On March 3rd, 2017 the Nintendo Switch was finally released to the world, the first true hybrid system of its time which allows for both handheld and docked play on the big screen proved to be a huge success, offering something unique in the larger landscape of gaming.

It's hard to believe but three years have passed since that first day when many of us were playing the already highly anticipated game; The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and simply marveling at how such a game could run on a platform as small as the Switch, especially considering that the original Wii U version launched alongside it.

Since then, the Switch has had many technically impressive titles, plenty of ports and an impressive amount of support from Indie developers across the board; also while there are thousands of games on the digital storefront, there are plenty of physical game publishers who are working tirelessly to ensure that there is at least more physical representation than there would have been without them, which is a good thing for those of us who intend to pick up the upcoming Streets of Rage 4 which comes from a series which has a strong physical lineage.

There has even been an alternative way to play in the form of the Switch Lite which offers many players an entry-level way of playing and is ideal for those who prefer to play purely on the go, not to mention that it has been on the market long enough to potentially entice anyone who has been waiting the upcoming release of Animal Crossing: New Horizons, though Nintendo is clearly missing a trick by not having a themed Switch Lite out in time for launch, though the themed base model does look rather nice.

Personally, I've most enjoyed playing games of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Mario Kart 8 DX and many more titles including some from the Capcom Beat 'em Up Bundle online with other staff members and members of our N-Europe forums; though I still have plenty of games which I've been wanting to play, so here's to hopefully many more years of the Nintendo Switch with many more classic games being played as well as many more titles to be announced which will ensure that there's plenty more to play throughout 2020 and beyond.

Sam C Gittins - Editor-in-Chief

Let's see what N-Europe staff members and forum members had to say about the Nintendo Switch on its third birthday...

'I don't think I've been properly excited for a new game since Super Mario Odyssey in 2017, so far, unfulfilled potential for me' - Gregory Moffett - Staff Writer

'Best supported Nintendo System since the SNES (excluding Wii and DS because shovelware does not = support). It's the first time in a long time that being a "Nintendo only" gamer has not left me feel like I'm really missing out. More quality content than you can shake a stick at.

Shame it's Nintendo that have been slacking, their output has been rather poor in year 2 and 3. We had high hopes of WiiU + 3DS levels of output and it just hasn't come to fruition, unfortunately. Perfect indie machine, but pricing is an issue that needs to be addressed. Other consoles get lower prices and better / more regular sales. However, they have struck gold with the form factor.

For the future, I'd like to see them expand on the Switch concept. The lite is a good move - cheap dedicated handheld device. I'd like to see them expand on this and experiment with a more powerful "home only" device, or a beefier Switch that switches. Of course that would need a better account / save cloud set up to support multiple systems in a more streamlined manner, so I'm sceptical. I'm still excited about the "family of systems" they talked about, so with the competition about to upgrade, I think late this year / early next is the time to take this concept to the next level. They need to raise their game in the software department, but MP4 and BOTW 2 both have me very excited. I'd like to see more in terms of new concepts / IPs going forward, along the lines of Labo and Ring Fit, but more "traditional".' - Nick Lone - Staff Writer

'I've only had the Switch for a year, but it definitely rose quickly in my consideration. Its handheld mode means I play it a lot more often than previous consoles (the TV, in the bed before sleep... even the sofa, when someone else wants to watch TV). Furthermore, organizing a small Smash scene is a lot more practical when bringing your Switches is so easy.

It helps that the Switch's library is so good. First party games, a handful of AAA games, remastered classics, and sooo many indie games... A lot of variety to play in any way that's most comfortable.' - João Pereira - Staff Writer

'My most vivid memory of Switch is still getting Breath of the Wild and being completely and utterly blown away by how big it was, and wondering how it could possibly fit on the cartridge. I remember exploring this enormous world, climbing the mountains and looking for horses to tame - and on a handheld too! Truly, I had finally reached the point where I no longer desired any better graphics than this. Similarly, my other highlight was playing Dragon Quest XI last year. At last, I had genuinely experienced a worthy successor to VIII.

