Goodbye Nintendo Switch

Doing something a bit different this week, which I guess makes it like every other week here. The Nintendo Switch is finally being put into the ground in a couple of weeks thanks to the bigger and better Nintendo Switch 2. So I thought it would be fun to recount all of the years of the Nintendo Switch, but not really focus on the games or the system itself, but how I evolved overtime and where I am at now vs when it launched. A lot has changed in the last eight years!

2017 (23 Years Old)

The Nintendo Switch 2 launched in March of 2017. I had just graduated college, was still working on Broadway and more than anything wanted to work in games. I didn’t really know or understand my path forward in this space, but I had known for a bit this is what I was aiming to do. At this point I had a podcast with some friends, we ran a small little blog where we occasionally wrote about stuff, talked, and made a bunch of Let’s Plays and reviews. It was about this time I discovered Easy Allies and the idea of what I wanted to do with my life took a bit more shape.

While it wouldn’t be for quite some time that I actually figured out my place in all of this, it was a simple time. Just some friends talking about a new Nintendo console and everything that encapsulates.

2018 (24 Years Old)

This year is mostly filled with memories of branching out on my own, starting my own blog (that only lived for two months) before being hired on as a contributor to a more well-known site that paid me very little for a lot. However, I cut my teeth, moved up in ranks, and eventually found a little home to call my own. It allowed me to start taking media appointments at Pax East, it gave me the space to start reviewing game son a more formal scale, and granted me plenty of insight into how this whole machine operates.

This is also the year I moved out of my parents home and out on my own. Just 23 at the time I moved into the same apartment I’m writing this newsletter from. I still remember sitting on a recliner in my new bedroom and firing up Octopath Traveler, which had just released. It was the first game I ever played in this apartment. It reminded me of home.

I’m not a big handheld person, but something about a new apartment, a new part of town, and a new game just made me want to play the Switch everywhere. I took it to local coffee shops, the park, and even just on the deck of my apartment. It was a small reminder of simpler times.

I attended my first big boy preview event in 2018 for Super Smash Bros. Ultimate. Which I still think is a pretty cool first preview event. I got to hang out with folks I always admired. Not as a fan, but as a colleague. It felt like “hey maybe I can do this actually.”

I took that event in between shifts of building and creating To Kill A Mockingbird on Broadway. I remember running over from that event to a production meeting across town, and then putting in almost 10 hours over at the Shubert. It was probably the busiest year of my life, but it’s also when I learned how to balance games and my career (at the time.)

I went to the Tony Awards, had some pretty devasting family stuff happen, and took a trip to Utah with friends. It was a really tumultuous point of my life, but one that made me a stronger person in every regard.

2019 (25 Years Old)

2019 was a much quieter year. Most of my life had slowed down. Things were finally settling into place. I learned how to better balance Broadway and games, I became much more acquainted with my neighborhood and living in Brooklyn, and I even went to medieval times for my 25 birthday.

I played a lot of game sin this time, but I was much more focused on trying to uncover how I was going to break into the games scene more effectively. How was I going to make the connections I wanted to make, the friends I wanted to make, and the work i wanted to make.

This was a planning year more than anything else, elaborate ideas for YouTube content that never materialized, or logos for shows I never made. I had a lot of ambition and drive to shift my career path, but it wouldn’t be until 2020 that all of it took place.

At the end of 2019 I did a pretty successful in-person Extra life stream with friends. 24 hours in a friends apartment with guests coming through the entirety of the stream. It was a blast and I even cut down a small highlight reel y’all can watch below. It finally felt like I had momentum and my brain was on board for my ambition.

2020 (26 Years Old)

Before Covid-19 hit the US and shut everything down, one very important thing happened in my life. I went to Pax East 2020 and appeared on my very first panel alongside some wonderful people. It was about ranking Bioware love interests and it was a great time. What I didn’t know at the time is how important some of the friendships I made through that panel would become as the pandemic hurdled toward us.

Pax ended, the world shut down, and everything in my life changed. Broadway didn’t return for over a year and I had to hard pivot my career choices to survive.

Idk, I guess I have to talk about Animal Crossing: New Horizons and it’s ~ place ~ in all of this. However, despite the camaraderie around all of it, the biggest take away I have from that specific moment in time is a Discord I was invited into for people playing the game, and then a separate group chat that spun out of that. This group chat became my lifeline during the pandemic.

It wasn’t even about Animal Crossing anymore. We were all trying to connect to something, anything, and New Horizons was easy common ground for us to stand on. As the world continued to get worse, we banded together for weekly Jackbox games and hangout sessions every Thursday. It became part of the routine. It gave all of us something to anchor to during a period were everything was upended. During the next few months we share din each others company and found solace in making new friends. We bonded over our shared love of media and life experiences. We helped each other through hardships, loss, and everything in between. We didn’t have to go through a lot of this alone.

That group would eventually come to be some of my closest friends to this day, and are largely responsible for my place in the industry. I didn’t expect to break into the space through a worldwide pandemic and a group of Animal Crossing sickos, but life seldomly goes as planned. People often talk about how they fell into this line of work. When i talk about it, I mention how I fell into a group of lifelong friends, and then fell into this industry afterward.

