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StarTopic Future Nintendo Hardware & Technology Speculation & Discussion |ST| (New Staff Post, Please read)

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Stinkmeiser45 said:
I was late 2023 but I'm edging more toward 2024 now. Not because of anything Nintendo said today, but because of what Sony said. Those sales are so bad. PS5 sales actually dropped 14%, when many of us were expecting the shortage to be getting better, not worse, by now. Nintendo cant sell a console if they cant make it. And they have room to extend this generation with price drops and bundles since they haven't actually done any yet.
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It takes much, much more silicon to make a single PS5 than it does to make a single Switch, or even Drake Switch (probably on the order of 3-4x, if not higher).

Just because there is a general shortage doesn't mean literally everything has to be in very poor supply.
BassForever said:
I can uno reverse your argument about the original Switch Lite, and it still happened. A premium version of the Lite that is portable only does not conflict at all with a premium version of the original switch that can do both docked and portable play. They're two different products serving two different markets.
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The Switch Lite was positioned as a lower entry point into the Switch family geared primarily towards handheld players. The OLED Switch was positioned as a premium entry point in the Switch family geared primarily towards handheld players, as nearly all of the enhancements benefit only handheld play.

They both serve the same market at two different ends. Introducing a new middle point does nothing for Nintendo.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
I was late 2023 but I'm edging more toward 2024 now. Not because of anything Nintendo said today, but because of what Sony said. Those sales are so bad. PS5 sales actually dropped 14%, when many of us were expecting the shortage to be getting better, not worse, by now. Nintendo cant sell a console if they cant make it. And they have room to extend this generation with price drops and bundles since they haven't actually done any yet.
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Before making the following comment I will admit I am not an expert on supply chains and technology component sourcing; however, Nintendo Switch uses a different chipset than PS5 (nVidia vs. AMD) and that could mean that PS5's supply chain issues are not the same exact supply chain issues that the Switch successor will face. Is it possible that the current Switch supply shortage is due to manufacturing switching from Switch to Switch 2 in preparation for a lunch early next year? I just don't think Sony's supply constrains means Nintendo is dealing with the same exact issue with Switch 2.

Additionally, again I am no expert, but Nintendo uses underclocked chips with better yields and Sony is using an overclocked chip for PS5 which requires a high quality chip with possible yield issues, correct? I thought this is one of the factors explaining why XSX/XSS is having better supply than PS5 because Microsoft can repurpose "bad" XSX yields as parts for the less powerful XSS. Again, if I am wrong on this please correct me, I am open to that.
 
megashock5 said:
If the next iteration is a "Switch Pro" I'll probably stick with my launch unit, if it's a "Switch 2" I'm in.
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This is why I'm skeptical a pro would be a good idea financially. I wouldn't say I'm in the most hardcore class of Nintendo fans, but I'm pretty deep into it, I'm even one of the idiots who bought a Wii U. And if Nintendo releases a switch pro and it does not have any exclusive first party games, I'm not buying it. So it makes me wonder how much of the casual audience would upgrade, if I wont. Surely it would be good for a shorter term boost similar to the OLED, however, the idea that a pro can carry it into 2025 or 2026 feels like a hard sell to me. I feel like after 1 year sales of it would start tanking as the ultra hardcore audience all buy it and they run out of potential customers.
 
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megashock5 said:
If the next iteration is a "Switch Pro" I'll probably stick with my launch unit, if it's a "Switch 2" I'm in.
If it's something between like a phone upgrade, things get muddy. I guess it depends on if there's exclusive software.

I can wait a bit yet, though. I think the current hardware is fine and quality games keep coming out.
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Based on the illegal Nvidia leaks, the new hardware seems to be closer to a successor than a mid-gen refresh in terms of performance improvements.

But whether or not Nintendo decides to market the new hardware as a mid-gen refresh, an iterative successor, or a successor, is purely a matter of marketing semantics.
 
Dakhil said:
Based on the illegal Nvidia leaks, the new hardware seems to be closer to a successor than a mid-gen refresh in terms of performance improvements.

But whether or not Nintendo decides to market the new hardware as a mid-gen refresh, an iterative successor, or a successor, is purely a matter of marketing semantics.
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Marketing aside I think the important question is if Drake will have exclusive first party games. That really determines everything in how people will view it, how well it will sell, etc. People buy Nintendo consoles for Nintendo games, not for graphics or third party ports, though those can help butter up the purchase a bit.
 
It will be at minimum 6+ years since Switch launch when Drake launches. I can't see how positioning it as an optional Pro console instead of the full-fledged Successor its specs warrant would be a smart or sensible play. It's far too powerful to be limited to rendering Switch games in HD. And revisions sell worse than new consoles anyways. Essentially everything we know about the console- it's entirely new architecture, new graphical technology, exclusive 3rd-party games- points to the next Nintendo system.
 