Switch just feels like a mature machine to me. There's a maturity about letting gamers play it how they want - as a handheld or on TV - with traditional controls too, and even the selection of games on the eShop caters for those who were playing arcade games back in the 1980s. It just seems so natural and effortless that I can have Final Fight and Double Dragon sitting there whenever I want them.' - Grazza - Staff Writer

'The promise of the hype of its reveal was, and is still being, fulfilled by the fantastic library that populates the system. Numerous well regarded Nindies stand proudly by the monumental Nintendo releases. However, with the recent trickle of games from Nintendo themselves, and the dire situation I find myself in with 3 full sets of JoyCons suffering from the dreaded 'Drift', a slight lack of that ever so bright Nintendo sheen has reared its head.' - Lee Davies - Staff Writer

'For me, the Switch is a device that had a great amount of potential but has failed to live up to my expectations. When Nintendo consolidated their handheld and console divisions I was hoping that their output would increase and the days of first party gaming droughts would be over. Sadly, that just hasn’t been the case and if anything I think we've lost more than we have gained with the release of this hybrid device.

I can see the appeal of the Switch and why it’s so popular but as someone who plays games across all formats, I find the software line up is really lacking. It’s great that things like Metro, Bioshock, The Witcher, Wolfenstein, Doom and other such games are part of the platform but most of these games have been played by me before on other systems or are far cheaper to buy ( sometimes free ) if I were to pick them up elsewhere, not to mention that they would run and look better, as well as having trophy/achievement support, which certainly means more to myself than the portability that the Switch offers. With such games out of the equation, that leaves me with Nintendo’s own titles having to do the heavy lifting, which is mainly why I buy I Nintendo platform in the first place.

If you look at the games that were released when Nintendo were supporting two different devices I think you seen them being far more creative and experimental with their titles. There were lots of smaller games being released on their handhelds and digital stores, while their consoles were where the bigger games went to. It was a good balance and I think if you had both devices you were pretty satisfied with how things worked out. Three years into the Switch’s life and the first party line up has been really lacking and they’ve had to rely on ports and outsourcing to their partners in order to get games out. In my eyes, a few of the new games that have been released, some made by Nintendo and some made by partners, haven’t been up to scratch when compared to previous entries. Mario Odyssey, Kirby’s Star Allies, Yoshi’s Crafted World, BOTW…all of these games had good components to them but weren’t a patch of things like Woolly World, Mario Galaxy games, both Kirby 3DS games and past Zelda games. Whilst the Wii U didn’t sell very well I do think that the software output was far better than what we’ve had from Nintendo and their partners so far on the Switch. Stuff like Donkey Kong: Tropical Freeze, Hyrule Warriors, Kirby and the Rainbow Curse, Yoshi’s Woolly World, Nintendo Land, Pikmin 3, Mario 3D World, Paper Mario Color Splash, Captain Toad, Mario Kart 8, Splatoon, New Super Mario Bros + Luigi, NES Remix, Mini Mario and Friends are just a few games off the top of my head that I played and loved from the Wii U era. It speaks volumes of the quality of these games when Nintendo have been relying on them to try and fill in the gaps in the Switch’s library.

I think one of the biggest missed opportunities of the Switch has been the Virtual Console and the lack thereof. When the Switch was first shown I think most of us on here envisioned that the hybrid console would allow for us to take Nintendo games from the past and present on the go with us. Again, 3 years on and we’ve only had a bunch of NES games and a handful of SNES games. To make matters worse, we now no longer even know when these games are going to drop. We went from monthly releases to waiting until Nintendo decides to drop the new set of games. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve enjoyed playing through the NES and SNES games that I have but I think most of us were wanting N64 and Gamecube era games, not the same old NES/SNES games we’ve played many times before on previous consoles. With the Switch we also lost complete ownership of these older games and we are now at the mercy of publishers who can now remove games from the service if they choose to do so. Once again, the Wii U actually trumps the Switch in this regard. We had Wii, NES, SNES, N64, GBA and DS games as part of the back catalogue of games, all of which could be straight up bought, without the need to fear that they would leave the service soon.