I would end this wild year by getting a job at Prima Games. A job that would define my space in the industry for the next three years. So yeah, I guess thanks for that Nintendo Switch.

2021 (27 Years Old)

2021 I would proceed to interview bigger developers, review bigger games, and begin to make a name for myself in the space. I got invited on more podcasts and tried to make the most of the opportunity I was given. We were building something special at Prima, even if we didn’t know it would be taken away from us pretty quickly once the company was sold down the line.

Still, I got to watch friends get married, buy homes, and learn how to navigate our new world, one that involved being much more compassionate and understanding, especially when it came to navigating going back outside once vaccinations were more common.

I underwent a lot of personal growth in 2020 and 2021, which I think has led to me being a more empathic person overall. I had finally made it to the space I so desperately wanted to be in, but it never felt like running through a wall and exploding onto the other side. it was far more gradual than that. It sort of felt like I was here the whole time, and folks just figured I had been around for longer.

I got to co-write the last ever Prima Games Strategy guide alongside Lucas for Axiom Verge 1 +2. Which is a cool life achievement and that book came out great thanks to the folks over at LRG.

December of 2021 I would be told to stop working on Prima Games while some company stuff was sorted out. So I spent the entirety of that month playing Final Fantasy 14 and getting caught up. I later learned at the end of the year the brand had been sold to Gamurs Group, which would again alter the course of my career.

2022 (28 Years Old)

I started the new year with the same website, but a new company. A weird way to start a year but I was hopeful that things would continue on as normal, and they did for a bit. Lucas and I would clock in, write our shit, and move on with our day. Over time we brought a new managing editor on and we were in a groove. Things were solid and we began building a team of hard working and talented folks. I got to keep doing my usual bullshit (with some more guides work thrown in) but overall I felt things were pretty good.

We shifted more toward guides each and every day as the hire ups continued to push that, which wasn’t bad at first, I mean we’re Prima Games after all, we’re the guides people! Slowly we shifted more and more toward guide work, and that became the bulk of the work everyday.

I somehow still found time to continue writing my usual bullshit in-between all of it. Things were different, but they weren’t ~bad ~, but hey I had still made it! I was Doing The Thing. Whatever that thing was anymore.

I would meet the Giantbomb folks alter this year in Brooklyn for the Giant Bombathon. Young Elmo would be born, and I would have a whole new crew to do silly things with. At this point my creative outlet for silly videos and humor was being satiated elsewhere.

I don’t actually know if I played a single Switch game in 2022. Wen Did Scarlet/Violet come out? I’m not looking it up. so it was either this year of next year. I don’t remember. In all honesty I was barely playing my switch outside of Pokémon or Zelda post Animal Crossing. But this is far less about the Switch and much more about the eight years I spent with it on my desk.

2023 (29 Years Old)

2023 would be another harrowing year. Gamurs faced layoffs, I got promoted, and then I shortly left the company all together in December of that year.

It was a long time coming, but something that I ultimately felt was right for me. The team there was great, I just couldn’t be a part of that machine anymore. I don’t feel the need or want to get into specifics, but if you’ve seen any of the news posts about what Gamurs has been up to and how they treat their staff, then you know what’s up. Take that information for what you will.

I moved over to the world of freelance, still barely playing my Switch. Instead I played my Steam Deck a lot more. I traveled the country, saw friends, attended Pax and Summer Game Fest. All because I had carved out a space for myself in this industry. One that had a weird and winding road, but I had made it.

2024 (30 Years Old)

2024 was one of the most difficult years of my life. I struggled a lot. I was in a losing battle with my mental health like never before. I questioned my self-worth, my ability to do anything in this life, and what legacy I was leaving behind for those who came after me. I am one to often go out of their way to try and help someone, so having to turn around and ask for help was not my strong suit. I had to unlearn all of the habits of not asking for help. I had to rely on my support system a lot. I felt like nothing but a burden to everyone around me. I fell into one of the darkest depressive holes in my life. Not wanting to get out of bed, not leaving my apartment for days at a time, barely turning a light on. I didn’t have the motivation to do anything, and I often found no point in anything i used to enjoy.

Despite all of that, I still managed to get new bylines at legacy sites like IGN, Kotaku, Game Informer, and more. I still traveled and saw friends. I still went on the Giant Bomb couch and made a fool of myself. I still put on the Young Elmo suit, I still tried to connect with the parts of me I liked.

I turned 30 in October of 2024. That’s it, my 20’s are over, and the Nintendo Switch was part of my life for most of them. While I didn’t use the system much in the back half of it’s life I’m weirdly excited about a new system. I’m excited to maybe trick myself into thinking I’ll play it handheld again, on a subway, or some long ass plane ride. However, the truth is, time passes, console generations happen, and the Switch saw me grow up. I moved out on my own, went through multiple jobs, opened 2 different Broadway musicals, got a job in the industry, left a job in the industry, became a Sesame Street Character, wrote a book. The list goes on and on. All because some friends and I back in 2017 were excited to talk about E3 and a new Nintendo console on a podcast.

Now you’re probably expecting a 2025 header here, but you’re not getting one, because the year isn’t over! But I’m doing great right now and that’s enough for me. Maybe we will talk more in a couple of weeks when the Switch 2 is here, but for now.

Be good to each other and I’ll see y’all around.