It feels like an endless cycle; a gaming manufacturer announces a new piece of hardware, I quickly find flaws with it, and I convince myself that it’s not worth buying. Despite all of this, whenever said hardware hits store shelves, I’m always there on day-one throwing down my money to pick it up. This same situation has played out countless times over the past 15 years with PlayStation, Xbox, and particularly Nintendo. Now, with the Nintendo Switch 2 having finally been shown off to the world, I know that history is about to repeat itself in roughly two months.
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Look, there is plenty to be upset about in the wake of the new Nintendo Switch 2 Direct. The console itself is more expensive than I hoped, the games look like they could begin retailing consistently for $80 moving forward, and there are far fewer bells and whistles with the platform when compared to the leap from Wii U to Switch. These problems aren’t necessarily going to resolve themselves over night, and especially won’t by the time the Switch 2 releases on June 5th. And while I know all of this, I’m still actively trying to decide where I should lock in my pre-order next week.
Events like the Switch 2 Direct prompt heavy criticism, naturally. While many view these broadcasts as fun presentations to get a thrill from, they’re truly just marketing pitches telling the masses why they should spend their hard-earned dollars on whatever is being sold. As such, I don’t necessarily feel bad about putting something like the Switch 2 under the microscope and weighing its pros and cons.
Still, I do feel pretty stupid for coming down so negatively on something like the Nintendo Switch 2 only to then fork over hundreds of dollars for it mere weeks later. As mentioned, this is something that I’ve done quite a bit in the past, most notably with the Xbox One. While I hated Xbox’s presentation for its successor to the Xbox 360 and found it to be out of touch, I was still there spending $500 upon its release date in 2013 and buying the majority of the games in its launch lineup. While the phrase “vote with your wallet” is thrown around a lot, I’m apparently incapable of doing so.
Likely the most ironic thing about my own situation with the Switch 2, though, is that I barely play the current Switch OLED that I own as it is. It’s a console that I’ll pull out every now and then to play whatever the newest Nintendo exclusive is that interests me. But even on that front, I’ve fallen far behind. I still haven’t even played The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom yet, despite being a Zelda fanboy.
So what is it that keeps me looking like a fool time after time? All of these years later, there’s something that’s still always thrilling about getting a new piece of tech. Whether that be with a mid-gen refresh like the PS5 Pro, something wholly new like the Steam Deck, or now a proper successor with the Switch 2. The process of tearing into the box of a new piece of gaming hardware is something that still gives me the rush of excitement that I felt on Christmas morning in 2000 when I first got a PS2. It’s not only the excitement of the hardware alone, but the thought of the future and what games I might play on it in the years ahead.
For that reason, more than anything else, I think it’s why I’m still always there throwing down my money at launch for whatever the newest gaming console might be. In a time when it’s becoming more and more difficult to touch base with my childhood, getting a new video game platform still makes me feel like a kid. I can’t truly roll back the clock to 1999 when I was sitting on my couch playing The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, but picking up the Switch 2 upon release can give me an inkling of those same feelings. And if all I have to pay is $450 to tap into that emotion, then I’ll just have to settle for my bank account being a bit lighter come June.
