The 12 Days of Switchmas: Day 5 — Friends and Voice Chat

It’s Day 5 of our 12 Days of Switchmas! A number of folks here at Geekscape have shared their hopes and desires in terms of what they want from the Nintendo Switch…except your truly. Well, the wait is over, and now it’s my turn to express not only what I hope the Nintendo Switch will be able to do, but rather what it needs to do.

Right off the bat, the Nintendo Switch needs to have a Restore Point feature for all its games. One of the things I love about the Wii U and 3DS is the Restore Point feature applied to their Virtual Console games. Restore Points give gamers the ability to simply pick up a game where they left off–making gaming incredibly convenient especially when sessions can be cut abruptly short as work and family responsibilities come up. When it comes to Nintendo’s Wii U, it is frustrating that its titles do not have that feature when both the PS4 and XBOX One have it. It may seem like a minor thing, but there’s an obvious difference when booting up the Wii U to play Smash Bros. for Wii U as opposed to booting up my PS4 to play Overwatch.

In addition, I believe it’s safe to say that I speak for many Nintendo fans when I say I want a much more seamless method to join my friends to play online games. While Nintendo thankfully got rid of their atrocious Friend Code system, they didn’t go as far as they could.

Wii U owners were able to add friends by simply typing their friend’s Nintendo Network ID, but once a friend was added, there would be no in-game notification to know when they signed on or off. The only manner to know is to briefly leave one’s game and go to their Friends List and check for themselves. Compared to how simple the PlayStation and XBOX allows its users to know their friend’s online status and what games they are playing, it makes the Wii U’s method appear archaic.

Lastly, there needs to be voice chat on the Nintendo Switch. If Nintendo wants to emphasize more of a presence in the eSports scene, voice chat capability needs to be a top priority.

I love Splatoon (my wife even more so), but when I played online sessions with my buddies Ash Paulsen, Joshua Jackson, and Noah Roman, it was frustrating not having a method of communicating when the enemy was heading towards a certain area on the map or when one needed support. While players could use outside programs like Skype, players shouldn’t be forced to do so when other video game consoles already allow voice chat. I can’t imagine the Nintendo Switch hitting the market without voice chat capabilities, then again, this is Nintendo we’re talking about.

All that said, I will be placing my pre-order and waiting in line with bated breath until I get my hands on the Nintendo Switch. I have no doubts that the Nintendo Switch is going to have an amazing library of games to play: I just want an simpler process to do so with my friends online.

Oh yeah. I also want a new F-Zero game. Nintendo, 14 years is a long enough wait. My good friend Rico would echo my sentiment.

I cannot sit by any longer and allow for an #Fzero title to be unreleased! I am here to protest! pic.twitter.com/VuYlQRYfkS

— Ｒｉｃｏ リコ (@KelphelpOG) January 2, 2017