Nintendo Cancels US Preorder Date and More

<v Speaker 1>Hey, everybody, welcome to Game Breaking News with Me Jeff Grub,
<v Speaker 1>your host from giant bomb dot com. Thank you for
<v Speaker 1>tuning in. In this episode, we're gonna be talking about
<v Speaker 1>tariff chaos, which is making Nintendo bulk on switch to
<v Speaker 1>pre orders, at least in the United States. It's gonna
<v Speaker 1>be a show. I don't know if it's a good one.
<v Speaker 1>I got Jane show with me. Jan, how are you doing.
<v Speaker 2>I'm doing great. Nothing nothing bad could happen today or yes, far.
<v Speaker 3>As I'm aware, nothing bad can ever happen to us.
<v Speaker 2>Right, Yeah, that's that's true. As long as you keep
<v Speaker 2>smiling Grub, everything's gonna be fine.
<v Speaker 3>Uh huh. I just want to be stupid and happy, Jan,
<v Speaker 3>that's all I need.
<v Speaker 1>It's not working. Uh yeah, we're gonna get into it all,
<v Speaker 1>but boy, it is. It's hitting the fan today. It's
<v Speaker 1>really it's gone sideways and it just feels like hopeless
<v Speaker 1>and it feels like it could get worse in a
<v Speaker 1>lot of ways, you know, And that's just the video games.
<v Speaker 3>Oh boy, it's gonna be a show, everybody. Let's explain what.
<v Speaker 2>We Grab your power gloves, grab your Nintendo zappers, call
<v Speaker 2>your representatives and head to the lighthouse.
<v Speaker 1>Now do something, somebody do something, Go get you know what. Actually,
<v Speaker 1>let's just send a Paul record after him. I think
<v Speaker 1>that's what we do. I think we can get him
<v Speaker 1>to annoy him just into submission. I think that's possible.
<v Speaker 1>All right, let's explain what we do here. Let's just
<v Speaker 1>get into it. Most weekdays, I Jeff Grubb, will help
<v Speaker 1>piece your gaming life back together. That includes breaking news
<v Speaker 1>and maybe even some of our own original reporting. For
<v Speaker 1>all these topics, I'll get the input of a bona
<v Speaker 1>fide expert who will make me look smart. If you
<v Speaker 1>were watching live on Twitch, welcome. You can always listen
<v Speaker 1>to the show later on podcast feeds by searching for
<v Speaker 1>game break News or find the RSS on Harss feed
<v Speaker 1>on giant bomb dot com. You can also catch the
<v Speaker 1>show later on YouTube. Hello YouTube. All right, we have
<v Speaker 1>a lot to get into, so let's start the morning
<v Speaker 1>mess with Nintendo switch To. Preorders have been delayed due
<v Speaker 1>to tariffs. Release date is still as of now June fifth.
<v Speaker 1>This is from Stephen Petite at GameSpot, who got this
<v Speaker 1>statement from Nintendo. Pre Orders for Nintendo switch To in
<v Speaker 1>the US will not start on April ninth. In April nine,
<v Speaker 1>twenty twenty five, in order for us to assess the
<v Speaker 1>potential impact of tariffs and the evolving marketing conditions and
<v Speaker 1>then parentheses in the United States. Nintendo will update timing
<v Speaker 1>at a later date. The launch date of June fifth,
<v Speaker 1>twenty twenty five is unchanged. So there's obviously a lot
<v Speaker 1>of sides to this, but just right there. They were
<v Speaker 1>originally going to begin preorders with retail partners and themselves.
<v Speaker 3>Nintendo is going to do pre orders through their website
<v Speaker 3>beginning on a April ninth.
<v Speaker 1>Some people we are already getting their confirmation emails from
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo saying exactly that, and the system is going to
<v Speaker 1>be four hundred and fifty dollars and then five hundred
<v Speaker 1>dollars bundled with Mario Kart World. That already felt like
<v Speaker 1>very high prices, and that's jen they were definitely predicting tariffs,
<v Speaker 1>like they factored tariffs into that price in the United States,
<v Speaker 1>and of course then that.
<v Speaker 3>Filters out to the rest of the world. That's just
<v Speaker 3>how it works.
<v Speaker 1>They were like, Okay, he's been talking about twenty twenty
<v Speaker 1>five percent tariffs, especially on China. He has a bone
<v Speaker 1>to pick with China constantly. Earlier this year, for Akawa
<v Speaker 1>was talking about how they were going to deal with this.
<v Speaker 1>They were asked explicitly about the potential of uncertainty and tariffs,
<v Speaker 1>and they told investors and the people that represent investors that, hey,
<v Speaker 1>we are diversifying where we produce these things, including Vietnam
<v Speaker 1>and Cambodia and lo and behold. Hours after the Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>switched to reveal on Roperation Day itself, Janichoa, Donald Trump announced,
<v Speaker 1>I think it's forty six percent and forty nine percent
<v Speaker 1>trade embargoes tariffs on Vietnam and Cambodia.
<v Speaker 3>Those are they are the ones that actually get hit
<v Speaker 3>the hardest.
<v Speaker 1>So that what that just all that really means is
<v Speaker 1>when Nintendo ships those consoles in from those countries, and
<v Speaker 1>I suppose like there's always they could get creative and
<v Speaker 1>try to launder them through some.
<v Speaker 3>Other country, I guess.
<v Speaker 1>But all countries across the world had like a baseline
<v Speaker 1>tariff built in now of like ten percent. Most of
<v Speaker 1>them have higher than that though, like the UK has
<v Speaker 1>a ten percent tariff that's new and that's just baseline,
<v Speaker 1>but most people are higher than that. But if they
<v Speaker 1>try to ship a console from Cambodia or Vietnam or China,
<v Speaker 1>which is also going to have high tariffs, obviously they
<v Speaker 1>will have to basically pay about an extra fifty percent
<v Speaker 1>on the price of that good. So that's all the
<v Speaker 1>money now they were expecting twenty twenty five percent, mostly
<v Speaker 1>just on China, and that like the pricing reflects that.
<v Speaker 1>The pricing sort of you know, we know what they
<v Speaker 1>want to charge for this thing, jan or like what
<v Speaker 1>they like in a perfect world. Yeah, but they would
<v Speaker 1>have been okay with charging on the low end, which
<v Speaker 1>is what they charged are charging for the Japanese language
<v Speaker 1>only region locked version of the switch to in Japan
<v Speaker 1>that they're going to sell it retail there. That's about
<v Speaker 1>three hundred dollars three hundred, three hundred and thirty dollars
<v Speaker 1>in that range. You add you know, twenty five percent
<v Speaker 1>on top of that, and you get to about what
<v Speaker 1>the price is here. Uh, and then you have to
<v Speaker 1>factor in a currency as well. So yeah, like that
<v Speaker 1>it made sense like they were like, we're going to
<v Speaker 1>price this same, We're going to go to the high
<v Speaker 1>end so we can be prepared and be agile, And
<v Speaker 1>no one was thinking that there would be about fifty
<v Speaker 1>percent tariffs on Vietnam and Cambodia. Clearly not Nintendo, but
<v Speaker 1>no one was. It was just it was just completely
<v Speaker 1>out of nowhere. It is insane. It's bad policy. It
<v Speaker 1>just straight up is bad policy. No one was expecting this,
<v Speaker 1>and now Nintendo's in a just unprecedented position of having
<v Speaker 1>to figure out, like, are they going to raise the
<v Speaker 1>price on this or what are they going to do?
<v Speaker 3>I mean, Jim, what like what happens next? I have
<v Speaker 3>no idea.
<v Speaker 2>I absolutely have no idea. And it seems insane that
<v Speaker 2>there are people look trying to look on the positive
<v Speaker 2>side of this and trying to push forward the ideal of, oh,
<v Speaker 2>why does Nintendo just make these consoles in America? Yeah,
<v Speaker 2>let's go ahead and try and create an infrastructure a
<v Speaker 2>workforce that is nonexistent. Yeah, let's go make these in Washington,
<v Speaker 2>where Nintendo's based out of an America. Yeah, where is
<v Speaker 2>any of these chips going to come from in America?
<v Speaker 2>It is absolutely insane. It is asinine to think that
<v Speaker 2>that is something you can do, and to think that
<v Speaker 2>none of this is targeted, that none of this is
<v Speaker 2>politically motivated by these tariffs. Being specifically put onto Vietnam, Cambodia, China.
<v Speaker 2>Is It's insane because Grup like they were already trying
<v Speaker 2>to build the price in with the four fifty, the
<v Speaker 2>five hundred, and to see the projected price of how
<v Speaker 2>the region locked switch to is going to be in Japan,
<v Speaker 2>the cards are on the table and the cards are shit.
<v Speaker 2>It is too late the fold now for us in
<v Speaker 2>the States, I don't know. Nintendo is in a terrible
<v Speaker 2>spot and it is absolutely wild to me that the
<v Speaker 2>Nintendo switched to maybe the catalyst or people, I hate
<v Speaker 2>to say this to finally wake the fuck up.
<v Speaker 1>It does feel like a moment, you know, in the
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo's position is bad. Obviously, everyone's relationship to this country
<v Speaker 1>right now is pretty bad, including the people who live
<v Speaker 1>here us. It's a you know, do process is now
<v Speaker 1>a question that's fun.
