My time at Portia on consoles

All other video games not related to the main farming series - Pokemon, Stardew Valley, My Time at Portia, and other indie-developed games.
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Anonymous Fish

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I have been waiting to buy this game for my switch for a while, but I read that the switch version is going to be a big downgrade from the pc version. Does anyone know if its going to get a patch around release time? I am hesitant to preorder for the switch if my experience is going to be noticeably worse than elsewhere, and if i have to I would rather get it on ps4 to have a better experience. Just sucks since i usually prefer to play these types of game on a handheld. I could live without voice acting, but super long load times and bad graphics will probably kill it for me
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Kikki
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There's quite a bit of info on this in the announcements thread, and it's all in the last few pages, but the length of that thread tends to intimidate people, so here's the short version:

The Switch version is essentially the same as the PS4 and Xbox versions, though because it has lower processing power, it isn't quite as beautiful (still looks good, but not quite as much.) and the some of the grass effect seems to be missing from the Switch version, though the PS4 (and probably Xbox) version has it. So the long blowing grass doesn't seem to be in the Switch version.

But NONE of the console versions have all of what the PC versions have. There is no voice acting in any console version of the game, and the loading times are pretty long in all of them, too. (Switch's appear to be slightly longer.) Ambient sounds are, I believe, missing from all versions as well.

There is due to be a day-one update as well as a second update sometime in May, which should bring the console version up to where the PC version is as we speak, with the final events added and the voice acting all in and so on. We don't know precisely what will be in which update, though. If you'd like to see links to articles and videos and so on that we've been checking, please take a look at through last 2 pages of the announcements thread starting around HERE to check out any extra details for yourself :) Both a Switch version and a PS4 version have videos linked in different comments across those two pages.
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Anonymous Fish

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Thank you so much, I will head over to that thread and check it out
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Kikki
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No problem :) I was worried when I first heard that the Switch version was sub-standard compared to other console versions, too...but I now feel like I've reassured myself that it's not different enough to bother me. Depends on what matters most to you, though.

EDIT: Actually, people may come looking for this again, so a brief overview with sources:

Switch footage
PS4 footage
A brief article on the updates expected day one and a second one two or three weeks later

I also noticed that the comments on the Switch version video have been added to and the owner of the footage managed to get in touch with Team17 to see why voices weren't added. They're still looking into the possibility, though their wording was a bit opaque...so they may or may not be added to console versions. But PC isn't an option for me no matter what so as long as the Switch version isn't notably less good than the PS4 version, I'm okay. (And to me the PS4 and Switch versions don't look much different. I think I even prefer not having the long grass.)
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Anonymous Fish

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I have a pc i could have played it on, but i was holding out for the switch version all the way back during the kickstarter just because i really prefer handheld and i didnt want to play early access because i wanted all the content available to me when i played. No voice acting doesnt bother me one bit, most games like this dont have voice acting and thats what im used to. I also like to imagine for myself what someone would sound like, so if i have this image in my head and then i hear a voice and its terrible, i might end up not liking a character as much. I'm a little disappointed in the lack of grass, but my main concern is mostly the load times. I noticed it took about a minute to load out of the house, i just dont know how i feel about that
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If load times are your highest concern, the PS4's are slightly less than Switch's, but both are a bit long. (I haven't seen Xbox footage yet but I imagine it runs pretty much the same as PS4.) The first loading screen is the longest, though...it looks like most loading times are shorter than the first one shown.

The voices can be turned on or off on the PC version, so if they do implement voices on console versions as well, I think they'd keep that option in as well, though at this point it's just an assumption. PC is unfortunately the definitive version, but even if I wanted to play it on PC, it's not possible for me unless I were to buy an external graphics card, and for $500+? No way.

I don't really mind the loading times. I mean, it'd be great if they could make them shorter, but it's not a deal-breaker for me. I like the simpler grass, and I also am ambivalent on the topic of having voices, so the Switch version is fine for me. Though I may wait until they get their second update out before I actually start playing.
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Anonymous Fish

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I'm still a little torn, but really if the only difference is going to be weather or not i have grass i might just stick with the switch version after all. the trade off for being able to play comfortably on handheld is probably worth giving up grass if ps4 load times will be mostly the same anyway. I wish there was a demo though, that would help put a lot of unease to rest
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Kikki
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I've been told by a few people that there's going to be a demo, but I don't know what their source is, because I never saw anything about a console demo. Still, I could have missed it, so...maybe they're planning to release one? But Pathea, though apparently full of nice people and all that, are not really very on-the-ball. They get things done eventually but it never seems to work out quite as intended. I really don't know if there's going to be a demo or not, but if there is, I wouldn't be surprised if it didn't get out there until after the game's release. Guess we'll find out, lol.

It's too bad we don't have quite enough information to reassure you completely. Pathea is ignoring questions about the console versions' voice acting and load times, etc, on all forums I've seen, like their Kickstarter and Facebook and Twitter, etc, so I'm afraid we probably won't get any more info than this before the release.
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Anonymous Fish

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Would there be a noticeable difference in buying the digital version rather than the physical?

As in maybe a slightly faster performance...
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Kikki
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I can't say for certain, as I've never seen side-by-side videos comparing digital performance versus physical, but probably not. There would probably be a sliiiiight speed increase in digital, but possibly so small it wouldn't actually be perceptible...the difference between how long it takes a machine to pull data off a cartridge as opposed to how long it takes to bring it out of its own memory is probably very minimal. The higher the transfer speed of your Micro SD card, the faster digital would be, but even so...not sure if it'd be a noticeable difference. And if you're in North America, our physical version is going to be late...not available until May 14th. Though by that point the day one patch and the one set for two or three weeks later would both already be out (according to their plans, anyway) so if you went with the physical version, at least any additions they were going to make would be ready to go as soon as you started playing. Probably.

EDIT: If you want, here's a video of a guy using BotW to show the difference in loading times between Switch's internal memory, a physical copy of the game, as well as the game when saved on two different Micro SD cards. It's not really a surprise to me that the internal memory is the very fastest, but naturally it's pretty impractical to try to save very many games onto your internal memory as it's pretty small. And honestly the difference isn't staggering...I think he said around 14% faster between game cardridge (slowest) and the Switch's own internal memory (fastest). The fast Micro SD cards were barely any faster than the physical copy. The Switch's internal memory is pretty precious though so I'm not sure I'd be willing to save Portia onto it.
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seachel
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Post  Posted:

I don’t mind no VA and no grass but I really hope they do something about the load times.

And based on this reply from their twitter seems that they will be doing something about it! So that does make me feel a bit more relieved.
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