Crunchyroll

Genre: Video Application

Players: 1

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Review:

Crunchyroll is a Video Application that began its life in 2006 as a website for streaming anime (often in less-than-legal circumstances), but in the time since it has turned into a respectable and legitimate streaming video service that has reached numerous platforms, including multiple videogame platforms. In 2022, Nintendo joined that list of platforms.

Many of you are undoubtedly familiar with Crunchyroll already, but for those who aren’t, I’ll describe it for you really quickly – Crunchyroll has a library of anime series available to watch, and viewers can watch them free with ads, or pay a monthly fee to dispense with those ads and gain the ability to download episodes to view offline (provided you have enough space on your Nintendo Switch to hold the video files). If you’re a fan of anime, it’s really a no-brainer.

This ability for subscribers to download episodes may hold extra appeal to Nintendo Switch owners, who may opt to take their device on the go after downloading some episodes and may not have access to an internet connection when they want to partake in an episode. What’s more, the Nintendo Switch version features both traditional gamepad controls and touchscreen controls to navigate menus, which is nice.

Unfortunately… I don’t know any better way to put this… the Nintendo Switch version of Crunchyroll appears to be broken. Subtitles do not appear to be timed correctly, menus do not respond appropriately, everything is a huge, janky mess. And given that you likely have multiple other devices that can use the service, I can’t see any reason you’d subject yourself to this frustration just for the novelty of watching it on your Nintendo Switch.

It’s a shame that the conversion of Crunchyroll to Nintendo Switch is so thoroughly busted, because it would have made for a great addition to Nintendo’s platform. Unfortunately, as-is, it is not worth bothering with – get it on any other platform instead.

tl;dr – Crunchyroll is a streaming Video Application for watching anime. Unfortunately, on Nintendo Switch it is horribly broken. Subtitles don’t work right, menus don’t act properly… and with this service available on countless other devices, there’s very little reason to bother with this version of it.

Grade: D

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This game has been nominated for one or more of eShopperReviews 2022 Game Awards:

Winner:

Worst Port / Remake – Who said this award had to go to a game? It doesn’t seem terribly difficult to release a streaming app on a game console. Countless streaming companies have done it on numerous platforms, including Crunchyroll. Yet the Crunchyroll app on Nintendo Switch has to be the buggiest, most poorly-constructed streaming app I have ever had the misfortune to use. One has to wonder why they released this app so late into the Nintendo Switch’s life, but you have to wonder even more why they would take so long only to bungle it so completely.

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