The original switch was a bargain too relatively speaking. My one switch outlasted about five or six phones I owned over the same time span.

It does kinda suck that it's gone up in price in the new generation, but like... PlayStation 5 was also around the same price a couple of years ago, when money was worth more.

I have thought about it and it is interesting that "virtue signal" is such a dirty word now. When I say "please" and "thank you" I'm essentially just virtue signaling that I'm willing to play nice

"Virtue signalling" implies a level of hypocrisy. Like, you don't really care about the underlying issue, and only cares in reality to look like you do.

When you say "please" and "thank you" you are being polite. You may be "virtue signalling" politeness when in truth you are an asshole, but I would be unable to tell, so I give the benefit of doubt.

By the way, I dislike the term "virtue signalling" as I think it was overused to the point of meaninglessness, and I have an issue with that. On top of that, sometimes performative actions do matter to call attention to a given cause. Things are more nuanced sometimes.

On the plus side, the virtue signalers saved $ and can spend it on something that’ll bring them more joy and is hopefully more aligned with their views. And gives them practice and a mindset of “I’m the kind of person willing to boycott” for any other boycotts that might have a real effect someday.

It's not really a boycott if you never really planned on buying the product. Otherwise, I'm technically boycotting Apple and Ford. Because I don't buy Apply products and I don't buy Ford cars.

When I say “please” and “thank you” I’m essentially just virtue signaling that I’m willing to play nice...

Those are specific actions you are taking in being kind and nice towards another person in reality. However, if you were to make a comment on Lemmy about how kind of a person you are because you claim you say "please" and "thank you" all the time, then that would be virtue signaling, because making claims about what you do or care about on social media is relatively meaningless without the specific actions being taken outside of that context.

So, in this case, talking about how evil Nintendo is for pricing a game at $80, what does that do exactly? Why should anyone else listen or care about someone expressing that opinion? Are you joining activist groups and spending time or money pushing for laws/politicians/etc to enact change to fight back against these actions? If so, then that's not virtue signaling. But I'm unconvinced most people expressing these opinions and upvoting/downvoting posts and comments are doing anything beyond exactly that.

The vast majority of Steam games can be easily cracked and played offline if they ever go rogue. Modern console games are much more difficult to jailbreak like that.

We'll have to see how Beast of Reincarnation turns out. Gamefreak's other side games weren't anything spectacular, except for Smart Ball.

https://youtu.be/H0r-Kap8kWI

Could you name one game please.

That's true, but that alone doesn't account for how just how bad it did. The idea that Nintendo consoles are always bought up by lots of people no matter what is completely untrue. One big advantage they've always had that they no longer do is affordability compared to the competition. What will determine whether it's a success will ultimately be how many good exclusive games they can pump out, and their track record has been awful since the launch of the Switch. A very large chunk were Wii U ports, which worked because nobody had one, but they're already heavily shilling Switch 1 upsells. Diehards will of course snatch them up, but with 150 million Switches out there I question how interested the masses will be in them. If Nintendo seriously ups their game and consistently puts out new good games, I imagine people will stomach the prices. But are they even capable of that any more?