StarTopic Future Nintendo Hardware & Technology Speculation & Discussion |ST| (Read the staff posts before commenting!)

[LiC]

If it's a Switch 2 they're not gonna sell the other Switch consoles alongside it. That defeats the entire purpose. You want people to buy the new hardware, not the old hardware. It's different when it's just another model like a Lite or an OLED, those aren't aiming to replace their predecessors.

So in this "Switch 2" scenario, TotK is the final "Switch 1" game? Pikmin 4 is going to be released for a system they're not selling anymore? Not to mention Metroid Prime 4? I'm very much over the name/revision/successor arguments, but whatever side of that you're on, I don't believe there's any scenario where the new Switch model replaces the current ones on release.

 

[Raccoon]

the only one I really agree on is Splatoon 3

a live game on a system that will be replaced in half a year? why not hold onto it?

 

[ShadowFox08]

I get your point about Pokemon, but releasing stuff like Xenoblade, Splatoon, and Mario + Rabbids so soon before a new console seems like a terrible decision. Those could be used to sell the hardware. And yes it's cross-gen, but the casual market won't realize that. They'll think it's on a dead system

A lot will depend a lot on how Nintendo markets Drake. The people who will jump first on Drake is the hardcore base anyway. Most of the remaining casuals will go for the low tiered/cheaper Switch first over a $400-500 console.. Not to mention Switch already has a ton of great 1st party games that are selling well.

Besides that, they (Nintendo) isn''t killing support for the Switch. It's going to likely be like PS4 and PS5 support. Nintendo will have those games on Drake (and enhanced) while still supporting the current software lineup with updates on current switch.The next switch model will get some 3rd party exclusives that aren't possible on the current switch models, but we'll likely get 1st party cross platforms for a couple years. Best believe Loz:TOTK, Pikmin 3, MP4, MP Remaster (rumored) will be on switch. I wouldn't count on the next Mario ksty, but who knows..

 

[Jaytra]

We have nothing else to talk about okay

Can we finally discuss the flagship colour the new hardware will launch with. OG was grey. Oled Model was White.

Wonder if theyll keep the neon.

 

[brebre73]

Can we finally discuss the flagship colour the new hardware will launch with.

It would be pretty cool if they use the black joycons that the dev kits come with

 

[Terrell]

This is factually untrue. 2015, 2016 and H1 2017 look almost identical to each other for 3DS family sales - until the October Switch announcement confirmed that the NX was a handheld, and 3DS sales dropped 20% over the previous holiday season.

The DS fell off the quarter after the 3DS announced - which was in July, not October. The argument isn't that the holiday drops after an announcement, in which case it wouldn't matter when it got announced, but that it's the quarter after the announcement drops, that's why you avoid the holiday.

There is very little evidence of a holiday drop - the 3DS->Switch example excluded - indeed because that sort of timing is avoided.

So an imminent new product completely fades from memory after the quarter it was announced in? Seems... unlikely. And summer quarters always tend to fall off the later years of hardware. Even now, Switch has dipped to #2 on NPD HW units sold for the first time in a LONG time this past August.

Besides, even if I accept that this would cause a major sales collapse, with how far ahead hardware launches have to be mapped out, it's not like they can wait all that long to announce new hardware anyways. Either you don't risk sales in the holiday period and cut your marketing time as thin as possible or you take the risk and give yourself some breathing room to drive interest in new hardware. So even if I were to believe there'd be a sales collapse, I don't consider their current hardware sales to be something inviolable to begin with.

If that’s the case then why even risk an announcement before the holiday period & put yourself in a position that something could happen.

Because the long-term success of their future hardware might mean more to them than undisturbed sales the last holiday period of their current hardware so long as software sales stay solid.
I'm really not sure why that possibility isn't in consideration.

They'll have to announce it at some point or else the entire thing is going to leak when it goes into full production. Wasn't the original Switch leaked that way almost immediately? Are they willing to risk waiting potentially 4-5 months into manufacturing to announce it in Feb/March?

You bring up a decent point: new hardware might basically be all-but-known in the holiday season regardless, with or without an official announcement, and then what good does holding the announcement do?

A Nintendo Switch 2 makes no sense next year given how this years software schedule turned out. You don't rush a bunch of tentpole releases out before a new console, you do that after. Splatoon 3, Xenoblade, Mario + Rabbids, Pokemon. You don't want to launch a brand new console AFTER those are out. You don't continue DLC for the previous console several months after a new console launch. The only way this makes sense is if it's pushed and marketed as a Pro.

