups are AMAZING. The best ones, like Skyrim, are book-like in their immersive-ness. Every non-playable character (NPC) you talk to says something connected to other NPCs. Talking to NPCs leads you on side quests and adventures that make the world feel connected and alive.
I went on to try other adult games like The Witcher 3, and Red Dead Redemption along with simpler games like Hollow Knight and Animal Well. (Civilization VI was another great hardcore game although too addicting for my taste.) But no matter what style of game I played, from open world RPG to metroidvania, they all shared one thing in common: they weren’t guitar.
Now, I want to be clear that I think it’s ok for things to not be guitar. My wife and kid aren’t guitar and forgive them for that. My morning cup of coffee isn’t guitar but I still drink it. My family and coffee have a space in my life that nothing could supplant. Guitar, however, holds a space in my life that is more fragile and less imperative to my physical survival. This is the space that video games force their way into, supplanting my music time. When the siren comes, she slowly moves my guitar into the other room while I’m distracted with tasks such as fencing stolen goods in a medieval sewer.
If I was retired I would have enough time for video games. Unfortunately, my financial independence has yet to appear on the horizon. Instead, I stand with white knuckles and a clenched jaw in resistance to the Switch 2’s song because succumbing to its melody only means cutting out my own. It doesn’t help that my only functioning guitar right now has what I’m finding to be the world’s most uncomfortable neck profile. It makes the new Switch 2 controllers look like pure luxury in comparison. It couldn’t hurt just to see how the new controllers feel in my hands, could it?
