New Road To Damascus Who Dis

My Nintendo Switch and I have been together for almost 6 years, and we have touched each other so infrequently during that time that you’d think we were part of an Edo-period politically arranged marriage. We’ve tried our best along the way to make things work, but the wintery starting conditions between us made venturing out frigid for both of us regardless of how convenient it may be that we could now ice skate to each other along the intercoastal waterways that connected our homelands. I was a PC guy trying to branch out, and it was the belle of the handheld gaming ball, and there weren’t a ton of unforced situations in which the twain would meet regardless of the increase in access and mobility.

I tried to get into Animal Crossing at the start of covid quarantine in LA, but the possibility that it might be the last island I ever got to visit spoiled the soup so to speak and I never managed to get more than a few spoonfuls of it down. I also tried to get into Breath of the Wild, but the lack of weapon durability got to me pretty quickly and having to pause constantly mid-fight to switch to a different stick or sword or whatever drove me up the wonderfully-pixelated wall. I’ve realized since then that I was wrong to quit that game for that reason, but at the time it just sort of was what it was and my resulting fugue sent the Switch into permanent storage.

I’m not calling Austin’s 6th Avenue the road to Damascus by any means, but I’ve recently realized the fundamental error of my ways and I felt compelled this morning to let you know about it. I dusted my Switch off a couple months ago in an effort to get Sloane to play Overcooked 2, but she refused because she said we already argue too much in the kitchen in real life which is fair. I then got Eastward, which is a Studio Ghibli-esque take on the old batch of Zelda games and my resistance started to break. Sure, it’s a game that takes a Tolkien-level amount of time to get to the point but it was worth the wait and I was finally hooked.

My time at the beach last week week was restorative and insightful on every level, and I’ve returned home feeling like a bumblebee with a fresh tank of buzzes and brand new wing joints. And part of the reason for my restoration was having a travel buddy in the form of my Switch that let me goof off in interdimensional ways while tanning or curling up in an armchair under a blanket like a toad in a stump armed with ribbits. I bought Graveyard Keeper the night before our flight because I’d heard that it was Stardew Valley but darker, and having an outlet to perform autopsies, tend to burial plots, and sell pumpkins and lentils to neighboring towns gave my brain the necessary juice it apparently needs to relax on deeper levels. Don’t worry, I also read an entire book and participated in Family Stuff too so I wasn’t aloof, but suffice to say my days of not really getting what the big deal is about the Nintendo Switch are firmly in the rearview mirror. It’s not the missing piece you’ve been searching for in recesses if your own spirit, but it’s a fun buddy for some of the liminal spaces in your day to day life or long-haul vacation commutes and I (finally) very highly recommend it.