Who says they're rushing out tentpoles?
And apparently BC isn't a thing, neither is offering DLC for games released on old hardware on the new hardware. Besides, if DLC shouldn't have been put forward due to new hardware arriving and Nintendo were apparently now required to wait for their DLC pipeline to be exhausted, we'd be looking at a 2024 release date for new hardware at the earliest, and the info we have already basically means we can chuck such notions into the bin.

If it was a Switch 2, Nintendo would hold back titles for the launch period. Especially massive tentpole titles. Yes, there will be a cross-gen period, but that doesn't change anything. It's simply not how gaming companies operate. Both Microsoft and Sony held back titles for their new systems for a big launch.

Who says they've not held anything back?

If it's a Switch 2 they're not gonna sell the other Switch consoles alongside it. That defeats the entire purpose. You want people to buy the new hardware, not the old hardware. It's different when it's just another model like a Lite or an OLED, those aren't aiming to replace their predecessors.

GBA SP was introduced the year prior to DS launch and sold alongside the DS at retail, where GBA actually outsold the DS in both 2004 and 2005 worldwide, but that says more about the GBA, since DS WW sales were no slouch, even before the launch of the DS Lite.

Nintendo has NO qualms about selling hardware from their last cycle alongside new hardware. None. It's honestly expected behaviour from them. These are just examples of "slim" versions of imminently-succeeded hardware released close to a new hardware release cycle.

Also, as an aside, every handheld since GBA has seen a Pokemon release at the dawn of a new hardware cycle (FireRed/LeafGreen for the GBA-to-DS transition, B2/W2 released AFTER the 3DS launch, Sun/Moon released 4 months before the launch of Switch). Just some food for thought.

the only one I really agree on is Splatoon 3

a live game on a system that will be replaced in half a year? why not hold onto it?

Looking at first-week sales of Splatoon 2 vs. first-week sales of Splatoon 3, I could think of one reason not to release a live game as a launch window exclusive on new hardware. Especially when the option to patch/enhance the game for said new hardware is on the table.

 

[Simba1]

If it's a Switch 2 they're not gonna sell the other Switch consoles alongside it. That defeats the entire purpose. You want people to buy the new hardware, not the old hardware. It's different when it's just another model like a Lite or an OLED, those aren't aiming to replace their predecessors.

Not really, Switch 2 will not be completely different platform or clear cut to current Switch models, Nintendo will keep releasing games for current Switch models for at least 2 years after "Drake" Switch launch, so they could keep selling also older hardware that would also runs those games.
Just releasing most expensive model ($400+) and stop selling current and more affordable models would not be best bussines decision,
not only that this "Drake" hardware will be very hard to find in 1st year (it would be sold out in any case) but also point that Nintendo always looks to have different price options on market (especially now when they have only one platform), so they will probably keep current Switch models in sales until they start releasing Drake revisions ("Drake Lite" model for instance).

 

[chocolate_supra]

Can we finally discuss the flagship colour the new hardware will launch with. OG was grey. Oled Model was White.

And the Super will be super.

 

[Gay Bowser]

Also, as an aside, every handheld since GBA has seen a Pokemon release at the dawn of a new hardware cycle (FireRed/LeafGreen for the GBA-to-DS transition, B2/W2 released AFTER the 3DS launch, Sun/Moon released 4 months before the launch of Switch). Just some food for thought.

It goes back even further than that. Pokémon Crystal, the first mainline Pokémon game to actually require the Game Boy Color, was released three months before the Game Boy Advance came out in Japan, and a month after the Game Boy Advance came out in the US.

Mainline Pokémon has always been a “we want the console to be as popular as possible to support this” type of game, not a “release on new hardware to make it popular” game. Kind of like Dragon Quest. In the future I fully expect Animal Crossing to be the same, and maybe Splatoon will be, too? Is it really the end of the world if Splatoon 4 arrives on the next Switch roughly three years after launch, in the same way AC arrived on the Switch three years after its launch? Splatoon 3 will be playable on the new Switch in the meantime, and likely with improved graphics too.

One of the most successful live service games of all time, Grand Theft Auto Online, was released for PS3/Xbox 360 just a month before the PS4 and Xbox One came out. Didn’t seem to hurt its live service ambitions. If anything, making it exclusive to the new hardware would have.

