Nintendo offers vague answers on the connection behind “Switch 2” – Ars Technica

As we continue with the early 2017 release of the Switch, there has been a lot of talk and speculation about the successor to the system. And among Switch owners, there are many concerns whether the upcoming “Switch 2” will be backwards compatible with the thousands of games already available on the current Switch.

So far, Nintendo is still unclear on this important question. In Investor Q&A (part translated by Twitter user Cheesemeister), Nintendo’s president, Shuntaro Furukawa, said that “while our company is always looking at different types of future hardware, I will not make specific comments about future hardware here… Our company wants to continue to provide unique ways to play with its integrated devices and devices embedded software business, please wait.”

It’s hard to read much that hasn’t been answered yet, considering Nintendo hasn’t announced anything yet each one information about its next console hardware. Later in the same Q&A, however, Furukawa he realized that “regarding the transition from the Nintendo Switch to the next-generation system, we want to do our best to make the transition for our customers, using a Nintendo Account.”

This is nothing new; Nintendo said in a 2020 earnings presentation slide that it plans to use Nintendo Account for the “Integrated Hardware-Software Next gaming system” released in “20XX.” However, the new statement emphasizing “smooth transitions” and legacy account management could be seen as a hint that Nintendo wants to allow Switch players to bring their game libraries ahead of the new devices.

Looking back

Nintendo has a long history of backward compatibility with its portable systems, each of which can play games from the previous generation in the chain from the Game Boy to the Nintendo 3DS line. Recently, the company launched a similar series of backends from the Gamecube through the Wii U, the latter of which can play games downloaded from the Wii.

But Nintendo broke its back chain of compatibility with the Switch, which combined all Nintendo lines into a new “hybrid” platform. Meanwhile, Microsoft and Sony focused on backward compatibility as a selling point for their latest Xbox and PlayStation games.

In terms of game development, Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto said in November 2022 that in the past, the software environment “could not be brought forward when the hardware changed, and it would not be possible to play previously released software without changing it.” Recently, the integration of development environments on hardware means that “in many cases, it has become easier to set up environments where software that was released on older hardware can play on newer hardware,” Miyamoto said.

Technically speaking

Of course, setting up backward compatibility on the new Switch depends on more than just the software environment and online accounts. New devices that support “Switch 2” will need to interpret software designed for a completely different SoC in a different way.

As Modern Vintage Gamer says in the best video of March on the topic, the Nvidia Tegra X1 device that supports the Switch runs on the company’s increasingly popular Maxwell, which started in 2014. , the new console can rely on a new SoC built on new designs such as Ampere or Lovelace.

The compatibility of the chip is also complicated by the way Nintendo’s Switch brand of software creates a complete package of Maxwell GPU drivers and special shaders for games and software. This means that the binary is written for Maxwell-based Switch devices will not work on a non-Maxwell GPU without any recompilation.

There are other ways around this problem, as The Modern Gamer explains. Nintendo may follow Microsoft’s lead in using a software-based streaming service to support older devices, a strategy that has proven successful for unofficial Switch emulators on the Steam Deck. Nintendo may also just include a full X1 chip on the “Switch 2” board, suggesting a strategy that has been adopted from previous consoles. Games of any kind can also be ported to use the new hardware, though this may leave some support holes, depending on the Switch’s huge game library.

A question of will

Technical issues aside, the question of Nintendo’s true desire to pursue a sequel behind “Switch 2” is huge. Many of the solutions we’ve discussed come with an additional cost to Nintendo, either in terms of emulation/enhancing the patch or the physical cost of the hardware itself. Backward compatibility would also require the new system to be fully compatible with existing controllers and the Switch cartridge format (which sits slightly above 32GB), both of which would force design compromises.

These may seem like small hurdles to overcome to ensure that millions of Switch owners can port their libraries to Nintendo’s new devices. But there is some market research that shows that previous interactions have little effect on the long-term success of the platform.

There are also some signs that Nintendo may not consider backward compatibility to be a key feature of the new hardware. In November, when Miyamoto talked about the increase in backward compatibility in software development, he added that “Nintendo’s strength is in our creation of new entertainment, so when we release new devices moving forward, we plan to continue to provide new and unique games that cannot be done on existing hardware. “

That’s not a strong denial, but it also doesn’t completely prove the need to keep current Switch libraries available on new hardware going forward.