You missed the * in the 2 in my post?
There is a reason why I put the * in there because of EXACTLY what you have written, I am already aware so your rant is kind of pointless.
I am not sure of the cost of the chips, I don't know what field of work you work at, so I leave that to your seemingly very knowledgeable expertise in product procurement, R&D and marketing cost of bringing a new console to the market.
For the record, putting a line or spec or statement or whatever with a * next to it, means at the end you put another * and write something to add to the number.
Or you write "2" controllers, to indicate that you realise the 2 is I'm not even sure of the write word for it, to highlight you think it's dodgy.
2*, means almost nothing, in fact it made me think that you meant 2 times, like you get the controllers AND you have the grip as well which is like a second controller. It didn't at all indicate to me you meant 1 controller.
AS for cost, one small chips cost less, that is just a basic thing, two mobile chips compete in a market that is more about commodity pricing than general pricing. Qualcomm, Samsung, whoever, sell these chips at close to cost because the profit is in the device, not the chip. So it's more about securing enough chips than anything else, hence commodity. Mobile chips became very cheap due to competition and volume being sold. The majority of mobile chips are between 80-120mm^2 now, the console chips are around 360-380mm^2, due to decreasing yields that means they cost 4-5 times as much in general, which fits with $20 vs $100 chips.
You also aren't really paying $100 more just to get access to Nintendo, the point of selling consoles is to bring people in to buy Nintendo software, not to charge a premium to access their software. It's why console hardware has historically always been subsidised because there is say 10x more profit from the software vs hardware for the console maker.
You get a cheap console then pay 2-3 times for software over what it would cost on the PC, that is the concept of consoles. Give them cheap hardware, lock them to you and charge more for software.
The Switch's biggest failing is the extra cost in the controller. Arms doesn't need motion control, it's an option, 95% of players won't use it. 99% of games on the Switch can't use motion control because they have to work in handheld mode, why make the controllers $80 with fancy motion control stuff in, when 99% of gaming on the console will absolutely not be motion control. Then for launch basically only 1,2, Switch uses motion control, and it costs $50(for demo software that shouldn't be more than $2 total).
They could have done no motion control, not bothered with 1,2 Switch, saved $50 on the controller, launched the Switch at $250 and it would mean buying an extra controller for more people to play costs $30 instead of $80.
Right there, removing the almost entirely unused motion control, would make Switch dramatically more viable cost wise. Horrendous decision to include motion control when the market over the past what 7-8 years of kinect, Wii, PS Move has flat out rejected motion control, to add it to a handheld also console that can't possibly use it as a primary control method in almost any game.
