But its weird to suddenly take a hardline stance on arguably underpowered hardware and suddenly demand higher performance on it. The Switch is not and never has been cutting edge. It is not marketed that way. And the vast majority of consumers on that platform don't demand it to be.
We all make choices on hardware which reflect what we demand in games. If BOTW is a game that underperforms relative to other switch titles then focus it on that. But you can't squeeze fps out of a magical stone.
The SNES isn't cutting edge either, nor is the 3DS or the Gamecube. They all have their fair share of games running at 60fps though, because developers made this their priority. The problem is not the hardware, it's developers making games that seem to be too ambitious for the hardware. So if I want to play the latest Fire Emblem, I have to do so somewhere between 20 and 30fps, which looks and feels awful to my eyes.
And if I play the game in a few years again I will notice how badly it will have aged compared to The Sacred Stones for example, because its blurry 3D graphics will look horribly outdated while running at 20-30fps, while the latter has timeless 2D graphics and 60fps.
A Link between Worlds has aged better than Ocarina of Time
Metroid Zero Mission has aged better than Samus Returns
Battlefield 1943 has aged better than Bad Company
Better performance helps any game to age better.
Nintendo has a policy of choosing a target framerate depending of the genre and scope of the game. Breath of Wild was never going to be a 60 fps game no matter what, because with the Zelda series they get overly ambitious in terms of general scope.
You have another example on Luigi's Mansion, wich runs at a targeted framerate of 30 fps, aiming for higher graphic
Mario Kart, Smash and Mario main series, for example, are 60 fps series.
It's a matter of design, just like, in one or two years from now, console games will be 30 fps by default
Exactly, developers get overly ambitious. And for the last sentence, message me again when that's the case. Because as far as I can see, we're getting more "performance modes" than ever since their introduction in 2016 with PS4 Pro. This user actually phrased it better:
Of course it matters, and I feel you sort of have to overlook a ton of facts selectively regarding performance trends in gaming over the last 10 years to argue otherwise.
Not saying that the degree to which it matters isn't up for debate... but more games target 60fps or include 60fps options now than at any time I can recall since the days of primarily 2D gaming, and that was the case even before these new consoles released with their hefty slate of high performance cross-gen games.
Performance notes like FPS, resolution, and stable frame rate are very easy to verify before purchase these days. If you can't stand games below a certain performance threshold why do you play them?
Because I enjoy playing Zelda or Fire Emblem. I would just enjoy them way more with performance that isn't 20-30 fps as with Fire Emblem for example. I ask developers to release better performing games, so I can enjoy them more. What's wrong with that?
Really? What would those be?
24fps, DTS Surround Sound, 1080p, subtitle size. They even state some of these things on the back of their cases. Imagine game cases stating resolution or framerate.