<v Speaker 3>So we got a lot of issues. It's bad for everyone.
<v Speaker 1>I think you're right though, despite you know, this government
<v Speaker 1>disappearing people. This is the kind of stuff that does
<v Speaker 1>break out. This is like everyone's like, look, I can't
<v Speaker 1>I don't know what to do about this country saying
<v Speaker 1>the Constitution is applicable only in certain circumstances. That's big
<v Speaker 1>and scary, and I feel the same way. I don't
<v Speaker 1>know what to do about that, but I was really
<v Speaker 1>looking forward to the switch too. To help me forget
<v Speaker 1>about all this. I was watching some people play Mario
<v Speaker 1>Party today and I was getting excited about a Mario
<v Speaker 1>Party game.
<v Speaker 3>So That's where I'm at, and I'm I was, I'm like,
<v Speaker 3>I know for a.
<v Speaker 1>Fact now that I was so ready to pay the
<v Speaker 1>price that they had already announced, because I'm like more
<v Speaker 1>mad now I'm not gonna be able to pre order
<v Speaker 1>this thing on April ninth. And this is such a weird,
<v Speaker 1>awkward thing for a very like you know, switch to
<v Speaker 1>announcements all over mainstream news yesterday. Right, it's a big
<v Speaker 1>new consumer electronics product that gets headlines from Marketplace on
<v Speaker 1>him and USA Today and all the nightly news shows
<v Speaker 1>things like that, this sort of quick reversal and and
<v Speaker 1>them explicitly stating it's because of tariffs. It's going to
<v Speaker 1>break through to that that that mainstream news as well,
<v Speaker 1>and maybe does bring more attention to just how crazy
<v Speaker 1>this is. Although everyone is well aware of a stock
<v Speaker 1>market diving and all that stuff, and and cog once
<v Speaker 1>again over sessions and uh yeah, this it's bad from
<v Speaker 1>every angle, but it's this kind of lightning rod that
<v Speaker 1>can cause people to maybe.
<v Speaker 3>Pay more attention than they would otherwise. I yeah, go
<v Speaker 3>go no, no, no, go ahead, Sorry it was good, Okay.
<v Speaker 1>So the other side of this, obviously, is why stop
<v Speaker 1>pre orders if you know you're gonna end up charging
<v Speaker 1>the same price? Right, Like, they're stopping pre orders because
<v Speaker 1>they're like they're not sure if this is the price
<v Speaker 1>they're going to go with anymore. And really, I don't
<v Speaker 1>think they would stop pre orders even if they weren't sure.
<v Speaker 1>I think they're sure they're going to raise the price again.
<v Speaker 1>So let's uh, let's go with this next story from
<v Speaker 1>Jessica Cogswell over a game spot switch to price likely
<v Speaker 1>to increase as Nintendo pulls US preorders over Trump's new
<v Speaker 1>tariff policies. Following President Trump unveiling the controversial new tariff plan,
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo has announced that it is delayed US preorders, originally
<v Speaker 1>scheduled to start on April ninth. A Nintendo representative has
<v Speaker 1>since confirmed this state has been pushed back indefinitely in
<v Speaker 1>order for the company to assess at the potential impact
<v Speaker 1>of tariff's and evolving market conditions. As such, it is
<v Speaker 1>likely we will see a sizeable increase in the console's
<v Speaker 1>price before it is relisted. The full statement, which was
<v Speaker 1>given to GameSpot via Nintendo spokesperson, could.
<v Speaker 3>Be found below. It's that one we already read.
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo's latest console has already been the subject of scrutiny
<v Speaker 1>and more than a few jokes due to its four
<v Speaker 1>hundred dollars four hundred and fifty dollars price tag and
<v Speaker 1>the cost of its upcoming first party titles. Following its reveal,
<v Speaker 1>Mario Kart World made headlines as Nintendo's priceiest game. It
<v Speaker 1>doesn't include a physical accessory, and yet it seems like
<v Speaker 1>prices will only go up from here. Okay, so let's
<v Speaker 1>I mean, let's do a little math. I guess back
<v Speaker 1>that I'm not going to get a calculator out or
<v Speaker 1>something like that. But back to the Napkin math. If
<v Speaker 1>it was twenty five percent on just one of the
<v Speaker 1>territories in which they were producing this thing, and it
<v Speaker 1>was you know, three thirty up to four fifty equivalent
<v Speaker 1>from the Japanese yen over the US dollar from the
<v Speaker 1>Japanese market to the US market or the global market. Uh,
<v Speaker 1>make that fifty percent instead, and you know we're talking
<v Speaker 1>five hundreds five point fifty. I mean at that point,
<v Speaker 1>maybe six hundred dollars because you don't know what's going
<v Speaker 1>to happen next. The reality is they don't know if
<v Speaker 1>these tariffs are going to go through, but they have
<v Speaker 1>to operate under the assumption that they will because if
<v Speaker 1>they do, they're there. They're screwed. They you know, it's Nintendo.
<v Speaker 1>They hate lose money. We could definitely argue that they
<v Speaker 1>could just sell these things at a loss. They are
<v Speaker 1>probably going to have to sell these things at a loss,
<v Speaker 1>but there's no way they were making a fifty percent
<v Speaker 1>profit margin on the hardware, not this early on. Even
<v Speaker 1>though they use our old hardware. Components are still hard
<v Speaker 1>to come by. Like it's that that that they still
<v Speaker 1>have to get in line for the you know, for
<v Speaker 1>the fabricators to actually make these chips, and there's a
<v Speaker 1>lot of other smaller chips that you know, they have
<v Speaker 1>to get in line for. And that stuff has since
<v Speaker 1>the pandemic, been hard to come by. Now they can
<v Speaker 1>demand a lot. They it's Nintendo, they have a customer
<v Speaker 1>or they have vendors that will serve them, but that
<v Speaker 1>stuff was already going to be expensive. I think that
<v Speaker 1>the likely scenario whore is they try to just jacket
<v Speaker 1>up fifty dollars and call it a day, five hundred
<v Speaker 1>five point fifty, and you know they're not going to
<v Speaker 1>be alone in this.
<v Speaker 3>If these teariffs stand. Yeah, clearly PlayStation.
<v Speaker 1>Is going to go up, Xbox is going to go up,
<v Speaker 1>so it's gonna make Nintendo not look like the outlier
<v Speaker 1>the way it did on April second.
<v Speaker 3>But I'm how much can we really stand? And at
<v Speaker 3>a certain point it's like, does.
<v Speaker 1>God to you even release this system? Obviously they're going to,
<v Speaker 1>but it just feels like, why are we even doing this?
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, because Grub, it's not just going to be consoles
<v Speaker 2>that are going to start increasing prices. It's going to
<v Speaker 2>be everything that uses chips, every and that's appliance is
<v Speaker 2>across the board. Now with how are day to day
<v Speaker 2>has been affected by having smart devices in every little thing,
<v Speaker 2>your game sets are gonna start rising in prices. But
<v Speaker 2>the thing that I start worrying Grub is that the
<v Speaker 2>the government has been able to kind of clamp down
<v Speaker 2>and take away certain websites from certain states here in America,
<v Speaker 2>right because that is considered though it messes with their
<v Speaker 2>agenda and everything and with and those people have been
<v Speaker 2>able to get by using other means. Now, the fact
<v Speaker 2>that this console may be priced in a way that
<v Speaker 2>is out of the realm of possibility for some people
<v Speaker 2>to get. I know that some people may be budgeting
<v Speaker 2>for three, four or five hundred dollars, this may be
<v Speaker 2>going up to six hundred dollars, maybe seven hundred. And
<v Speaker 2>the price of games also increasing, and that audience, the
<v Speaker 2>gaming audience, becoming suddenly very vocal and now a very
<v Speaker 2>important part of the voting demographic or whatever. I could
<v Speaker 2>see this government starting to clamp down on video games
<v Speaker 2>in a very hyper specific way that is asinine and
<v Speaker 2>so fucking backwards in the world.
<v Speaker 1>I mean, you know, they could try to implement tariffs
<v Speaker 1>on digital goods, like they really could. That money is
<v Speaker 1>going out of the country, let's tax it on its
<v Speaker 1>way out, like when you make a digital purchase. That
<v Speaker 1>that's something I think Trump, why would he not want.
<v Speaker 3>To do that? He would he would want to do that.
<v Speaker 3>That's money that he would want to capture. And like,
<v Speaker 3>just like tariffs, are bad policy. Has said that earlier,
<v Speaker 3>like why does he like them so much?
<v Speaker 1>It gives like, just imagine you're in a position and
<v Speaker 1>you are obsessed with people coming to you and bending
<v Speaker 1>the knee and begging you for stuff and putting you
<v Speaker 1>in the position where you get to say yes or
<v Speaker 1>no to the thing that they want most. Trump or
<v Speaker 1>Trump's for Trump tariffs are that. Every single time, every
<v Speaker 1>single single time he suggests a tariff, all of the
<v Speaker 1>leaders of all these businesses come to him and ask
<v Speaker 1>for exemptions. And so he loves this stuff, and we're
<v Speaker 1>going to get more of it, not less. It's like
<v Speaker 1>the one thing that he keeps doing, Like why is
<v Speaker 1>this the one policy we keep coming back to, because
<v Speaker 1>it's the one policy that leads directly to the thing
<v Speaker 1>he needs most, which is people coming there and saying
<v Speaker 1>how much they love him and.
