Much has been made of Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour already, but after getting to spend some time with it, it feels like an ideal way to start the Switch 2 adventure, and was a really good time for the entirety of what I experienced.
I’m not going to sit here and argue back about the “it should be a pack-in” argument, because aside Wii Sports and Sony doing it with Astro’s Playroom, that’s just not a thing that’s happened with enough regularity to actually be a consistent thing. Nintendo didn’t do it with the GameCube, and didn’t do it with the Switch. This is a £10 welcome tour by name and by experience, it’s designed for families to sit around and learn about the Switch 2, and have a bit of fun doing it.
With that in mind, I wanted to take a look at what I experienced, in a less traditional method of previewing the title, so you can gauge for yourself if you think it’s going to be worth it. Caveat time: I didn’t play for hours, and there were things I was told are “not in this demo build”, but I was surprised at how much there seemed could be just lurking around the corner.
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour: Find the Strongest Rumble
In the Joy-Con 2 (L) area, “Find the Strongest Rumble” is exactly what you’d expect it to be. Using the Joy-Con 2 as a mouse, you will move a line from left to right (or right to left) with the HD Rumble kicking off beneath your hand. The strength will increase and decrease, and your job is to find the perfect spot (which to my genuine delight, I pretty much did) and hit the button to confirm you have feelings in your hands, and can find the rumble. I mean, look at my absolutely gormless, but delighted face below and tell me you don’t suddenly want leaderboards and to beat this accuracy.
The first part of this is called “Along a Line”, but there’s more. As you play Welcome Tour you are rewarded with medals, and once you’ve managed to get eight you can revisit this mini-game and unlock the second stage: “Along Two Axes”. As you might guess, this means you now have to navigate up and down as well, and this makes finding the sweet spot harder. As quickly as I felt pride, I felt shame, as while I thought I got close, the game did not, and gave me zero stars. Ouch. I don’t know if there’s a third version, because I failed, but there could be.
Dodge the Spiked balls
In the same area, I played “Survival Mode” of the Dodge the Spiked Balls mini-game. If you’re noticing a theme here, it’s that I think there’s more to these mini-games than initially met the eye. Here you are playing a game that gets you to move the mouse around, avoiding Mario-spike balls of varying sizes. It’s a terrific example of how the mouse fidelity works with Switch 2, and honestly, while I got the three medals with 53.08 seconds, the 50 second bar seemed pretty high for that award. It was getting hairy, hence why I crashed out then. I turned to my colleague at the event and said “that shouldn’t be as fun as it is”, and foolishly forgot to sneak a peek at what the second stage was.
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour: Maracas Physics Demo
This really is the first one that isn’t a “game”. Similarly to how HD rumble was shown off way back at the Switch Hammersmith event, it’s designed to show off how the rumble feels in the hands. It’s like the marbles in a box demo, and you can switch between beads and a rubber ball, which might sound simplistic, but still, nearly a decade on, it’s an impressive demo and warrants use in future titles.
Guess the Frame Rate
In the “Nintendo Switch 2 console area”, the 120fps demo was something I was pleased to see. For years people have argued 30v60, and here you will see various things (like a football, for example) rush across the screen before being offer two frame rate choices. Pick the one you think it is, and hope you’re not being a fool in front of your mates. The first up is 20fps vs 120fps, which, while obvious, does highlight that a large part of the Nintendo audience may not know about this kind of technical term.
Moving up the gears, then it’s a basketball that you have to choose between 30fps and 120fps. Next is a tennis ball, and 40fps vs 120fps. Where I failed was 60v120, which is simply because I haven’t had enough experience with 120fps titles. While not something you’ll return to over and over, this is one of the best explanations for what a frame rate is, and looks like, that I’ve seen, maybe ever. Bravo on that, for sure.
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour: The Quizzes
The name of these is a bit of a misnomer, unless I failed to see something. Here, what you’ve got, is a proper visual explainer with text of what things do. In the “Nintendo Switch 2 Console Area” you can visit “booths” and check billboards which simply explain features of the Nintendo Switch 2. For example, you will see “A crisp and detailed screen”, where it tells you about 1920×1080 resolution. Is this section for the kind of person who would be reading our publication? No, probably not. But I can absolutely imagine parents with young families, or friends with non-gaming pals using this to explain away some of the jargon that so prevails our beloved hobby.
And that’s that, a brief tour of Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour. Whether you think it’ll be worth the money come June 5th is up to you, but I was pleasantly surprised at what it had to offer, and while my hope for leaderboards is likely to be misplaced (this feels like the least competitive thing ever, and intentionally so), I’ll definitely be trying it out in full on launch day. It’s a fun explainer for people less familiar with gaming and its nomenclature, and feels like a warm hug telling people they’re welcome in the club.
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour is out on June 5th for Nintendo Switch 2.
