The Nintendo Switch Online Expansion is here and with it, N64 games….and the results are less than optimal. Since the launch, many users have been coming forward with multiple issues and complaints about the quality of the emulation. For instance, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time has drawn complaints about how fog, draw distances, and water textures on the Switch.
Ocarina of Time
N64 vs Wii VC vs Switch
(h/t @zfg111) pic.twitter.com/HM9renorc3
— SSFF | ??? (@stopskeletons) October 26, 2021
and
HAHAHAHA pic.twitter.com/S2h4C7ahtF
— MutantAura (@MutantAura) October 26, 2021
GameXplain has done a video discussing the issues which can be seen below and this does not only concern Ocarina of Time as slowdown with frame rates at startup and missing fog has occured in other titles, along with latency issues while playing online.
One of you has a dodgy connection…https://t.co/iAyiHZ0hDF
This is a Scotland – America connection.
— ??????? Xiphos | Is Wearing A Kilt! (@Xiphos_YT) October 26, 2021
This is not even getting into the basic game features that are missing such as in Mario Kart 64, which needs a Controller Pak to save time trial data and race against ghosts. Tjhe NSO version will direct players to “insert N64 Controller Pak into controller 1”, however, the Expansion Pack doesn’t have any Controller Paks for the Switch Online Expansion Pack, which means, ghost trials haven’t been carried over.
Oh god they filled up the back pic.twitter.com/MAuVTbGi0H
— Connorb0t (@itbeconnorb0t) October 26, 2021
Saving is also proving to be a problem in the games, necessitating the use of save states due to issues with the emulator and the button layouts are an issue as well, and remapping controls isn’t the app isn’t possible. Some games also have the rumble feature disabled for certain regions, but not others such as Super Mario 64.
These issues were not in the Wii or Wii U virtual console versions, so this is a bizarre situation.