<v Speaker 3>How loyal they are to him.
<v Speaker 1>So yes, imagining ways in which this could expand into
<v Speaker 1>other aspects of our lives, into other aspects of video
<v Speaker 1>games is reasonable because it's probably going to happen, like
<v Speaker 1>it's probably going to happen.
<v Speaker 3>And then if.
<v Speaker 1>This does lead to a situation where there is a
<v Speaker 1>backlash because of this video game company saying they're going
<v Speaker 1>to delay things or raise a price explicitly because of
<v Speaker 1>Trump's tariffs. You're right, he could get petty and come
<v Speaker 1>back and begin regulating the industry and making things more
<v Speaker 1>expensive in other ways, or prohibiting things from being sold
<v Speaker 1>here certain games. Yeah, and who's gonna stop them. They
<v Speaker 1>haven't been able to stop him doing anything else, So yeah,
<v Speaker 1>this could get really out of hand. And again, it's
<v Speaker 1>just it's just video games. It's not people disappearing or
<v Speaker 1>do process being erased from the constitution.
<v Speaker 3>But it's all part of the same thing. So it's
<v Speaker 3>worth talking about.
<v Speaker 2>And I see people saying, well, he might walk it back,
<v Speaker 2>he might take it back, and it might whatever. But
<v Speaker 2>the reality is he already put this on paper to
<v Speaker 2>see if he could get away with it and see
<v Speaker 2>the outrage that, Okay, if it's not I'm not increasing
<v Speaker 2>terrorists by this percentage, I'll increase it by this percentage instead,
<v Speaker 2>and then or he'll delay it.
<v Speaker 1>For a month and then get bored and do it again,
<v Speaker 1>which is what he's done over and over exactly.
<v Speaker 2>So he's just like pushing and pushing and pushing to
<v Speaker 2>see with what what he can get away with, the
<v Speaker 2>reality is he's going to keep trying to do that,
<v Speaker 2>even if he takes his word back on the existing
<v Speaker 2>tariffs now or whatever else the agenda he's going to
<v Speaker 2>push forward.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, this price could go up a lot, and you know,
<v Speaker 1>I think as they will try to, they could even
<v Speaker 1>raise it globally, although I don't think they will, but
<v Speaker 1>that could increase arbitrage.
<v Speaker 3>You know.
<v Speaker 1>Part of this could be then deciding like, let's allocate
<v Speaker 1>more systems to other territories while the US sort of
<v Speaker 1>sorts this whole thing out, So there could be a
<v Speaker 1>huge supply crunch, worse than it would have been otherwise.
<v Speaker 3>It's.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, and to go back to the idea of this
<v Speaker 1>creating domestic industry where these things are manufactured, No, that's
<v Speaker 1>that won't happen. But even if it did, it would
<v Speaker 1>take decades. It would take literally decades for that to happen.
<v Speaker 1>So it wouldn't have any effect on the switch to
<v Speaker 1>and he if he like, I don't even want to
<v Speaker 1>like entertain that that's what this is about. It's it's
<v Speaker 1>never really about that, Like he doesn't give a shit
<v Speaker 1>about anyone, Like, of course he doesn't, are you joking
<v Speaker 1>like this idea that why he listened to the news,
<v Speaker 1>and they're saying the reason he's saying he's doing this
<v Speaker 1>is because it's going to reindustrialize America, which you know
<v Speaker 1>some experts disagree with. Like to even credulously and entertain
<v Speaker 1>that idea is in embarrassment. We shouldn't be doing that.
<v Speaker 1>And but like like if we want to play in
<v Speaker 1>that space, just like to like pretend for a second.
<v Speaker 1>Nah No, it's like it's a completely different economy than
<v Speaker 1>it was one hundred and fifty years ago, and you
<v Speaker 1>just shouldn't be surprised. And then the people that could
<v Speaker 1>work those jobs, we don't let them in the country anymore,
<v Speaker 1>or we kick him out, We round them up, and
<v Speaker 1>then we send them to our Salvador.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, so we accident wort them and put them in jail.
<v Speaker 2>Yesh god. Our friend of the site, Michael mikey O'Leary
<v Speaker 2>had Blue Sky posted on Blue Sky that you know
<v Speaker 2>it's worrying when Warrio sixty four has to put a
<v Speaker 2>price in parentheses. Yes, because the prices may go up
<v Speaker 2>and up and up.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, I am I still really want this thing. I
<v Speaker 1>want I want to switch to you know, I want
<v Speaker 1>to find a way to get it right. In this moment,
<v Speaker 1>it feels like, what is that even.
<v Speaker 3>Going to look like?
<v Speaker 1>Should I try to pre order one in Windsor and
<v Speaker 1>go up there and cross the border and try to
<v Speaker 1>sneak it across without telling customs?
<v Speaker 3>So then I cause I think I would have to
<v Speaker 3>pay the tariff if I did that. Like, I don't
<v Speaker 3>know how that works exactly. I'm I'm no expert, but
<v Speaker 3>like you have to declare it. I don't know, so
<v Speaker 3>I'm gonna be a bootlegger. Jan, It's kind of what
<v Speaker 3>I'm thinking now.
<v Speaker 2>Dan and I wound up on CBC, the Canadian broadcast channel.
<v Speaker 2>Maybe it's just time to move everyone up there.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, I wouldn't. Hey, let's do it. You guys were
<v Speaker 3>big stars there on the CBC. I like to see
<v Speaker 3>in that. Hey, you did get to see this thing, Jan,
<v Speaker 3>You got to watch Dan Foy a lot of games,
<v Speaker 3>you know, while you know a lot of people were
<v Speaker 3>yelling at Nintendo about, you know, lower the price, lower
<v Speaker 3>the price.
<v Speaker 1>What was the vibes like at the event itself? For like, like,
<v Speaker 1>this is pretty good? Right, That's kind of how you
<v Speaker 1>guys came away from it.
<v Speaker 2>Have you ever what's the opposite of being in a
<v Speaker 2>burning building where everything else around you is burning, but
<v Speaker 2>sure inside or having fun?
<v Speaker 3>This is this is actually fine.
<v Speaker 1>You're the dog this time, actually in a safe split space,
<v Speaker 1>and the forest across the street is burning this time.
<v Speaker 3>Okay, I got it.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, yes, when I say I got that dog in me,
<v Speaker 2>that is the dog I'm talking about, politely sipping coffee
<v Speaker 2>wearing a fedora, saying this is fine. The vibes inside
<v Speaker 2>were immaculate, grub like. Everything was great. We were all
<v Speaker 2>having fun, and then we step outside. Okay, Sean a bunker, right, Yes,
<v Speaker 2>that's what.
<v Speaker 1>We're talking Yes, yeah, okay, you were in the Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>The Apocalypse doomsday bunker.
<v Speaker 3>That sounds great to me.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah. The vibes, it's all just one big rumpus room.
<v Speaker 3>I love it.
<v Speaker 2>Yes, yes, everyone was super excited, grub like. Uh and
<v Speaker 2>you know, Dan and I will probably talk about this
<v Speaker 2>later on BCR, but it felt very much like an
<v Speaker 2>old press event, like an E three.
<v Speaker 3>Of your uh.
<v Speaker 2>You got to see you like one peers in media.
<v Speaker 2>You got to see games journalists grub like people existing
<v Speaker 2>in this profession all together and like just chatting and
<v Speaker 2>talking together and sharing the excitement. And sure there was
<v Speaker 2>the undercurrent of the room of like the price, because
<v Speaker 2>the price wasn't announced during the direct and then like
<v Speaker 2>slowly people were learning about what this was supposed to cost,
<v Speaker 2>but the game cards were supposed to cost. But there
<v Speaker 2>was still the overall excitement in the room about like, Yo,
<v Speaker 2>this thing works. This thing is not a wee you,
<v Speaker 2>this is the switch to This is like the sequel,
<v Speaker 2>and this is gonna be like the Back to the
<v Speaker 2>Future two of the original hit movie.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah I am Yeah, I was watching those videos. You
<v Speaker 3>guys did a great job. It got me all excited.
<v Speaker 1>Although I definitely understand the price anxiety, and I and
<v Speaker 1>the people yelling at Nintendo, it's like, yeah, you got
<v Speaker 1>to apply pressure where you can so them. Everyone's spamming
<v Speaker 1>chat for hours, staying over the price. But here we are,
<v Speaker 1>and this is the exact thing that they were not
<v Speaker 1>certain about.
<v Speaker 3>I do. I'm like trying to imagine like what they
<v Speaker 3>can do here.
<v Speaker 1>And that's really like people, we do we do this
<v Speaker 1>show jan and I'll talk about like what these companies
<v Speaker 1>are thinking. And that's not like some magic formula or
<v Speaker 1>magic insight. All you have to do is what if
<v Speaker 1>it was your money, Like, that's all you have to do.
<v Speaker 1>Imagine this was your money and you had a product
<v Speaker 1>and you were going to sell it at a price,
<v Speaker 1>and someone came and told you, now, we need fifty
<v Speaker 1>percent of those dollars that you just made from selling that.