Branduil said:
It will be at minimum 6+ years since Switch launch when Drake launches. I can't see how positioning it as an optional Pro console instead of the full-fledged Successor its specs warrant would be a smart or sensible play. It's far too powerful to be limited to rendering Switch games in HD. And revisions sell worse than new consoles anyways. Essentially everything we know about the console- it's entirely new architecture, new graphical technology, exclusive 3rd-party games- points to the next Nintendo system.
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If it’s positioned as a next gen system then we’ll know about it sooner than if it was positioned as an iteration. That’s good for me to know about it sooner lol.
 
Dark Cloud said:
If it’s positioned as a next gen system then we’ll know about it sooner than if it was positioned as an iteration. That’s good for me to know about it sooner lol.
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If this is a successor and releasing next year there's basically 0 chance we would not have heard about it by now. So if it's a successor it's probably not coming early next year at this point.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
If this is a successor and releasing next year there's basically 0 chance we would not have heard about it by now. So if it's a successor it's probably not coming early next year at this point.
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That’s true. Even though the Switch wasn’t announced until 5 months before release, Nintendo told us about “NX” farrrrrr before that.
 
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Stinkmeiser45 said:
Marketing aside I think the important question is if Drake will have exclusive first party games. That really determines everything in how people will view it, how well it will sell, etc. People buy Nintendo consoles for Nintendo games, not for graphics or third party ports, though those can help butter up the purchase a bit.
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Look if they can bring performance improvements to Animal Crossing, you will get a chunk of the more casual audience to upgrade. Those islands can get real choppy.

Nintendo is going to market any game performance improvement a new model brings. It’s not going to sell everyone, but it will see old and new players buy in. 3rd parties are getting frustrated with that hardware, they want more power. I believe there is enough there to sustain Switch sales for another 2-3 years as Nintendo develops another revision that will see them move develop to more powerful hardware.

Generations are going to become more slippery from here on out.
 
If it’s coming in a year the rumors will pick up by a lot anyways. I hope Nate gets his last piece of info he’s looking for. Eurogamer, Bloomberg, anyone just feed me
 
CesareNorrez said:
Look if they can bring performance improvements to Animal Crossing, you will get a chunk of the more casual audience to upgrade. Those islands can get real choppy.
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I strongly disagree but this is all just speculation so I cant really prove you wrong on that. It's certainly possible a bunch of casual animal crossing players will upgrade to play in better quality, but from the mainly animal crossing switch players I know that's probably not going to happen.
 
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Even though Nintendo's forecast is typically conservation (their exchange rate forecast is too), their profit forecast for FY22-23 is ... not good. The announcement of stock split and share buyback is to prop up the stock price against such a weak forecast. (As a reference, Sony's forecasted net profit for FY22-23 is -6%.) Barring a major forecast modification during this FY, it is a clear indicator that the gravy train is losing steam. I don't believe that Nintendo would let the situation further deteriorate. A new model release toward the end of this FY or anytime during the H1 of next FY seems likely.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
Marketing aside I think the important question is if Drake will have exclusive first party games. That really determines everything in how people will view it, how well it will sell, etc. People buy Nintendo consoles for Nintendo games, not for graphics or third party ports, though those can help butter up the purchase a bit.
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I imagine Nintendo's probably going to release cross-gen games for a couple of years before releasing first party games exclusive to the new hardware.
 
fwd-bwd said:
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Even though Nintendo's forecast is typically conservation (their exchange rate forecast is too), their profit forecast for FY22-23 is ... not good. The announcement of stock split and share buyback is to prop up the stock price against such a weak forecast. (As a reference, Sony's forecasted net profit for FY22-23 is -6%.) Barring a major forecast modification during this FY, it is a clear indicator that the gravy train is losing steam. I don't believe that Nintendo would let the situation further deteriorate. A new model release toward the end of this FY or anytime during the H1 of next FY seems likely.
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Their net sales forecast being only 5% down and their profit forecast being a whopping 28% down actually tells me their operating expenses are planning to skyrocket. Which would line up with a hardware launch, no?
 
Serif said:
I only recall the Mariko/Lite rumors, where they ended up using the more capable Tegra X1 for battery life, and the OLED/4k devkit conflation in 2021. Were there any other rumors?
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Basically since 2018 there have been rumors floating around of a more powerful switch in some form or another.
 
Tron1 said:
Basically since 2018 there have been rumors floating around of a more powerful switch in some form or another.
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Aside from what I've mentioned I don't remember anything else, the 4K DLSS reports from Nate/Bloomberg are the most recent and those are from 2020/2021. I'm not including fan speculation as rumors.
 
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Skittzo said:
Their net sales forecast being only 5% down and their profit forecast being a whopping 28% down actually tells me their operating expenses are planning to skyrocket. Which would line up with a hardware launch, no?
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The OLED definitely has a lower profit margin than the base switch model. This could mean that they expect the OLED to be a larger share of the sales this year. Inflation also doesn't help.
 
Honestly I think the best financial argument for a Switch successor (or whatever) sooner rather than later could be inflation. I'm sure they really want to increase the price right now, probably of their games too, but it would be hard to justify that without a new model.
 
