$70 Mortal Kombat 1 Switch version called "robbery" as graphical comparisons flood the internet

stopthatgirl7@kbin.social to Games@sh.itjust.works – 65 points –
eurogamer.net

Mortal Kombat 1's graphics on Nintendo's hybrid console have been widely panned, with many wondering how the developer …

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Imo the anger is a bit misdirected. Making a toned down version of the game takes equal the amount of resources, if not more compared to other ports. Performance wise the switch always has been a toaster, even compared to the last gen of consoles. There probably are now phones with more graphical power, so ports to hardware that is so far behind is difficult.

I've ported games to switch and there is a lot of extra loops to go through to make it even remotely run at decent frame rates.

The publisher could have made the switch version cheaper, but they probably invested more resources into it than porting it between xbox and playstation, so i can kind of understand why they didn't.

The argument "it looks worse so it should be cheaper" is kind of questionable, when the console they are buying it for just doesn't allow for much better considering the art direction. If the switch was as powerful as the ps5 or current xbox, they would have made the game look as good as it is on all the other platforms.

A valid question is if this needed a switch port at all, and considering the backlash, the publishers are probably asking themselves the same question.

Aren’t most Switch games still $60, though? Just flipping through the US E-store, the only game I saw at $70 was Tears of the Kingdom, and this version of Mortal Kombat is not going to compare favorably to that.

I wouldn't personally buy it for the switch.

But typically publishers are not making the price on release based on what platform you run it on. It looks worse, but that isn't really the game's fault. It has the same amount of cost attached to it as any other port of the game, if not more. On the other hand, from the consumer perspective, I can 100% understand why someone wouldn't want to spend $70 on this.

In the end, will it be worth the money they put in to port this game to less-than last gen? I have no idea.

Some mid level exec wants to keep his units sold spreadsheet relevant for all platforms.

The argument “it looks worse so it should be cheaper” is kind of questionable, when the console they are buying it for just doesn’t allow for much better considering the art direction.

I disagree.
When you have to pay the same or more for something less then that's simply not justified for the consumer. If the console can't handle anything better and is that expensive to port over, then you should simply not port your game over to it. If that's a general Switch problem, then the Switch maybe shouldn't be a thing either. I thought that's how markets are supposed to work, no?

But it's not something less, it's something less, in your device. That's the distinction.

If the console can’t handle anything better and is that expensive to port over, then you should simply not port your game over to it

If enough people want to play it on the switch, the investment is worth it.

I thought that’s how markets are supposed to work, no?

Well, if it were up to you maybe, but if there's enough people that will buy it just to play it on the switch, then the markets are working as intended.

Lot's of hypothetical "ifs" there that are seemingly in direct contradiction to this topic.

You can call it less because you only value graphics. Someone else can call it more because it's portable.

Discounting the most expensive port to do doesn't make sense.

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