<v Speaker 1>That's now ours, and okay, you're left with you were
<v Speaker 1>going to sell it for now you have two fifty
<v Speaker 1>Your margins were not two hundred and fifty dollars. They
<v Speaker 1>were probably closer to something like in Nintendo's case, maybe
<v Speaker 1>twenty five percent, and that's why they were at the
<v Speaker 1>price they were at. And so yeah, I think like
<v Speaker 1>maybe you try to get creative here. You maybe put
<v Speaker 1>a ticking time bomb on this to see if you
<v Speaker 1>can be the company that applies pressure and you say, hey,
<v Speaker 1>we already have about a million systems in the country.
<v Speaker 1>We will sell those at the original price, but we're
<v Speaker 1>gonna have to raise the price on everything following.
<v Speaker 3>Just to make it very clear that this is about
<v Speaker 3>the tariffs.
<v Speaker 1>We're not gonna we have we we were predicting this,
<v Speaker 1>We're ready for these systems. These are still four fifty
<v Speaker 1>and five hundred and then everything after that. As soon
<v Speaker 1>as we have a ship in new stuff, well, we're
<v Speaker 1>gonna have to raise the price on this because it's
<v Speaker 1>just the math that's I don't don't I don't think
<v Speaker 1>they will do that.
<v Speaker 3>But it's like they are probably gonna have to try to.
<v Speaker 1>Get a little creative because I think people are only
<v Speaker 1>gonna have so much sympathy with a corporation.
<v Speaker 2>That's true, grub. I just knowing and seeing the existing
<v Speaker 2>landscape and how people behave for something like Pokemon cards
<v Speaker 2>and how riots break out in front.
<v Speaker 3>Of you, they probably want to avoid riots. That's a
<v Speaker 3>good point.
<v Speaker 2>And think about the riots, Yeah, how riots have started
<v Speaker 2>outside of Pokemon vending machines. The likelihood that if this
<v Speaker 2>initial first batch of switches are going to be still
<v Speaker 2>originally priced at four fifty five hundred, it is going
<v Speaker 2>to be bedlom outside of these big box retailers, outside
<v Speaker 2>of game stops, outside of your local mom and pop
<v Speaker 2>brick and mortars that are going to be selling these.
<v Speaker 2>It is like Amazon factories, Amazon shipping warehouses may get pillaged.
<v Speaker 1>Grub Yep, Yeah, I just I'm like trying to like
<v Speaker 1>struggle think of what it's just gonna have to be
<v Speaker 1>a massive price increase across the board. And then you know,
<v Speaker 1>because of arbitrage, selling, because of bootlegging, does the price
<v Speaker 1>have to go up even more in other countries so
<v Speaker 1>that we don't try to bring in stuff from Canada
<v Speaker 1>and you know, in Mexico and all these other places
<v Speaker 1>where it's now going to be actually much more affordable,
<v Speaker 1>even though it was looking like Okay, yeah, it's more
<v Speaker 1>sots in the United States than some of these countries.
<v Speaker 3>It's even more expensive. Well maybe not for long. I
<v Speaker 3>don't know. It's an impossible situation.
<v Speaker 2>I hope it stays cheaper in other countries. I hope
<v Speaker 2>it does because I don't want the rest of the
<v Speaker 2>world to suffer for the fucking mess we have.
<v Speaker 1>They should, and I honestly, I don't know, Like Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>can't get away with that, right, Like that's like making
<v Speaker 1>it clear it's about US tariffs.
<v Speaker 3>They just wouldn't be able to get away with that.
<v Speaker 3>They have to just sort of ride with it.
<v Speaker 1>And I know they were worried about arbitrage, but they
<v Speaker 1>can only use that like that's their problem, right, that's
<v Speaker 1>not anyone else's. So trying to be like, oh, we're
<v Speaker 1>going to treat the world differently because of the United States.
<v Speaker 1>That's a way to be like, we don't It's a
<v Speaker 1>way to get associated with the United States instead of
<v Speaker 1>being opposed to it. And you kind of you just
<v Speaker 1>can't run that risk. I don't think so, yeah, I think,
<v Speaker 1>and we deserve it. Yes, people and chatter are saying like,
<v Speaker 1>of course, like this is what we get. We this
<v Speaker 1>is our dishwashing liquid. We got to soak in it.
<v Speaker 3>And uh, you know, at least maybe things will get
<v Speaker 3>better in his third term.
<v Speaker 2>Jean, Uh, I need all the people in the Nintendo
<v Speaker 2>Treehouse YouTube chat to stop yelling at Nintendo for this,
<v Speaker 2>because the problem is not at Nintendo. The problem is
<v Speaker 2>at the core of the United States. And it turns
<v Speaker 2>out this apple has been rotten for fucking decades. And hey,
<v Speaker 2>I know on this website, on game break News, on
<v Speaker 2>the Bomb Cast, we lightly will touch on politics and everything,
<v Speaker 2>and because people will come to these shows come to
<v Speaker 2>this website as a distraction in getting politics out of games,
<v Speaker 2>I'm sorry, folks, we can't take politics out of video
<v Speaker 2>games because politics is actively fucking up video games now.
<v Speaker 2>Uh so yo, if you were in the States, fucking
<v Speaker 2>go register to vote, do your fucking research. Actually, go
<v Speaker 2>call your representatives and use that outrage, use your frustrations,
<v Speaker 2>and maybe together the gamers can rise up in a
<v Speaker 2>positive way for once.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, you gotta get and we gotta do what we
<v Speaker 1>gotta get on the streets. You gotta get in, and
<v Speaker 1>you gotta get in your representatives' offices and yell at them.
<v Speaker 2>Don't only be a freaking the sheets, be a freak
<v Speaker 2>in the streets.
<v Speaker 3>That's right, Just go right to their faces. They should
<v Speaker 3>be scared. I don't know what I mean, I don't
<v Speaker 3>know what else to say it.
<v Speaker 1>Like, you know, this is a distraction, really, because the
<v Speaker 1>real threat to all this is fascism. Like that's what
<v Speaker 1>we're dealing with, right, And fascism is a cancer and
<v Speaker 1>and there's only one thing you do to cancer.
<v Speaker 2>Cut it out.
<v Speaker 1>I mean cut it out with a knife, burn it, yes,
<v Speaker 1>so you know, get out there, do something about it.
<v Speaker 1>That's that's where we're at.
<v Speaker 3>And uh whatever, I'll play whatever for a fucking switch
<v Speaker 3>to who cares. Uh, this is just a small little
<v Speaker 3>symptom of so many worse things. Well, maybe figure it
<v Speaker 3>out or we won't or yeah, it's really what it is, right,
<v Speaker 3>either we figure.
<v Speaker 1>This out or we're done. But we're done. It's either
<v Speaker 1>we're done or they're done, and so do something.
<v Speaker 2>The reality is, grub we may be in a fortunate
<v Speaker 2>and comfortable, comfortable enough position to be able to swing
<v Speaker 2>it and pay for the switch to a see.
<v Speaker 1>About four hundred fifty dollars retro tank four k CE
<v Speaker 1>to make my GameCube look like an old TV on
<v Speaker 1>a new TV.
<v Speaker 3>H And you know, I get it.
<v Speaker 2>We're gonna need to because for the nature of our jobs,
<v Speaker 2>we need to cover the switch to we're going to
<v Speaker 2>need to play these games. But there are people out
<v Speaker 2>there that are like living, not barely living from check
<v Speaker 2>to check, that are looking for some type of escapism
<v Speaker 2>to escape this hell whole world that we're living in,
<v Speaker 2>like you mentioned, Greb. And now that solace, that little
<v Speaker 2>light at the end of the tunnel has been snuffed
<v Speaker 2>out for them because they can't financially afford food on
<v Speaker 2>their plate. That the one thing they were looking forward
<v Speaker 2>to this year is now ripped away from them.
<v Speaker 3>Yep.
<v Speaker 1>And it's the yeah, And that's a good point. It's like,
<v Speaker 1>it's not this is not just the terri fun video games.
<v Speaker 1>A lot of other stuff comes from these countries, including
<v Speaker 1>the food that we eat, a lot of fruit, vegetables. Yeah,
<v Speaker 1>so all that stuff you need to live is going
<v Speaker 1>to get more expensive too. So switch To is going
<v Speaker 1>to be way, way way away down the list. All right, Jane,
<v Speaker 1>let's take a break, Let's come back and what we do.
<v Speaker 1>One more story about the switch to and it's pricing
<v Speaker 1>in the backlash from the perspective for people who actually
<v Speaker 1>worked in attend. We'll get into that, and then we'll
<v Speaker 1>talk about Dusk Blood's.
<v Speaker 3>That new game from from Software after this one more thing, Grub, Yeah, please,
<v Speaker 3>I'm already you know, hey, I'm wearing a specific hat
<v Speaker 3>for a reason today on the show for people watching
<v Speaker 3>the video.
<v Speaker 2>I realize it's going to be backwards because of discord,
<v Speaker 2>but he's an excuse my language here. These fuckers are
<v Speaker 2>going to increase the price of coffee on me. I'm
<v Speaker 2>already radicalized, Grub. If these fuckers are going to take
<v Speaker 2>my caffeine away from me, it's over.
<v Speaker 1>No, I'm already there, like this is hitting. This is
<v Speaker 1>my retrotinks and my Chinese handhelds. We're already getting more
<v Speaker 1>expensive so yeah, coffee and Chinese handhelds. They really picked
<v Speaker 1>the wrong fight here.
