The Nintendo Switch

welcome!

i think there's another indie direct tomorrow. last one didn't have any games in my wheelhouse though

congrats, Leee. they maybe didn't tell you this at the store, but it's a good thing to note before enjoying your new nintendo switch purchase: the games are cheaper on josh's PS4. ok, i think you're ready to participate!

Also, the Switch is not Bluetooth capable, I think because the joycons use their own dedicated Bluetooth. However, I was able to get a Bluetooth adapter that goes in the headphone jack, so now in tandem with our cheapo LED projector my kids and their friends should be able to play the Switch in the backyard on a big screen (or the side of the garage). Which is kind of awesome.

Yeah, and the games are expensive, too.

<3 u josh

co-op HONK

OK, speak of the devil, I could use some help with this bluetooth workaround. Like I mentioned, Switch doesn't really support Bluetooth because it doesn't want anything to interfere with the Joy-cons, afaict. But you can buy bluetooth transmitters that plug in to the headphone jack so that you can use the Switch with wireless headphones or an external speaker. It's the latter that I'm trying to figure out, so my kids can play it outside but still have the game be loud enough to hear over the din of cicadas and cars. I bought one of these dongles:

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/S/aplus-media/vc/cab7feac-87fc-4dfe-8c7f-19430e892a64.__CR0,0,150,300_PT0_SX150_V1___.jpg

And what do you know, it works ... except the signal is so quiet that even with everything turned up it sounds like sitting next to someone listening to something on headphones. The same thing happened with a couple of different portable bluetooth speakers. I'm going to hold on to it and try to see what's up, but in the meantime, do any of you know why the Bluetooth signal via a transmitter in the headphone jack should be so muted?

I just ordered one of these (which plugs into the USB-C on the base) to see if I get different or better results:

https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/71VdPuH9QsL._AC_SS350_.jpg

How is the bluetooth dongle powered?

It's battery powered but can also operate while charging/plugged in via USB.

how are you getting video to the LED projector? Are you not using the dock+hdmi to the projector? why aren't you grabbing sound from the projector?

The Switch (which has to remain docked) goes to the LED projector via HDMI. The projector does have audio, but it's pretty quiet/rudimentary; when we show movies outside we connect to an external Bluetooth speaker. Hmm. I *could* try attaching the dongle to the projector itself and see what difference that makes ...

what is the projector? I'm not suggesting to play audio off the projector's speaker, but there may be a line level audio output?

It's a cheapo no name brand projector (like, literally, as far as I can tell) that does have a 3.5" AV line out input. I suppose I could just buy a 3.5 to 3.5 connector. I assume the Bluetooth speaker I have has a 3.5 input somewhere as well.

hypnospace outlaw !

i would hope that has touchscreen controls since its entirely a point and click game. extremely good game if the port works out

this indie world has a bunch of stuff I'm into! Notably the aforementioned Hypnospace Outlaw, A Short Hike, Spiritfarer ("a cozy management game about dying"), Garden Story (instabuy when it's out), Takeshi and Hiroshi (love the visual design), Bear and Breakfast, Raji (indie indian god of war?), Card Shark (a historical cheating game!) and Struggling (jesus at this character design).

Hell, even Torchlight III might make for a fun, portable Diablo.

diablo is already on switch fwiw

you want a challop: i prefer torchlight.

i do too, you just made it sound like it'd be a substitute

is 3 made by any of the same ppl who made 1&2? their studio got shut down a while back after 0 people in the world besides me liked Hob

max schaefer still on it
https://www.pcgamesn.com/torchlight-3/crunch

It sounds like their MMO idea fizzled (with the market) and so they're playing it safe with a retread of TL2 with a couple of new character ideas. Fine by me!

Diablo 3 might be the most boring game I ever played... I was still in the "tutorial" section (5 hours in?) and was struggling to stay awake on Hard mode as my characters just razed their way through oceans of bad guys

isn't that kinda the point though, like it's the american equivalent of dynasty warriors/musou games

though i guess those at least have some light RTS-ish map control elements that diablo lacks

i kept checking to see if i fucked up the character creation when i walked away from the computer and came back to find my guy gamely bobbing in place while a group of zombies ineffectually swiped at me without impact

This is just making me want to play Diablo 3 again

A buddy of mine is one of the main devs of Torchlight 3. He’s pumped about it.

Tell I'm very excited about Train Guy

Dang train class looks cool!

Has anyone had any problems with game cards that can't be read? I've put one in that hasn't been played for a few months and I'm getting the error every time. The Switch website has no useful info.

re: Diablo 3 difficulty, i went through the same thing. it was incredibly easy at first, no matter how high i pushed the difficulty. it wasn't until beating the game (for the first of many times) that the more difficult settings open up. look at this ridiculous list:

ULTIMATE EVIL EDITION DIFFICULTY LEVELS
Normal: 100% Health, 100% Damage, 0% extra gold bonus, 0% extra XP bonus
Hard: 200% Health, 130% Damage, 75% extra gold bonus, 75% extra XP bonus
Expert: 320% Health, 189% Damage, 100% extra gold bonus, 100% extra XP bonus
Master: 512% Health, 273% Damage, 200% extra gold bonus, 200% extra XP bonus
Torment I: 819% Health, 396% Damage, 300% extra gold bonus, 300% extra XP bonus
Torment II: 1311% Health, 575% Damage, 400% extra gold bonus, 400% extra XP bonus
Torment III: 2097% Health, 833% Damage, 550% extra gold bonus, 550% extra XP bonus
Torment IV: 3355% Health, 1208% Damage, 800% extra gold bonus, 800% extra XP bonus
Torment V: 5369% Health, 1752% Damage, 1150% extra gold bonus, 1150% extra XP bonus
Torment VI: 8590% Health, 2540% Damage, 1600% extra gold bonus, 1600% extra XP bonus
Torment VII: 18985% Health, 3604% Damage, 1850% extra gold bonus, 1900% extra XP bonus
Torment VIII: 41625% Health, 5097% Damage, 2150% extra gold bonus, 2425% extra XP bonus
Torment IX: 91260% Health, 7208% Damage, 2500% extra gold bonus, 3100% extra XP bonus
Torment X: 200082% Health, 10194% Damage, 2900% extra gold bonus, 4000% extra XP bonus
Torment XI: 438669% Health, 14416% Damage, 3350% extra gold bonus, 5000% extra XP bonus
Torment XII: 961759% Health, 20387% Damage, 3900% extra gold bonus, 6400% extra XP bonus
Torment XIII: 2108607% Health, 28832% Damage, 4500% extra gold bonus, 8200% extra XP bonus
Torment XIV: 2889383% Health, 40774% Damage, 5200% extra gold bonus, 10500% extra XP bonus
Torment XV: 6334823% Health, 57664% Damage, 6050% extra gold bonus, 13400% extra XP bonus
Torment XVI: 13888770% Health, 64725% Damage, 7000% extra gold bonus, 17000% extra XP bonus

it's only at the higher difficulties (like literally TORMENT VII or something) that it starts to get challenging and you have to think about what you're doing. and you have to fucking GRIND to get to unlock that difficulty!

it's a really bizarre setup, which i can only guess came into being due to the way the game was released, patched and upgraded a million times afterward. it seems like they eventually landed on a really good balance for the core fanbase that had already been playing the game for 2 years, but in the process they created an alienating, confusing start for newcomers

do you have to beat the game every time to raise the Torment level?
i've always been terrible at these games so probably could barely even beat lvl 1

however! once you get near a difficulty level that makes sense, it becomes muuuuuch more fun and addicting, especially for couch co-op. the only reason i persevered through all the grinding is because my couch co-op partner really enjoys the feeling of playing on a really "easy" mode and fucking wailing on everybody. to it was actually a great intro to the game for her, as the difficulty verrrrrry slowly ramped up over the course of 10 hours or so. by the time we were actively seeking higher levels of self-inflicted Torment IX in our life, we were ready for it

/least persuasive recommendation ever

xp it's been a while since i played, so apologies if this is just flat out wrong, but i think you unlock the torment difficulties after you get your character to LVL 60, and i think higher tiers of torment open up after that.

i know what you mean about being terrible at these kinds of games, but they really did make it so you are basically a walking god the first time you play through it. (which is baffling to people expecting a typical diablo challenge)

Following up to my external speaker question,, the 3.5 to 3.5 headphone jack to speaker solution sucked - once again too quiet - which indicates the problem is with the Switch headphone jack. But the (second) bluetooth transmitter I got that plugs into the base of the Switch seems to work pretty well.

the circuit designed to drive headphones tends to be different from the one designed to drive a preamp.

I'm sure. But the bluetooth transmitter that plugged into the headphone jack had a really, really weak signal, too. That's different than a cable connecting the Switch to a speaker directly, isn't it?

ideally it would be different, but cheap little boxes from amazon don't always do things well, even if they advertise them. if the switch headphone jack gets audio to your ears via headphones, it's doing its job correctly.

I still don't understand why you're not just getting the sound from the projector like you would do for a movie?

I can! It's just a cheap projector is all, and using it outside the native sound gets drowned out by the sound of the natives, as it were. Bugs, cars, etc.

you can't run an audio out cable from the projector to the speaker? add an amplifier in between as needed?

Well, I'm definitely not setting up a system with an amplifier in my little backyard, not until someone pays me to do this. The audio out from the projector, let me check ... there's a 3.5 headphone jack and a 3.5 AV jack - I haven't tried those to the speaker via 3.5-to-3.5 cable yet, that's the next experiment. There is an HDMI input, but that's where the Switch (or, say, Amazon firestick) plugs in.

Anyway, like I said, the bluetooth transmitter that plugs into the base of the Switch *does* work and, more importantly, requires the least amount of work and cables. Though of course to plug the Switch into the projector requires it to be docked, which is a pia, too.

if it's an "AV jack", you'll probably need a cable with 3.5 mm TRRS on one end for the projector and 3.5 mm TRS on the other for your speaker.

lol I was going to ask about the dock and getting hdmi to your projector. do you have a small headphone amp? can you add it between the switch and your bluetooth transmitter?

You mean like a DAC? No, nothing portable/practical. And for the AV jack (it just says "AV" on it), you mean a male-to-male 3.5-to-3.5 TRRS to TRS cable? They don't seem as prevalent/easy to find as male-to-female.

not a DAC. the output of the headphone jack is already analog. it seems like there's signal loss between your headphone jack and the bluetooth transmitter and amplifying the headphone output before the transmitter would help. TRRS is pretty uncommon, in general. just wanted to make sure you knew a TRS wouldn't work with it.

For the sake of your neighbours if you're playing mariokart outside you probably should be sticking to volume levels that are low enough that they can't drown out passing traffic, no?

Not drown out, simply hear above from just a couple of feet away from the speaker. Trust me, the cars, trains, and bugs are clearly winning. There is no competition here, let alone winning, just adapting the best we can.

so i guess i should buy Fire Emblem and bury my hopes and dreams in it?

My Switch + BOTW arrived this weekend, haven't gotten around to playing it yet, though.

if your experience is anything like mine, say goodbye to your evenings. BoTW was all-consuming for a month or so there