Game developers reveal changes they want to see for Nintendo Switch 2
Several Japanese developers have gone on record about the difficulties they’ve had porting their games to Switch and what they want to see from the Switch 2.
Several Japanese developers have gone on record about the difficulties they’ve had porting their games to Switch and what they want to see from the Switch 2.
While nobody is expecting the Nintendo Switch 2 to be as much of a graphical powerhouse as the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X, it’s still assumed to be a significant upgrade compared to its predecessor.
Nintendo itself remains mum in terms of the exact specs, although it’s commonly believed the Switch 2 will be roughly equivalent to the PlayStation 4, but have enough technical wizardry to allow it to run the kind of games seen on the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X.
It’s not just fans that are eager for a more powerful console from Nintendo, though. Developers want the same thing, particularly those who’ve had trouble porting games from other platforms to the current Switch.
Recently, Automaton sat down with a number of Japanese game developers and engineers to talk to them about the new console. Their biggest hope for the Switch 2? ‘Improved overall hardware specs.’
The developers admitted to facing plenty of difficulties with making Switch ports because of its lower specs. For instance, the Switch’s CPU (central processing unit) often isn’t capable of pre-loading (a technique that allows assets and data to be loaded in the background), which creates slowdown problems and longer load times.
Storage problems have also been a common issue. Standard Switch game cartridges only allow for up to 32GB of data, so any game larger than that needs to be compressed (which has been described as one of the hardest aspects of porting games to Switch) and/or have the rest of its data be downloaded to the Switch’s internal storage or a microSD card.
Ever wondered why you don’t see the Call Of Duty games on Switch? (Activision)This is one of the key reasons why the Call Of Duty games have never been ported to Switch. Last year’s Call Of Duty: Black Ops 6, for instance, needs about 84 to 86GB of space on PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. So, when Microsoft touted how its purchase of Activision would bring Call Of Duty to Switch, it knew it was impossible on any of the current models.
What’s more, the Switch apparently reads games faster from its built-in storage and microSD cards, with developers saying the cartridge versions of games suffer from ‘abnormally slow load times.’ Something that will also hopefully be addressed with the Switch 2, which looks to have a new cartridge format.
For all the complaints, however, these developers did stress that they love the Switch as a platform and it’s because of that they want its successor to be stronger. That way, game development stands to be a lot smoother, and it’d be easier to bring more games to the system.
There are enough rumours to suggest the Switch 2 will be exactly what these developers are hoping for. It’s claimed Microsoft is planning to bring Xbox One era games to the console, like Halo: The Master Chief Collection and Fallout 4, and it’s theorised the likes of Tekken 8 and Red Dead Redemption 2 already have Switch 2 retail listings.
The first Red Dead Redemption already made it to Switch in 2023 (Take-Two Interactive)Email [email protected], leave a comment below, follow us on Twitter, and sign-up to our newsletter.
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