<v Speaker 2>Grub the United force of you and I. They take
<v Speaker 2>away your Chinese handhelds, they take away my coffee. Anyway,
<v Speaker 2>go to hell.
<v Speaker 1>Okay, we're going to I want to bray cool. Be
<v Speaker 1>right back, everybody, all right, let's get back into it.
<v Speaker 1>As mentioned former Nintendo, this is says pr manager. But
<v Speaker 1>they were like product managers. They did a lot of stuff.
<v Speaker 1>Comment on Switch to pricing backlash, former Nintendo product managers
<v Speaker 1>Kit Ellis and Christy Yangs have said in a new
<v Speaker 1>video that Nintendo is facing a true crisis moment over
<v Speaker 1>the pricing of the Nintendo Switch To games and the
<v Speaker 1>console in certain countries. They said it was a deliberate
<v Speaker 1>omission from Nintendo not to reveal the console price in
<v Speaker 1>the presentation, leading fans to scramble online to find out
<v Speaker 1>how much the games and the consoles cost. Yesterday, the
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo treoustream chat was spanned by fans urging Nintendo to
<v Speaker 1>drop the price. Ellis said, I don't want to blow
<v Speaker 1>things out of proportion, but this does feel like a
<v Speaker 1>true crisis moment for Nintendo. I think I think it's
<v Speaker 1>obviously still a crisis, but I do think that the
<v Speaker 1>the the tariffs just being explicitly said out loud, do
<v Speaker 1>shift things a little bit in their favor, where it's
<v Speaker 1>like they can point to an obvious reason why this
<v Speaker 1>is happening, and they can even say it's worse than
<v Speaker 1>what we are expecting, which is what they're saying by
<v Speaker 1>delaying the pre order thing. But most people, you know,
<v Speaker 1>we have this show, everyone here understands what's going on.
<v Speaker 1>Everyone here is does a good job and just kind
<v Speaker 1>of thinking about these things in a common sense sort
<v Speaker 1>of way and understanding how these things work. The vast
<v Speaker 1>majority of people don't care. They see the price for something,
<v Speaker 1>they see a company charging that price. It is a
<v Speaker 1>straight line from that company wants my money and they
<v Speaker 1>want this amount of money for this thing that when
<v Speaker 1>I compare it to other things like this is no
<v Speaker 1>PS five.
<v Speaker 3>It's that simple. And so Nintendo does have to sort
<v Speaker 3>of deal with that still, and I don't know how
<v Speaker 3>they get through that specific crisis other than to make
<v Speaker 3>games that are so good that people can't ignore your thing.
<v Speaker 3>That's really all they can do.
<v Speaker 2>Right on grub like it is, it's just a wild world.
<v Speaker 2>For anyone to try and makes sense or try and
<v Speaker 2>see a positive in this because it feels like gloom
<v Speaker 2>and doom. Because it is gloom and doom. Let's call
<v Speaker 2>a spade a spade. And honestly, I do hope that
<v Speaker 2>that folks open their eyes and take a look around,
<v Speaker 2>because the reality is we're all running out of money,
<v Speaker 2>and money is going to our pockets are going to
<v Speaker 2>become or our purse strings are going to become tighter
<v Speaker 2>because we will have to be choosier with how we're
<v Speaker 2>spending money. And that's not just in regard to entertainment.
<v Speaker 2>I mean, we've seen across the board with the movie
<v Speaker 2>going audience has dwindled significantly over the years. And that's
<v Speaker 2>not just because of the pandemic grub and people being
<v Speaker 2>scared to go to the movie theater. That's because watching
<v Speaker 2>movies as a family has become an expensive experience. So
<v Speaker 2>if that is something that people are choosing to be
<v Speaker 2>more selective with their money, that is going to continue
<v Speaker 2>across the board. And hey, maybe I would prefer my
<v Speaker 2>family to eat and be comfortable on a day to day,
<v Speaker 2>week to week basis versus having an hour two hours
<v Speaker 2>of distraction time with like a new fancy device.
<v Speaker 3>Right, Yeah, that's exactly.
<v Speaker 1>It jen like we are all having a personal crisis
<v Speaker 1>of the cost of living and Nintendo having to navigate
<v Speaker 1>this crisis, you know, again their problem. To a certain extent,
<v Speaker 1>I think it is easy to have like to or
<v Speaker 1>it helps to have them sort of become this iconographic
<v Speaker 1>representation of this fight and make it very easy to understand.
<v Speaker 1>The tariffs are going up in a product they're shipping
<v Speaker 1>from very specific countries.
<v Speaker 3>It's going to cost more because of that, and it
<v Speaker 3>doesn't make any sense. So it's just like, why is
<v Speaker 3>any of this happening.
<v Speaker 1>It's a little bit easier to understand than like the
<v Speaker 1>complexities of going grocery shopping, something people just do out
<v Speaker 1>of habit and don't think about too much. And then
<v Speaker 1>they just see the price go up and that just hurts.
<v Speaker 1>It just hurts, and that's all they can really process.
<v Speaker 1>It's all I can process usually, and everything's going up
<v Speaker 1>in price. God my, it's so frustrating jam because it's
<v Speaker 1>like I have less money, even though I'm making more
<v Speaker 1>money in some ways, but so it's like what does
<v Speaker 1>that matter if I have less? And then like, oh cool,
<v Speaker 1>like I bought a house during the pandemic. That was
<v Speaker 1>pretty cool, and it's gone up in value. Jan that's
<v Speaker 1>pretty exciting. You know what that means more property taxes.
<v Speaker 1>My property taxes now are significantly more. So it's like, oh,
<v Speaker 1>can I even afford this house that up?
<v Speaker 3>I don't. I don't know.
<v Speaker 1>It's it's it's getting like out of hamps, Like I
<v Speaker 1>should be feeling good because this thing I bought it's
<v Speaker 1>worth more and it's only hurting. So it's like, how
<v Speaker 1>does all everything, no matter what angle it comes from,
<v Speaker 1>just causes more pain? And so that everyone's dealing with this,
<v Speaker 1>and so to sympathize with Nintendo to an extent, but
<v Speaker 1>not all that much. Deal with your crisis on your own.
<v Speaker 1>We can only we can't really help you.
<v Speaker 2>And you know, the other aspect of this scrub is
<v Speaker 2>you could tell people to go outside, go for a hike,
<v Speaker 2>go visit park, go visit a national park, perhaps, but hey,
<v Speaker 2>even those are being hit.
<v Speaker 3>Yep, Yeah, everything's being taken away.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah it's uh, and and yeah, I don't know what
<v Speaker 1>we do other than sort of continue to try to
<v Speaker 1>bring this whole thing down.
<v Speaker 2>So maybe let's just uh let's just keep the kids
<v Speaker 2>in school. Maybe, uh, they'll be fine over there. They
<v Speaker 2>can get their time occupied there at public schools.
<v Speaker 3>Oh wait, oh.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah shit, uh huh, Well, at least in Ohio here
<v Speaker 1>they're gonna subsidize that with Bible study.
<v Speaker 3>So that's fun. Oh yep, cool country.
<v Speaker 1>I am, yeah, I'm I'm pissed off at all of this.
<v Speaker 1>And I so when I see people in chat yelling
<v Speaker 1>at Nintendo and the you know you're right, the tree
<v Speaker 1>Offs people having to deal with that, I empathize with
<v Speaker 1>everybody ize. I empathize with the people at Treehouse having
<v Speaker 1>to deal with that, And I empathize with the people
<v Speaker 1>who are who just are like, like, how dare you
<v Speaker 1>charge me more? Everything else is charging me more? Are
<v Speaker 1>going to do this as well? Like, look at this
<v Speaker 1>year as much as a PS five or an Xbox
<v Speaker 1>Series X and the power doesn't justify that. It's a
<v Speaker 1>very easy thing to understand for a lot of people.
<v Speaker 1>But yeah, this is a crisis that doesn't feel like
<v Speaker 1>it has an easy solve. So I think we're gonna
<v Speaker 1>have to kind of stand back and see what Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>does next. And I don't think it's going to be
<v Speaker 1>anything other than more pain.
<v Speaker 2>And the real unfortunate part, Grub is, like, you know,
<v Speaker 2>Dan and I did get to go to that event,
<v Speaker 2>and you got to see the hard work that had
<v Speaker 2>been like going on for years right at this point
<v Speaker 2>to gear up for the switch to launch, and video games,
<v Speaker 2>as we all know at this point, hopefully we know
<v Speaker 2>at this point, are not an instantaneous turnaround process. They
<v Speaker 2>take years and years of development to do, and especially
<v Speaker 2>when you were trying to tackle something like new hardware,
<v Speaker 2>to see all of that work kind of just get
<v Speaker 2>thrown away and just now the common consensus or the
<v Speaker 2>general consensus being like, oh.
<v Speaker 3>This is too expensive, drop the prices.
<v Speaker 2>Instead of like you know, being able to celebrate your
<v Speaker 2>years of hard work finally getting to be out there
<v Speaker 2>for people is so deflating. Has got to be so
<v Speaker 2>deflating for like the Nintendo Treehouse team, the Nintendo teams
<v Speaker 2>out there, and like, now what should have been a
<v Speaker 2>celebratory moment for the switch to finally being announced and
<v Speaker 2>coming out so so soon, is now being dominated by
<v Speaker 2>this idea that like it is incredibly expensive and or
<v Speaker 2>maybe incredibly expensive because of real life things.
