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First Look at Nintendo Labo


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This is impressive technology. I had no idea that the Joy Con are capable of this.

 

As others have pointed out, this is clearly targeted primarily at young children, and I think Nintendo will be successful in reaching that demographic. Nintendo is a toy company and it shows. Nintendo Labo is clearly not intended for me, but 20 years ago I would have begged for it.

 

This is a good announcement. 

 

EDIT: I will add: I hope Nintendo has a plan for helping replace the cardboard components. That could mean including multiple sheets of the cardboard pieces in the box, or selling replacements cheap as a separate unit. It is cardboard after all. It's likely to break after heavy use.

 

Edited by WatcherJoshua
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13 minutes ago, WatcherJoshua said:

This is impressive technology. I had no idea that the Joy Con are capable of this.

If you look back at the Nintendo Switch presentation, you'll see where they spoke about tech inside the Joy-Cons and they're pricey for what they pack in small form factor.

 

But I think Nintendo Labo mostly use the IR camera that is on the right Joy-Con, which I believe only 1-2 Switch used. I'm glad to see feature for a Nintendo console not being under utilized for once.

 

Good thinking here, Nintendo!

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I like the concept of the Labo, and do plan to get the Variety Toy-Con at launch. The piano, motorcycle and RC cars all interested me. If the fishing rod tied mini-game is an expanded version of what was available via the 3DS's AR Cards, I think I could get some time out of that as well. The biggest thing though is probably the piano. I've been interested in games like Electroplankton and enjoyed creating my own tracks in WarioWare D.I.Y. I think the piano Toy-Con in combination with some note taking and smartphone recording could connect with me creatively on top of the push for these Toy-Cons to be personalized. Nintendo clearly advertised the Labo for kids, but I think it can connect well with adults interested in DIY projects, engineering or those in a creative block. The Labo, more so in terms of the Variety Toy-Con set, combines several of my hobbies, so I don't think it'll be $70 wasted.

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Very dope and creative.

 

Wonder if the software will be available digitally as well. I can see a lot of card board being saved/built by people who don't want to pay the full price for all of that. Personally, if I could get the stuff for 20% off with Gamers Club, I would be interested in trying it hold, just to see how easy/difficult it is to put together and function. With that being said though, I probably won't only because I would get bored with the stuff pretty quick and I don't have the room to keep any of that stuff. My friend has young kids so I'm sure I'll be able to test out their kits when they are released.

 

I'm excited for Nintendo. Hopefully this does well. I could see them doing more kits in the future if this really takes off. Almost wish I had a kid to play this stuff with. One day. :P

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42 minutes ago, IU said:

I like the concept of the Labo, and do plan to get the Variety Toy-Con at launch. The piano, motorcycle and RC cars all interested me. If the fishing rod tied mini-game is an expanded version of what was available via the 3DS's AR Cards, I think I could get some time out of that as well. The biggest thing though is probably the piano. I've been interested in games like Electroplankton and enjoyed creating my own tracks in WarioWare D.I.Y. I think the piano Toy-Con in combination with some note taking and smartphone recording could connect with me creatively on top of the push for these Toy-Cons to be personalized. Nintendo clearly advertised the Labo for kids, but I think it can connect well with adults interested in DIY projects, engineering or those in a creative block. The Labo, more so in terms of the Variety Toy-Con set, combines several of my hobbies, so I don't think it'll be $70 wasted.

I'm interested in the variety pack too, and the piano really caught my attention. But now I've remembered that I have a very fancy actual piano waiting for me on another property. But like, I'm hot fucking garbage so I'm probably gonna go for this tiny cardboard replica anyway.

 

psyduck;

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The Joy-Con that slots into the back has a camera, which can see the back of the keys so that it knows which ones you’re pressing, and then relays that information to the Switch. The sound-modifying knobs, meanwhile, each have distinctive stripes that are associated with their respective sounds, so that the camera can tell them apart.



this shit blows my mind. anybody who says "it's just cardboard" is insane

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I'm thinking that they're going to have a Labo presentation for late March or early April. I think there will be quite a bit more to the software available than what may be expected. I'm thinking back to how ARMS was when it first appeared in the January Switch presentation last year and then that ended up with its own Direct, several character videos and a handful of free updates that really fleshed out that game. The more videos and information I look at for the kits, the bigger I think these releases may be. The Robot Kit seems to interact with a full game as opposed to something more mini-game based for the Variety Kit, and we hardly saw any of that game beyond what some movement could do with the Labo construction.

 

Edit: Found out too that there are knob inserts for the top of the piano toy-con that can change the sound of the keys. I'm curious to learn what that range is for those different effects and what exactly they sound like. It does make me think back to creating tracks in WarioWare D.I.Y. which I spent at least 10-15 hours with in that aspect alone. If it does turn out to be anything like that in its effect range, I think the piano could be big for me and could justify the $70 in itself. Having the feedback of pressing keys in versus using a stylus to drag around notes should go a long way hopefully in getting me more immersed into music creation and exploring that kind of creativity.

Edited by IU
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1 minute ago, IU said:

I'm thinking that they're going to have a Labo presentation for late March or early April. I think there will be quite a bit more to the software available than what may be expected. I'm thinking back to how ARMS was when it first appeared in the January Switch presentation last year and then that ended up with its own Direct, several character videos and a handful of free updates that really fleshed out that game. The more videos and information I look at for the kits, the bigger I think these releases may be. The Robot Kit definitely seems to interact with a full game as opposed to something more mini-game based for the Variety Kit, and we hardly saw any of that game beyond what some movement could do with the Labo construction.


Whats really interesting is that labo could break away from the normal video game schedules we're used to because toys have their own fairs and expos and stuff.

For instance there's the International Toy Fair in Feburary, I could very easily see Nintendo going and doing a full presentation to coincide with that.

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At first I thought this was really stupid but after thinking about it it's actually brilliant. They have actually revived playing with boxes! It's recyclable, it's cheap to sell and mass-produce, it has wide appeal, and there's very little market risk for producing a ton of it. I don't actually want one but I'm quite surprised by this clever idea.

 

11 hours ago, WatcherJoshua said:

EDIT: I will add: I hope Nintendo has a plan for helping replace the cardboard components. That could mean including multiple sheets of the cardboard pieces in the box, or selling replacements cheap as a separate unit. It is cardboard after all. It's likely to break after heavy use.

I believe it was confirmed that they'll sell the kits separately from the software at about $10- super easy to replace!

Edited by Carl321
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Alright, I've some time to digest this, and I'm okay with it. I think it's great. I mean if you look at some of the toys they're making for kids these days there's definitely a shift towards building the grassroots knowledge of basic programming and engineering, prepping the workforce of tomorrow to function alongside an automated world that will need these skills. Something not many of us had when we were quite young as from Lego et al.

 

What they've done here is show cased the untapped technology of the Switch and its Joy-Cons and made these DIY kits to give kids (and they did straight up say for kids) something they can build, create, and then see it in action with a software title. It's brilliant. Will it sell well? Who knows? But it has massive potential as a lot of the toys that have these type of features are fairly expensive, so there is definitely a market for it. Throwing the Nintendo name out there would definitely help.

 

Given that these kits do require a different type of project team behind them, it doesn't seem like we're losing any of Nintendo's resources from other game development and how far they take it is limited only by the technology they've now shown us. Once people have played with these I wouldn't be surprised if the torch was passed, per se, to indy developers making their peripheral/games and seeing cheaper and more variety kits become available. Nintendo has introduced a new way to game to the industry, like they've been known to do, now it's up to the industry to see where we go next.

 

Bravo, Nintendo.

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