 

[KeijiKG]

Wait some of you still think this will be a "Pro" instead of a succesor?

Once again, I reiterate I like the idea it could be a bit of both like the GBC or New 3DS but a larger and possibly continuous magnitude as if it's Nintendo's Android or iOS and every console is just running a version of it.

Something about the concept of NX rubbed me that way when hearing about it, though I could be mistaken.

 

[Bonejack]

Back to naming/positioning talk? Okay, here are my 2 cents:

It will be launched and marketed as a Switch family member, but they will make sure people know and understand it's more powerful.

Switch is a hit product, the whole name/line works, no need to have a hard cut by calling it a full on successor, even if the tech inside is worth being called that.

Nintendo won't release exclusives for this device for at least 1.5 years, so TotK / Pikmin 4 won't be the "last Switch games".
Third parties are free to do whatevery they want, and i do think they will have Drake exclusives. Maybe they also offer Cloud versions for the base Switch versions?

Ultimately they will slowly phase out the old Switch versions and also start to change their marketing tone, going more for the "Switch Pro is where it's at for the future".

 

[Hajeman]

If it's a Switch 2 they're not gonna sell the other Switch consoles alongside it. That defeats the entire purpose. You want people to buy the new hardware, not the old hardware. It's different when it's just another model like a Lite or an OLED, those aren't aiming to replace their predecessors.

That's why I have mentioned in the previous post that we need a clear confirmation whether Switch Drake is a Pro (Gen 1) or 2 (Gen 2). If a Pro, Switch can exceed PS2 155 million sales but if it's a 2, maybe satisfy in 3rd place behind PS2 & DS. For me better marketing Drake as a Switch Gen 2 because it's totally different beast in all aspects (use super or advance in name likes snes & gba)

 

[1UpMango]

thread newbie here, read oldpuck's awesome summary and scanned through posts since then and I wanted to throw out a question (sorry if a similar question was already asked before or if it's a weird question to ask),

assuming that this new Switch releases next year with an Ampere GPU, ELI5 how is it that this new Switch seems to be much better equipped to run modern games than the OG Switch did in 2017, when the new Switch is releasing 3 years after the GPU generation was first brought to consumers like the OG Switch was? (Maxwell released in 2014 -> OG Switch released in 2017 and Ampere released in 2020 -> new Switch released in 2023)

I understand that it's basically impossible for any mass-produced hardware to simply have the latest GPU architecture due to how chip production and processes work and I'm assuming that the answer to my question is probably going to be mostly due to the fact that the Switch has to deal with mobile architecture (and/or hybrid form factor) unlike the box consoles & leaps in power efficiency from the past several years, I'm just wondering how much of OG Switch's aging (sub-720p resolutions, third-party games being really nerfed compared to PS4/XB1 ports and all that) can be attributed to a somewhat unfortunate timing of when it got released and maybe get a better understanding of how much more efficient mobile chips have gotten over the years.

 

[Hermii]

thread newbie here, read oldpuck's awesome summary and scanned through posts since then and I wanted to throw out a question (sorry if a similar question was already asked before or if it's a weird question to ask),

assuming that this new Switch releases next year with an Ampere GPU, ELI5 how is it that this new Switch seems to be much better equipped to run modern games than the OG Switch did in 2017, when the new Switch is releasing 3 years after the GPU generation was first brought to consumers like the OG Switch was? (Maxwell released in 2014 -> OG Switch released in 2017 and Ampere released in 2020 -> new Switch released in 2023)

I understand that it's basically impossible for any mass-produced hardware to simply have the latest GPU architecture due to how chip production and processes work and I'm assuming that the answer to my question is probably going to be mostly due to the fact that the Switch has to deal with mobile architecture (and/or hybrid form factor) unlike the box consoles & leaps in power efficiency from the past several years, I'm just wondering how much of OG Switch's aging (sub-720p resolutions, third-party games being really nerfed compared to PS4/XB1 ports and all that) can be attributed to a somewhat unfortunate timing of when it got released and maybe get a better understanding of how much more efficient mobile chips have gotten over the years.

Because there are many other factors at play here than gpua architecture. Also, this is not the same ampere that launched in 2020. You can say it’s ampere 2.0. It has several improvements, like a new cache structure.

The switch launched at 20nm, which in practice is much closer in performance to the 28nm of launch ps4, than it is to 16nm. As dakhil constantly points out, nm is a marketing term, and doesn’t scale linearly with performance. The evidence is quickly stacking more and more against 8nm being the node of Drake, with 5 nm being a likely candidate.