<v Speaker 1>Yep, and all those people that like work there, They
<v Speaker 1>like sit down, isolated, siloed off from reactions, and they
<v Speaker 1>just try to like look at the numbers and figure
<v Speaker 1>out like what is fair for both them selling a
<v Speaker 1>product and people buying a product. They want to be
<v Speaker 1>in that sweet spot that is, you know, just when
<v Speaker 1>you look at basic economics, that's where you sell the
<v Speaker 1>most or that's where you make the most money is
<v Speaker 1>charging the highest price that the market can bear while
<v Speaker 1>also being able to get the most customers interest in
<v Speaker 1>actually converting to pay that price. And so they do
<v Speaker 1>things like and I know no one wants to hear it,
<v Speaker 1>but they're like, Okay, sixty dollars in twenty seventeen does
<v Speaker 1>come out to about eighty dollars. Now, that is inflation.
<v Speaker 1>That's just the raw inflation that we've already had. And
<v Speaker 1>I like, my response to that is the same as
<v Speaker 1>everyone else, is like I don't give a shit, I
<v Speaker 1>don't want to hear it. I don't care everything else
<v Speaker 1>is more expensive. I'm not making more money. What does
<v Speaker 1>that have to do with me? So I get that,
<v Speaker 1>But these people sitting here trying to be like, Okay,
<v Speaker 1>we're spend.
<v Speaker 3>A lot of money on this stuff. We want to
<v Speaker 3>have a new launch.
<v Speaker 1>We've got to set ourselves up for success for five
<v Speaker 1>to ten years for this next generation at this price
<v Speaker 1>is probably fair, right, everything else has gone up, We're
<v Speaker 1>paying people more. Let's actually you know, set this through.
<v Speaker 1>It's like, okay, it's eighty dollars per game and it's
<v Speaker 1>all and we see it's like, this is a cash
<v Speaker 1>grap and again it is.
<v Speaker 3>This is these company just like again, think of it
<v Speaker 3>as if it was your money. If you could get
<v Speaker 3>more money, you would take more money.
<v Speaker 1>They can get more money, They're going to take more money,
<v Speaker 1>and so it is a cash grab, but it is
<v Speaker 1>a cash grab informed by the environment in which we exist.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, I think that the backlash is probably actually
<v Speaker 1>going to subside here a little bit over the next
<v Speaker 1>couple of days as the attention does turn specifically onto
<v Speaker 1>these tariffs. But it's really gonna be it's going to
<v Speaker 1>determine on how Nintendo navigates the next few days and
<v Speaker 1>comes back and back.
<v Speaker 3>And tells us how is this going to work with
<v Speaker 3>pre orders? All right?
<v Speaker 1>Other stories, other headlines Why from Soft is all in
<v Speaker 1>on multiplayer was switched to game The Dusk Bloods.
<v Speaker 3>This is from Michael mcwherder at Polygon.
<v Speaker 1>Dark Souls developer From Software surprised fans and perplex some
<v Speaker 1>with this week's reveal of a new competitive multiplayer game
<v Speaker 1>for Switch to the Dusk Bloods, alongside elden Ring Night Rain.
<v Speaker 1>It's the second multiplayer forward game coming from the studio,
<v Speaker 1>which is best known for its immersive role playing games.
<v Speaker 1>But there's a reason why The Dust Blood's director Hitataka
<v Speaker 1>Miyazaki is focusing heavily on competitive multiplayer. In a new
<v Speaker 1>interview with Nintendo, the game director and From Software president says,
<v Speaker 1>I've always found the PVPVE structure very interesting. It allows
<v Speaker 1>for a broad range of game design ideas while also
<v Speaker 1>letting us leverage our experience of designing challenging enemy encounters.
<v Speaker 1>Miyazaki impacts those game design ideas in the interviews, saying
<v Speaker 1>that the playable characters in The Dust Bloods, which are
<v Speaker 1>known as blood Sworn, have abilities that lend themselves to
<v Speaker 1>multiplayer action, including dashes, double jumps, and long range attacks.
<v Speaker 1>The dust Bloods setting, he says, allows for the depiction
<v Speaker 1>of firearms, such as every character is equipped with some
<v Speaker 1>means of attacking from a distance. I feel this is
<v Speaker 1>one of the game's unique aspects when compared with our
<v Speaker 1>previous titles. I hope these new action elements are one
<v Speaker 1>area that the players will enjoy. The eight player PVPVE
<v Speaker 1>structure of The Dust Bloods will follow a last player
<v Speaker 1>standing rule set for the most part, but the win
<v Speaker 1>conditions in the game's multiplayer matches vary. Players may need
<v Speaker 1>to eliminate a specific player or team up with another
<v Speaker 1>to take down a boss, or they may receive new
<v Speaker 1>orders from that creepy moon with wings seen in the
<v Speaker 1>game's revealed trailer. Miyazaki says that like past from software titles,
<v Speaker 1>we've therefore designed the PvE boss encounters to present a
<v Speaker 1>tough challenge and a sense of accomplishment upon defeating them.
<v Speaker 1>He also confesses to be not much of a PvP
<v Speaker 1>person himself, explaining that the Dust Bloods boss battles should
<v Speaker 1>satisfy the from software fans who come to their games
<v Speaker 1>for PvE, regardless of.
<v Speaker 3>Whether it's PvP or PvE.
<v Speaker 1>The idea to provide players with an experience that allows
<v Speaker 1>them to learn and hone their skills as they play
<v Speaker 1>is the goal.
<v Speaker 3>Here, according to Miyazaki.
<v Speaker 1>Jee where are you at with the dust bloods. I
<v Speaker 1>haven't had a chance to talk about this with you
<v Speaker 1>too much. I get is still a difficult one to
<v Speaker 1>pen down about exactly what it's going to be like.
<v Speaker 1>To me, I'm very interested still, although admittedly less interested
<v Speaker 1>than if this were to be say, a bloodborn successor,
<v Speaker 1>you know, in everything but name right.
<v Speaker 2>I think the the common consensus initially when the trailer
<v Speaker 2>was dropping was that, oh, is this going to be
<v Speaker 2>just straight a blood borne a blood born to a
<v Speaker 2>spiritual successor. And now that we're learning more about it,
<v Speaker 2>I think I'm still pretty excited because you know, Miyazaki
<v Speaker 2>has been hard, hard at work. They haven't let him
<v Speaker 2>out of the Soul's minds for years now, and I
<v Speaker 2>am interested to see what his take on this genre
<v Speaker 2>could and would be. And also like, I feel like
<v Speaker 2>they wouldn't make this a switch to exclusive if they
<v Speaker 2>didn't believe that folks would get really interested in entangled
<v Speaker 2>into it.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I think you know that they're maybe thinking about
<v Speaker 1>going after and I know Monster Hunter doesn't have real PvP,
<v Speaker 1>but I think they're trying to maybe position it that way,
<v Speaker 1>and that's why the Nintendo switch maybe makes sense to them.
<v Speaker 1>They're like that audience is on here, so we'll have
<v Speaker 1>a quest that you can go on, and sometimes it
<v Speaker 1>is about you teaming up with another person and taking
<v Speaker 1>down a monster.
<v Speaker 3>That's what he's saying. That is that could be very
<v Speaker 3>Monster Hunter.
<v Speaker 1>And then in some situations it'll be one player has
<v Speaker 1>something you need and you have to take them down
<v Speaker 1>and the whole crew has to go after them.
<v Speaker 3>You know, it's a VIP situation. I think that they
<v Speaker 3>are like.
<v Speaker 1>We want this to kind of be the kind of
<v Speaker 1>game where people are just carrying their switch tos with
<v Speaker 1>them everywhere and they're playing the game in short bursts
<v Speaker 1>constantly as a hobby for a very long time, the
<v Speaker 1>way that Monster Hunter has been in Japan for decades
<v Speaker 1>now and has become elsewhere at this point.
<v Speaker 3>You know, I want to see that.
<v Speaker 1>I'm like, I'm interested in that to a point, but
<v Speaker 1>I do want the ability to be like, hey, most
<v Speaker 1>of the time, I'm gonna I want to be playing
<v Speaker 1>on my own, and then if that means sometimes I
<v Speaker 1>walk into an area and and something multiplayers begins, I'm
<v Speaker 1>gonna be okay with that.
<v Speaker 3>But I just I want to play.
<v Speaker 1>These games sort of on my own, trying to figure
<v Speaker 1>out these scary, creepy places trying to get my bearings.
<v Speaker 1>And then if there's multiplayer intersections with that gameplay, that
<v Speaker 1>sounds okay to me.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I almost anticipate this kind of being almost emulating
<v Speaker 2>like a Destiny two or maybe like even a Final
<v Speaker 2>Fantasy fourteen experience, where like, you can get through a
<v Speaker 2>good chunk of this game on your own, but there
<v Speaker 2>will be opportunities and moments where ah, snap, I gotta
<v Speaker 2>interact with people, or you can kind of just skirt
<v Speaker 2>by and doing your solo stuff. Because I'm with you, Grub,
<v Speaker 2>I kind of prefer that. But also I do see
<v Speaker 2>this and hearing that Monster Hunter is a point of comparison,
<v Speaker 2>I do kind of maybe see them going for the
<v Speaker 2>og Monster Hunter freak audience that existed on the Nintendo
<v Speaker 2>DS or three DS, and the we where they want
<v Speaker 2>this very niche experience and we're going to put this
<v Speaker 2>on the niche console and appear to those freaks.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah. I don't know.
