Switch (and to a greater extent Switch 2) is brilliant hardware, don’t get me wrong. I like it. It’s well built, great screen, suspend works great, docking is awesome, etc.

But I don’t like that it killed (or at least marked the end of) the old handheld gaming paradigm. Some of this is undoubtedly nostalgia, but I think there’s things that were objectively better about the old way.

Around the time of 3DS launching smartphone gaming was taking off, and for a moment it looked promising which really hindered sales of handheld consoles. There were tons of innovative, fun experiences available at low prices. This pushed companies away from handhelds. It’s a lot tougher sell when people have smartphones now.

But then smartphone gaming turned into a barren hellscape of ads and fremium mtx ridden slop. I don’t know about you, but despite owning high end smartphones I have literally no games on my phone. Not to say that no good smartphone games exist… But they have such a huge uphill battle - nobody buys mobile games because they assume they’re trash, and they don’t have the necessary advertising budget to fight the big names in mobile gaming. So the selection is small and hard to find.

Then there’s the ports like Minecraft and Fortnite/etc, which are also loaded with mtx nowadays. But smartphones seem like the absolute last choice platform for these titles. Nothing I hate more than playing a game designed for a controller on a touchscreen.

So say I go to pick a friend up from the airport and I have 20 minutes to wait because their flight was a bit late. What to do? I could play a game on my Switch. Totally a feasible option. Except, I almost certainly didn’t bring it. Why would I? It’s a fairly large device. And with the big exposed screen and analog sticks I’d have to case it up too. I’m not grabbing that thing “just in case”. So I grab my phone and doomscrool. Not because I want to, but because… What else am I gonna do?

But let’s say I had a 3DS… Pocketable (or easily fitting into a modest sized purse). I can take it without thinking. No case needed, it’s a clamshell. May as well keep it on me. Plus I can grab some Streetpass passes (when that was a thing) which basically gamifies the action of taking it everywhere. I’d probably spend those 20 minutes playing something on the 3DS.

That’s the thing. Tablet sized portables like Switch/2, Steam Deck, etc are technically portable, but I have to plan it. If I’m going on a road trip yeah awesome those consoles are insanely good. But in my day to day life they never leave the house. The extent of portability really means I might play them in bed instead of the living room. The Switch Lite is definitely an improvement, but it’s still not the size it would need to be to become effortless to bring around.

And the games. Switch/Switch 2 games are mostly just home console games that can be played on a handheld. We don’t get nearly as many of those smaller games designed for 10-30 minute play sessions. The type of games that used to be developed for handhelds. This is 10x as true on PC handhelds. I mean, such games do exist no doubt they’re just a lot smaller part of the market. We don’t see big studios putting money into them like we’d see them do for dedicated handhelds of the past. That’s not to say there weren’t big epic stories meant for long sessions on old handhelds, but they weren’t the main type of games on them.

I understand why things are the way they are. I get it. But I don’t like it. Some might ask why I don’t just carry an old handheld - I have been! With the modern modding scene the 3DS is insanely good. I’ve had a blast with it and have been playing a ton of games from the library I never got around to back in the day plus emulators for older consoles etc. You can even play online again with community servers. But it would be really sweet to have new games to look forward to, and an active community and support.

Then there’s new like, boutique handhelds out there like the Ayn Thor etc. They look awesome and I’ll probably pick one up one day, but honestly it has the same problem as my 3DS. No new exciting stuff coming. No big community.

I don’t forsee things changing anytime soon… But I feel like if things were just a bit different they could. Like, graphics have kinda plateaued in the past 2 generations of consoles. Developers can’t really say their games are held back by graphical limitations much anymore. Let’s say the Switch 2 has an 8 year lifecycle - the Switch 3 could be a dockable handheld clamshell the size of a 3DS XL. Skip the 2 screen thing. With advances in processing/battery tech, I think in 8 years they could do that and still have graphics marginally better than S2 (but maybe not as big of a leap as S1 -> S2) and with a lot more RAM/vRAM assuming the RAMpocalypse ends by then. It could be a pocketable handheld that can still do 1080p gaming on TV while docked, keeping the single device benefit for development cost savings that the Switch brings.

I don’t actually think that’ll happen, but a person can dream eh?

Anyway thanks for reading my rant.