Two of the Switch’s biggest strengths are points that are pretty much lost on me. These being indie games and portability. I can see why the Switch is popular with both of these points but sadly they don’t really impact me and as such it makes the Switch less appealing.

The first point is a weird one because when I first got my Switch I was in love with the indie scene and really liked how Nintendo had curated some great titles for the launch period. In fact it was smaller games like Kamino that pushed me into buying the Switch in the first place. Unfortunately, this didn’t last long, the flood gates were opened and the eShop became a mess, just like every other digital store, if not worse. The indie exclusives started to dry up or be buried and either games were being released on all the consoles or old games were being ported over. As I mentioned at the start, with me being a multiconsole gamer this means I had most likely already played a lot of the indie ports already and the new indie games that were appearing on every console usually got bought elsewhere due to the reasons I stated when speaking about the third party games being ported over.

The second point is one I’ve said this many times before in various threads and that is that the hybrid nature of the Switch isn’t something that I need as I’m not in a situation where my time is very limited or the TV is being used by someone else. For me, it’s essentially just another Nintendo home console.

I do think the success of the Switch has made Nintendo very complacent, something which happens with all of the big 3 when they find success. I often find when Nintendo have their backs against the wall that they are at their most creative and interesting. Being the underdog often forces a company to bring their A game to the table. It also forces them to try and make their product more appealing in the eyes of the consumer, as seen by what Microsoft has been trying to do these past couple of years. The Switch is selling well so there is no need for Nintendo to address things like the barebone features of the system, poor online and joy-con drifting issues because they have been able to coast along quite comfortably. If the console is selling well then there’s no need to fix the problems.

Ultimately, over the past few years I’ve come to realise that the Switch is a device that isn’t made for me. I would go as far as to say that it’s my least favourite Nintendo console of all time. Will this change in the future? Possibly. It's all down to the software but i'm honestly not too optimistic about it all.' - Adam Hirst - N-Europe forum member

'A favourite memory... way too many to choose from, I might cheat and go for two...

That the first six months or so were simply magical. Being in amongst it as the world fell in love with the Switch was great after the lean years of the Wii U. We're used to a lot of other consoles not really getting going software wise until the second or third year but Nintendo had an incredible start to the Switch and while the last couple opening halves of the year haven't been as plentiful first party wise as I'd have liked, there's been no shortage of stuff to play on this thing.

Nintendo are talented enough to have given the industry some real key milestones in gaming, those Super Mario Bros, Mario 64, Ocarina of Time etc type moments. I figured we wouldn't see another one so groundbreaking again, from any developer. Breath of the Wild was that game though. I'll never forget what an incredible ride that was, it made me feel like a kid again and I'll never forget how I felt playing that game.

(PS: Tetris 99 being a thing, a free game for online members. It's probably in my top 5 most played games, and it was free.)

(PPS: Oh and Mario + Rabbids being a thing. From that first Ubisoft reveal with Yves Guillemot to Davide (Don't cry Ubisoft man) Soliani to the incredibly charming and fun game itself.)' - Ronnie - N-Europe forum member

'Slay the Spire.' - Drahkon - N-Europe forum member

Those are our thoughts on the Nintendo Switch's third anniversary but what do you think about the system? Had it provided you with plenty of unique and engaging games to play so far? Or are you still waiting for the right moment to get all aboard the hype train? (one thing is for certain, it's going to be an interesting ride either way and we're excited to arrive at the final destination for the console, wherever that may be but let's enjoy what games we can because things are surely just getting started)

Leave us a comment below or join in with the discussion on our forum. We'll be back with another N-Eaction in the not too distant future.