<v Speaker 1>I trust from software to make something that is worth
<v Speaker 1>our time at the very least, So I'm still very
<v Speaker 1>curious about this. It's not we're not going to get
<v Speaker 1>until twenty twenty six. Probably a lot of time for
<v Speaker 1>us to learn a lot more in various other presentations.
<v Speaker 1>But yeah, switch to exclusive from Software game TVP is
<v Speaker 1>a focus. You can just you can see all the
<v Speaker 1>reasons why people are like I'm interested, I'm not interested,
<v Speaker 1>Like what is this thing? I can't believe it's switch exclusive,
<v Speaker 1>but it is, so it's going.
<v Speaker 3>To be a curious one when it does finally come out.
<v Speaker 1>Miyazaki did go on to say that he promises switch
<v Speaker 1>to exclusive dust blood won't distract from Software from their
<v Speaker 1>single player games. This is from Jordan Midler at VGC.
<v Speaker 1>Eldering Director hit Ataka me as Zaki has said that
<v Speaker 1>the recently announced Nintendo switch to Exclusive The dust Bloods
<v Speaker 1>won't mean that From Software is moving away from a
<v Speaker 1>traditional single player game development focus. The dust Bloods, a
<v Speaker 1>brand new multiplayer focus game from From Software, was announced
<v Speaker 1>during Wednesday's Nintendo Switch to Direct Now. Speaking as part
<v Speaker 1>of the Nintendo Creators Voice series, hit a talking Miyazaki
<v Speaker 1>explains how The Dusk Bloods became to be and his
<v Speaker 1>interest in the PVPVE genre, But really he just kind
<v Speaker 1>of gets to a point where he's like, we are
<v Speaker 1>going to we still intend to actively develop single player
<v Speaker 1>focus games such as Elean Ring that embrace our more
<v Speaker 1>traditional style. I'm getting the sense jan that Eleandering taking
<v Speaker 1>as long as it did. I think it was their
<v Speaker 1>longest development time ever for.
<v Speaker 3>A game like.
<v Speaker 1>As they were wrapping that up and looking at like
<v Speaker 1>other projects to take on, they did want to try
<v Speaker 1>some other stuff. So we did get Armored Core six,
<v Speaker 1>and we are getting elean Ring Night Rain, where it's like, Okay,
<v Speaker 1>we do have a lot of the assets and let's
<v Speaker 1>find creative ways to reuse that while trying something new.
<v Speaker 1>And we have this PV stuff in our games already,
<v Speaker 1>let's expand on that. Or I guess night Ran.
<v Speaker 3>Is PvE, but then let's take the PvP stuff and
<v Speaker 3>apply that to this Nintendo game. Nintendo wants to work
<v Speaker 3>with us, and Miyazaki wants to work with them, apparently
<v Speaker 3>and make a game specifically for them. He wants to
<v Speaker 3>explore his game design ideas in this format. It seems
<v Speaker 3>like they are.
<v Speaker 1>They're doing these dalliances in the meantime to help them
<v Speaker 1>refresh for what is almost certainly going to be an
<v Speaker 1>eventual Elder Ring follow up of whatever that looks like.
<v Speaker 2>Right exactly, They're they're following what RGG has been doing
<v Speaker 2>for quite a while now, where yeah, could be good example,
<v Speaker 2>they have this existing tool set, these assets, and instead
<v Speaker 2>of kind of trying to do like an asset flip
<v Speaker 2>flip game that is maybe considered as mediocre, they're trying
<v Speaker 2>to do a spin on it with their existing tool set.
<v Speaker 2>And hey, you know, like, for as much as the
<v Speaker 2>prospect of what Dusk Bloods is pushing forward may not
<v Speaker 2>necessarily be for me, there is a gigantic PvP audience
<v Speaker 2>in Elden Ring in the Souls games that love messing
<v Speaker 2>with each other or invading someone's world. So I don't
<v Speaker 2>see this as like detracting from whatever Frumsoft is hard
<v Speaker 2>at work doing. I feel like this is the type
<v Speaker 2>of project that you can kind of maybe have fun with,
<v Speaker 2>maybe be a little bit lighter with those existing assets,
<v Speaker 2>and be like, hey, let's try and do this. Like
<v Speaker 2>I remember from a couple of months ago, sometime last year,
<v Speaker 2>Miyazaki was interviewed and he was interested about the prospects
<v Speaker 2>of like, oh, what if I did a turn based game,
<v Speaker 2>And you know, I didn't think you would be building
<v Speaker 2>something from the ground up. I would have assumed he'd
<v Speaker 2>be using some existing assets from an Old Soul's game
<v Speaker 2>or elden Ring or oh a turn based armored corps.
<v Speaker 3>Okay, yeah, would I would love that?
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, I exactly, I like, I do want them still
<v Speaker 1>making their RPGs, and personally I want elder Ring two.
<v Speaker 1>That's what I want, and I'm by my expectation is
<v Speaker 1>that's going to take a very very very very long time.
<v Speaker 1>So if they can spend some time like while, like
<v Speaker 1>I imagine, while he's making Dusk Bloods, there is another
<v Speaker 1>larger team getting a bunch of new art assets ready,
<v Speaker 1>new lore ready, maybe letting George r. R cook just
<v Speaker 1>for another half an hour worth of notes or whatever,
<v Speaker 1>and like getting like the land fertilized for that team
<v Speaker 1>to come back and focus on the next RPG in full.
<v Speaker 3>Now.
<v Speaker 1>It could be a Dark Souls, could be a Sacro
<v Speaker 1>follow up or whatever. There's a bunch of stuff they
<v Speaker 1>could do. But you know, the one I want is
<v Speaker 1>more elden Ring. That's I'll be honest, that's the one
<v Speaker 1>I want. And all that is is likely what he's going.
<v Speaker 3>To return to here very quickly.
<v Speaker 1>And I think that they are almost certainly have a
<v Speaker 1>lot of people already working on that in this moment,
<v Speaker 1>even though dust Bloods isn't coming out till twenty twenty six.
<v Speaker 1>So yeah, I'm I'm just not that concerned here, and
<v Speaker 1>I think most fans, like when they think about it,
<v Speaker 1>probably won't be as well. Although for people who don't
<v Speaker 1>want this, I don't blame them for being like, ah,
<v Speaker 1>this does feel like a distraction from me personally, because
<v Speaker 1>this is not something I'm going to play, So.
<v Speaker 3>I get it all right.
<v Speaker 1>Last couple of stories here Nintendo explains why Switch two
<v Speaker 1>doesn't run every original Switch game flawlessly. From Darren Bonteuse
<v Speaker 1>at game Spot, we mentioned that they were talking about
<v Speaker 1>having a hybrid of a solution for emulation, where it's
<v Speaker 1>both hardware and software.
<v Speaker 3>This is where it comes from.
<v Speaker 1>But they have they've put out a list that's a
<v Speaker 1>pretty lengthy list of games that will have some sort
<v Speaker 1>of issue, and they're saying that they're investigating everything and
<v Speaker 1>investigating all these problems, and it's mostly going to be
<v Speaker 1>like the kinds of lists that you see on wikis
<v Speaker 1>for emulators like the Dolphin emulator, where it's like, hey,
<v Speaker 1>this game has a certain graphical glitch in one area,
<v Speaker 1>where the colors don't show up right, or an alpha
<v Speaker 1>layer doesn't display properly, that sort of thing, and they're
<v Speaker 1>just being completely transparent. So there's you know, it's a
<v Speaker 1>long list of games, but they're they're said, the reason
<v Speaker 1>this has happened is because it is mostly a software
<v Speaker 1>emulation solution. There isn't a switch one in the switch
<v Speaker 1>to so what hardware is in there. When they're saying
<v Speaker 1>theyre doing a kind of a combination, My guess what
<v Speaker 1>they mean by that is Nvidia built them something specific
<v Speaker 1>to put on the system on a chip to make
<v Speaker 1>the software run better for emulation, and that's what they're
<v Speaker 1>getting at. Or I don't know, maybe there's no way
<v Speaker 1>there's an FPGA chip on there. That's not what's happening
<v Speaker 1>because that would be way too expensive. So some other
<v Speaker 1>creative solution. But this is mostly just as software emulator
<v Speaker 1>running these games. And so yeah, they're going to run
<v Speaker 1>into graphical issues, which is something that happens when the
<v Speaker 1>PlayStation and the Xbox emulates these old games as well. Mostly,
<v Speaker 1>I'm just happy that that backward capatibility is there, and
<v Speaker 1>if it's a little bit like tricky, I'll be okay.
<v Speaker 1>There's a certain level where it's like, if the games
<v Speaker 1>really have a lot of problems, I'm gonna be really
<v Speaker 1>annoyed because it's like, you guys should have figured this out.
<v Speaker 1>But I don't think that that doesn't sound like what
<v Speaker 1>this is. Jan so Us playing old switch games on
<v Speaker 1>switch to sounds like it's mostly not going to be
<v Speaker 1>a problem.
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, of course they come after me in Pokemon Grub.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, yep, oh yeah, I'm sorry.
