An interactive museum for your console that still feels like it should be pre-installed on the Switch 2.
I'm a complete nerd for hardware development, I love nothing more than digging into teardowns on sites like iFixit as soon as those clever electrical engineers can get their hands on the hardware.
There some fascinating insights that can be gleaned by looking at the component parts, but usually that information is left up to third parties, we don't get many official insights into what makes our new console tick.
The NINTENDO SWITCH 2 WELCOME TOUR opens up the device with an interactive exhibition packed with mini games and information in a cute and stylish experience.
It's interesting, but I was left with some pretty big questions about the game after playing it.
When you fire up Welcome Tour you're presented with a very familiar experience to the hands-on events that launched the Nintendo Switch 2, pick your avatar and step onto a giant Joy-Con 2 controller as you explore each component of the new console.
It's really slick, with each area opening up after you've fully explored and collect Stamps for a traditional Japanese Stamp Rally.
Throughout each of the exhibits you'll be presented with little interactive experiences, some feel much more like a tech demo than a game, others are much more interactive and are designed to show off the new hardware on offer.
There are quite a few new exhibits that make use of the mouse functionality, dodging falling objects as a little spaceship or racing through a laser maze to try beat your time.
These mini-games are enjoyable enough but they don't have a stack of replayability, this isn't Wario-Ware by any means.
Once you've done the gimmick and unlocked the basic medal for each experience you'll likely want to move on, but luckily for me the most enjoyable part was all the new information presented.
One of my favourite parts of Welcome Tour was actually the little Insights exhibits, you're given a multi-stage panel of information about HD Rumble 2 or the controller design or noise cancellation processing. Look I know it sounds like riveting stuff but it was really compelling.
Working your way through each of these little displays you then have a quiz to complete at the end. It's not tricky but it's interesting to learn more and there are lots of little opportunities to glance back into the past as well.
I particularly liked when talking about vibration features some of the games of my youth like Pokémon Pinball were shown, kids these days don't know how cool that was and stealing batteries from the TV remote to keep playing.
This part of Welcome Tour feels much more like a museum exhibit than anything else, interactivity is pretty minimal really.
It's not without a bit of frustration though, a mainstay of Japanese tourist attractions is the Stamp Rally which has you visiting different locations to collect new stamps for your book. Here you'll need to visit each of the hardware features of the console in each area before you can move onto the new area.
They are hidden from view until you approach them and honestly sometimes I spent way too long trying to find the final location. I was ready to move through to the next area but because I didn't find one plinth required I was blocked.
I can understand why they would do this, a guided experience is what they are going for here, but it would have been good to hit the threshold lower seeing as all you're doing is clicking a button when your character walks nearby. That's it.
When reflecting on Welcome Tour the main thing that comes to mind is just why wasn't this game included with every console? It's effectively a tech demo for the console, very similar to PlayStation 5 pre-installed title Astro’s Playroom or the Steam Deck's Aperture Desk Job.
It was former Nintendo America President Reggie Fils-Aime who campaigned for Wii Sports to be included with every console as he recently shared online, a game that became synonymous with the console.
Welcome Tour is relatively inexpensive but when you've got players shelling out hundreds for a brand new machine, the game which serves as primarily a promotional tool for that console feels like an obvious inclusion, even if it was tied to the Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack Subscription.
If you love video game history and development then you might get a fair amount of out of Welcome Tour, but it's not going to have the same cultural impact as Wii Sports by a long shot.
A Nintendo Switch 2 console and a copy of NINTENDO SWITCH 2 WELCOME TOUR was provided to SIFTER for the purpose of this review.
