Here Are Our First Hands-On Impression Of The New Nintendo System

It's a next gen system. It's a portable system. It's a multiplayer system. It's out of control.

Hello! We’re Ahmed and Tanner and we were lucky enough to demo the new Nintendo Switch system at an event in NYC.

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If you're unfamiliar with the system, we got our first glimpse of it in a trailer in late October 2016. It can be played in a whole bunch of configurations, including a completely portable tablet. Hence: the Switch!

The system will cost you $299 when it releases on March 3rd, 2017. Each system comes with a charging dock, Switch console, and two Joy-Cons, which is the name of the little doodads attached to the side of the tablet above. Usually, Nintendo systems come with only one controller, so this is good news. However, some games will require you to use both Joy-Cons, like ARMS and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

Here's what the tablet config looks like next to Ahmed's giant-sized head.

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It's like a Extra New Nintendo 3DS XXXL. You might worry the controllers or screen are too small or the system too big, but honestly, the tablet felt perfect in our hands. And while it's not as good-looking as on an HD TV, it didn't seem too far off.

When the console is docked, the Joy-Cons slide into a special charging controller for a more traditional set-up.

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The Joy-Con Charging Controller comes included with the Nintendo Switch, but a second one will cost you $29.99.

You can also detach the controllers from each side of the console or Joy-Con Charging Grip and switch a one-player controller setup into a two-player setup!

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An extra set of Joy-Con controllers will run you $79.99, while just picking up the left or right Joycon will be $49.99. Eek. These guys can do all sorts of thing: they have motion sensors, gyroscopes, HD rumble, and social media share capabilities.

Take a look at how teeny one Joy-Con is relative to Tanner's giant-hands.

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This also seemed pretty comfortable, despite how small it is.

Each Joy-Con has a weird new HD rumble feature. In this 1-2 Switch minigame, we had to guess how many marbles were in the controller and could actually accurately guess by feeling them "move" inside the controller.

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There's also a more standard Pro-Controller, which we used to play a more input-intensive game like Ultra Street Fighter II: The Final Challengers.

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This controller retails for $69.99.

We also checked out the much-anticipated The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild.

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It's great. I mean, of course it's great. Ahmed already played it and wrote all about how great it is.

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It's what you want from a next gen Zelda game. If you're familiar with the franchise, it'll be exactly what you expect it to be. It has the same basic control scheme and feel that most of the Zelda games have had since the days of Ocarina of Time, except now it’s massive in scope and totally open world. It looks and feels like Zelda, but plays like Skyrim.

What got us real psyched was how great it looked and played on the portable display.

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You don't even need to pause. You can just pick up the Switch and keep playing right where you left off. It's totally seamless. There was something pretty special about playing a beautiful new Zelda game on a portable system.

Next up, we played ARMS!

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The game is like a combination of Punch-Out!!! and Wii Boxing, where all the characters are less-racist versions of Dhalsim from Street Fighter.

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You control your character by juking around with Joy-Cons, jumping and dashing with buttons, and punching by swinging your arms.

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But what makes it so entertaining is that your arms are SUPER long and you can play different characters who can equip different gloves that… punch differently? It’s hard to describe. The ninja character has one glove shoots out three mini-punches at the end and another that sends out a little ninja star at the end. You can mix-up your punches to catch your opponent off guard. It’s super intuitive, but seems to have a lot of depth.

The Nintendo Switch releases March 3rd, 2017 and retails for $299.