<v Speaker 1>Marcus and Chad just said the ANALYT sixty four is
<v Speaker 1>now going to be six hundred dollars.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah, they keep delaying that thing too. They almost got
<v Speaker 3>that thing.
<v Speaker 1>Out before the the tariffs, but nope, now they've delayed
<v Speaker 1>it so down they are going to be right in
<v Speaker 1>the heart of them, right in the meat gang by
<v Speaker 1>three fifty.
<v Speaker 2>I hope you all enjoy the phone that you have
<v Speaker 2>right now, and I hope that the phone you have
<v Speaker 2>right now is operating in confunction at at and the
<v Speaker 2>batteries aren't quickly dying or whatever, because we all read
<v Speaker 2>a strap in for this one, folks.
<v Speaker 3>Yep.
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, people might remember, like, hey, we me and you
<v Speaker 1>Jay were talking about how manufacturing isn't happening here like, well,
<v Speaker 1>what about like the fifty billion dollars that Joe Biden
<v Speaker 1>signed to get the chips produced here in America. That
<v Speaker 1>stuff is still in place. The plan was like that
<v Speaker 1>was going to take literal decades, and even when they
<v Speaker 1>did get that done, the chips they were producing are
<v Speaker 1>not going to be the super processors that are being
<v Speaker 1>produced in Taiwan. So yeah, if you want a phone
<v Speaker 1>that has a decent ship and you want it in
<v Speaker 1>the next five years, you're still going to have to
<v Speaker 1>pay all these tariffs.
<v Speaker 2>Here's the thing, grub all right, you know what, this
<v Speaker 2>metaphor is going to take way too long. Basically to
<v Speaker 2>say the TLDR, I'd rather buy a croissant from an
<v Speaker 2>old woman in France versus someone straight out a culinary
<v Speaker 2>program that they kind of skated and skirted by here
<v Speaker 2>in the States.
<v Speaker 1>I'm just saying, you're not like, that's literally what we're
<v Speaker 1>talking about too. Like in the processors that they make
<v Speaker 1>at the TSMC, the Taiwan Semi Conductor Manufacturer, they have
<v Speaker 1>the most talented people in the world working there ready
<v Speaker 1>and they all go there to work on this stuff.
<v Speaker 3>They aren't here. They literally are not here.
<v Speaker 1>The people that can do this work, So you would
<v Speaker 1>have to train them up, and even if you do
<v Speaker 1>train them up, the expectation that they would be as
<v Speaker 1>good as the people have been doing this and learned
<v Speaker 1>the hard way how to do lithography at three nanimeters,
<v Speaker 1>something that is basically basically impossible.
<v Speaker 3>It's a joke. It's a joke that we're going to
<v Speaker 3>get there. And listen.
<v Speaker 1>I do think that the fifty billion dollars on the
<v Speaker 1>CHIPEK was a good idea. I love investment in the
<v Speaker 1>United States manufacturing. Critically, we do need these these chips
<v Speaker 1>for weapons, Like, if we're going to have a military
<v Speaker 1>or whatever, you've got to have missiles, and the missiles
<v Speaker 1>need these. That's what you sunk the USSR was not
<v Speaker 1>being able to keep up with with semiconductors that were
<v Speaker 1>going into missiles and so yeah, I get it, but
<v Speaker 1>that's not going to save us money on our phones,
<v Speaker 1>and they're kind we're not going to start making Nintendo
<v Speaker 1>switch twos here. That's not happening, all right, and then
<v Speaker 1>Nintendo could firm switch to GameCube. Games are going to
<v Speaker 1>come at launch, and that's going to include the handful
<v Speaker 1>of launch games which were a win Waker, Soul Caliber two,
<v Speaker 1>and F zero g X. I think Pokemon's probably coming
<v Speaker 1>pretty soon after that. That was Pokemon XD Gale of Darkness.
<v Speaker 1>They were showing off GameCube games on the tree out
<v Speaker 1>stream yesterday, and I think they had Super Mario Strikers
<v Speaker 1>as one of us, the fourth game in there. So
<v Speaker 1>that also seems like maybe that's coming, because later they
<v Speaker 1>came back and that wasn't there anymore. So they had
<v Speaker 1>a different version of GameCube ready to go. But other
<v Speaker 1>games that will come later, Super Mario Sunshine Fire and
<v Speaker 1>Limp Path of Radiance, Super Mario Strikers, Pokemon NEXTD Gale Darkness,
<v Speaker 1>Chibi Robo, Luigi's Mansion, Pokemon Coliseum.
<v Speaker 3>Those all don't have a date, but the GameCube itself
<v Speaker 3>will be there at launch. Uh And I think Jen,
<v Speaker 3>that's gonna do it. That's gonna do it.
<v Speaker 1>For the show today, for the headlines, let's get to
<v Speaker 1>the poll questions from yesterday. Did we actually get that posted?
<v Speaker 1>I can't remember or if we did or not. Yes,
<v Speaker 1>I don't think we actually got that posted.
<v Speaker 3>So let's we'll catch up everybody, buddy.
<v Speaker 1>Let's I'll do one more check in because we got
<v Speaker 1>more votes on the grade that the switch to direct.
<v Speaker 1>Forty five percent gave it a B, thirty percent gave
<v Speaker 1>it an A, seventeen percent C eight percent gave it
<v Speaker 1>a D or lower.
<v Speaker 3>We only had like one hour of results yesterday, so
<v Speaker 3>there you go. I think we asked, are you going
<v Speaker 3>to get a switch to maybe a good thing? We
<v Speaker 3>do save that question.
<v Speaker 1>Let's we'll put that in there and we'll ask that now,
<v Speaker 1>because who the hell knows side on well? Am I
<v Speaker 1>going to be able to find one? And will I
<v Speaker 1>be able to afford it? I have no idea, So
<v Speaker 1>we'll see from there. Jan what do we have going
<v Speaker 1>on on the website?
<v Speaker 2>Later today or right after this, we're going to roll
<v Speaker 2>into BCR. We're gonna we may just do a fun
<v Speaker 2>trip report from New York with Dan and I telling
<v Speaker 2>you and whoever is available to join about the fun
<v Speaker 2>times we had. We did have good pizza at least
<v Speaker 2>that's good. That's fun, that's nice. I saw a building
<v Speaker 2>that said Minati on the side of it, and I
<v Speaker 2>got scared, rightfully. So but after that, we're going to
<v Speaker 2>have unprofessional fridays. I believe we're going to be doing
<v Speaker 2>some hardcore park Core. I forget the specific name of
<v Speaker 2>the game, but we're going to jump in together and
<v Speaker 2>jump around, and then we're going to have the Game
<v Speaker 2>Spot homies finishing off the day with Game Spot after Dark.
<v Speaker 2>And yeah, if folks, if you missed it yesterday on
<v Speaker 2>the game Spot YouTube channel, we put out a quick
<v Speaker 2>hands on impressions video that Dan and I chatted together about.
<v Speaker 2>We're going to have a try to have a little
<v Speaker 2>bit of a longer one because Dan and I filmed
<v Speaker 2>a longer discussion that we had and put that out
<v Speaker 2>on the GB YouTube sometime if not today, over the weekend. Promise.
<v Speaker 2>I just want to get that out of there, folks.
<v Speaker 3>Yep, it was a good work so far. Looking forward
<v Speaker 3>to talking to y'all on BCR here in a minute.
<v Speaker 3>All right, let's.
<v Speaker 1>See here we do have a new poll question as well,
<v Speaker 1>so maybe we'll run both of these.
<v Speaker 3>Are you going to get a switch to yes or no?
<v Speaker 3>And what are we even doing here? Gang? Is the
<v Speaker 3>new pole question.
<v Speaker 1>Your options are woolf, a pain, sigh or yeah man
<v Speaker 1>and then stares you just kind of stare those a
<v Speaker 1>your options. Vote on that and we'll get the result
<v Speaker 1>to talk about it on Game breaking news here on
<v Speaker 1>Giant Bomb on the Power Block on Monday. Speaking of
<v Speaker 1>the Power Block, look forward to seeing here on the
<v Speaker 1>BCR here in the next couple of minutes. With all
<v Speaker 1>that out of the way, Janet Chowa, thank you so
<v Speaker 1>much for getting me through this today, man, I really
<v Speaker 1>appreciate it.
<v Speaker 2>Somehow we have to start the day.
<v Speaker 1>Yes, somehow we have to. And in the meantime, again
<v Speaker 1>the get those un yeahs in chat. All right, yeah,
<v Speaker 1>maybe we can add un yeah to the there.
<v Speaker 3>We go, un yeah. I added it to one of
<v Speaker 3>the options there on the poll. All right, thank you
<v Speaker 3>all for watching.
<v Speaker 1>You're the best audience of gaming and that's forever reason
<v Speaker 1>you come in here. You guys are ready to talk
<v Speaker 1>about this stuff, ready to listen. You have a lot
<v Speaker 1>of common sense. It's easy to have this conversation when
<v Speaker 1>I know you all are the ones here on the
<v Speaker 1>other side, because you already are thinking about the selves.
<v Speaker 1>You're thinking about these things yourselves. Let's get out of
<v Speaker 1>here until next time. Have a good one, take care
<v Speaker 1>of yourself and goodbye.
<v Speaker 2>Tell a friend about the show.
<v Speaker 3>Yeah,