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Stinkmeiser45 said:
The OLED definitely has a lower profit margin than the base switch model. This could mean that they expect the OLED to be a larger share of the sales this year. Inflation also doesn't help.
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I thought they had said the profit margin was nearly the same.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
I think it's really obvious that Nintendo should launch Drake next year but the chip shortage is worrying.
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There's not much Nintendo loves more than "they can't keep these consoles on shelves" headlines. Remember how hard Wiis were to get for the first like, year and a half? As long as they can make SOME, I don't think limited quantities would stop them. Especially if this doesn't instantly replace the base/Lite/OLED models and lives alongside them, they can position it like "well, if you can't find a Pro, we have 3 other models that might interest you"
 
Dakhil said:
I imagine Nintendo's probably going to release cross-gen games for a couple of years before releasing first party games exclusive to the new hardware.
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I'm interested in seeing the transition between preserving x1 switch models sales momentum and onboarding onto t239 models momentum.
 
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The issue with cross gen on drake is that it's vastly stronger than the switch, meaning you either just run switch games at 4k (which greatly underutilizes the hardware) or try to desperately break down a Drake game enough to run on the switch somehow. I feel like what would make the most sense is to have some cross gen support but not all. That way they could still have drake games that push the hardware while continuing to capitalize on the switch's install base. Like run the next Mario Party or 2D Mario on both, but Mario Kart 9 is Drake only.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
The issue with cross gen on drake is that it's vastly stronger than the switch, meaning you either just run switch games at 4k (which greatly underutilizes the hardware) or try to desperately break down a Drake game enough to run on the switch somehow. I feel like what would make the most sense is to have some cross gen support but not all. That way they could still have drake games that push the hardware while continuing to capitalize on the switch's install base. Like run the next Mario Party or 2D Mario on both, but Mario Kart 9 is Drake only.
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If i remember, nate said that nintendo will launch games compatibles with both consoles, but there are third parties than they are preparing games only for drake.
 
Skittzo said:
I thought they had said the profit margin was nearly the same.
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This is from Nintendo's official translation of the Q&A session uploaded on 10 February 2022.
Q7:
I have a question about hardware manufacturing costs. It appears that costs are rising slightly due to the current semiconductor shortage, but what degree of impact does that have on gross profit? Also, going forward, will you increase production volume to secure the required volume of hardware even if costs rise, or do you decide production volume while taking costs into account to a certain degree?

A7:
Furukawa:
Nintendo Switch was launched several years ago, and we have continued to work to reduce costs, but the recent component shortages are leading to increased costs. And even though the rise is gradual, it has been impacting our gross profit. Looking at the full year, we anticipate that impact to be minor this fiscal year, but if costs continue at current levels through next fiscal year as well, then we would expect hardware profitability to decrease correspondingly compared to this fiscal year. In addition, as has already been mentioned, Nintendo Switch – OLED Model has a lower profit margin than Nintendo Switch and Nintendo Switch Lite. Unless the situation changes dramatically, we do not foresee profitability improving next fiscal year and beyond. That said, these cost increases do not affect our production plans, and we will continue to produce the volume required to meet demand.
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Blue Monty said:
If in every region PS4 performed like in Japan in 2012-2014 (we are talking worse performance than Wii U), Sony would be out of the hardware buisness. You can’t use at all PS performance in Japan and try to make it global , in other regions like UK/Spain PS5 software has been selling great and it’s the best selling SKU by a lot in almost all cross-gen releases between the two platforms.
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I’m not using JP performance for every region. The user is saying that we cannot have an active read on PS5 because of various reasons. I am saying there is at least one market where we do have information and that you can glean information for that one market.
 
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Skittzo said:
Didn't they pay for the new building this past FY?

They'd probably specify what exactly was impacting their expenses if it was something they could talk about freely.
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They purchases the land. Building is supposed to be open in 5 years. So who knows.
 
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Skittzo said:
Their net sales forecast being only 5% down and their profit forecast being a whopping 28% down actually tells me their operating expenses are planning to skyrocket. Which would line up with a hardware launch, no?
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That could be partially attributed to new hardware with a small profit margin, yes.
 
OLED has been selling great even if it is a much minor update compared to what we expect from Drake. I don't understand the fear of Drake not selling well at least during the first year and in the the second year we should start getting exclusives from third parties and maybe even a couple small exclusives from Nintendo to start giving reasons to buy the console to the general audience outside of the early-adopters, and in the 3rd year a lot the 1st party output should already be exclusive to the Drake.
 
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It's clear that we'll have to wait longer for some news... probably a new leak.

The lack of chips could last until 2025 (if things don't get even worse 😢) and I don't see why Nintendo has to wait for better times, when new devices (pc, smartphones, tv, cars etc) are continuously announced and released.
 
Stinkmeiser45 said:
I still believe strongly that a switch pro (dane) was legitimately planned but canceled due to the chip shortage, replaced with the OLED.
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I just don’t think there was a pro planned at all and OLED was always the model coming out.

As for cross-gen expect what we are seeing with Xbox/PS5 quite a lot of cross-gen games with exclusives coming down the line eventually. Even if those games run like cheeks on the old hardware. As for 3rd parties then can want all they like for more powerful hardware but if they are the only ones there then they are probably not expecting high adoption if Nintendo isn’t going exclusive out the gate.
 
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