You also have a bunch of more factors like the existence of the series s, the amount of cuda cores, dlss and so on.

 

[Gay Bowser]

assuming that this new Switch releases next year with an Ampere GPU, ELI5 how is it that this new Switch seems to be much better equipped to run modern games than the OG Switch did in 2017, when the new Switch is releasing 3 years after the GPU generation was first brought to consumers like the OG Switch was? (Maxwell released in 2014 -> OG Switch released in 2017 and Ampere released in 2020 -> new Switch released in 2023)

I have a few thoughts on this!

The first is that what sort of determines what “modern games” are isn’t the architecture of PC GPUs, it’s consoles. That’s sort of the baseline that developers seek to support. The Switch released a little over three years after the PS4 and Xbox One. But this new system seems like it’s going to release a little over two years after the PS5 and new Xbox consoles. (That’s not an insignificant difference; by all accounts big franchises like Street Fighter and Final Fantasy and Resident Evil will not have had moved onto “next gen” with exclusive games by the time the new Switch comes out, which is different from last time.) Another factor is that the new Xbox consoles and especially the PS5 have been severely supply constrained, so the industry hasn’t switched over to the new consoles being the baseline quite as fast as they have in the past. We’re still seeing major first party releases be cross-gen even two full years in and that’s sort of seeming like the new normal, in a way it wasn’t in the past.

Second, a huge focus on game development over the last decade has been to make things more scalable. This is in response to not just things like the Switch itself, but mobile games in general and even things like Microsoft releasing two different next-gen consoles for the first time (another thing that’s sort of a boon for the new Switch). A big part of the GPU performance overhead for Xbox Series X and PS5 games is rendering 4K gaming, which some people don’t care about, so there are devices like the Series S.

Which brings me to the third point, which is sort of the next Switch’s ace in the hole: DLSS. This basically allows the new Switch hardware to punch above its weight, rendering scenes at a lower resolution and using DLSS to help make up the difference. This is a feature that the other consoles don’t have, nor is it a feature the original Switch had.

Throw all these together and you have a Switch that does seem like it is meaningfully better equipped to continue getting versions of contemporaneous “modern” games from other consoles than the original Switch was.

 

[Terrell]

thread newbie here, read oldpuck's awesome summary and scanned through posts since then and I wanted to throw out a question (sorry if a similar question was already asked before or if it's a weird question to ask),

assuming that this new Switch releases next year with an Ampere GPU, ELI5 how is it that this new Switch seems to be much better equipped to run modern games than the OG Switch did in 2017, when the new Switch is releasing 3 years after the GPU generation was first brought to consumers like the OG Switch was? (Maxwell released in 2014 -> OG Switch released in 2017 and Ampere released in 2020 -> new Switch released in 2023)

I understand that it's basically impossible for any mass-produced hardware to simply have the latest GPU architecture due to how chip production and processes work and I'm assuming that the answer to my question is probably going to be mostly due to the fact that the Switch has to deal with mobile architecture (and/or hybrid form factor) unlike the box consoles & leaps in power efficiency from the past several years, I'm just wondering how much of OG Switch's aging (sub-720p resolutions, third-party games being really nerfed compared to PS4/XB1 ports and all that) can be attributed to a somewhat unfortunate timing of when it got released and maybe get a better understanding of how much more efficient mobile chips have gotten over the years.

To try and ELY5:

First, only half the story is told through the GPU. The CPU in the Erista SoC used in Switch was a BIG.little configuration, meaning it had 4 A57 cores for doing intensive tasks and 4 A53 cores for doing what I call the "minor busywork" tasks, but a game console typically doesn't have many "minor busywork" calculations to perform, so they were permanently disabled to save power consumption by Nvidia. Now, with a custom SoC commissioned explicitly by Nintendo, Nvidia has opted for a CPU that utilizes 8 A78C cores of the same size, and the power efficiency between A57 (originally designed by ARM in 2012) and A78C (designed by ARM in 2020) is quite dramatic, as ARM was incredibly focused on designing for power efficiency at peak performance.

As for the GPU (and the CPU, as well, to some extent), some of the gains you see in performance are through accelerators, specially designed units inside a CPU or GPU to calculate highly-specific types of information, usually paired up with a standard core in the CPU or GPU to pass the information back to when it finishes. For example, the reason that your phone doesn't overheat and explode when trying to play 4K compressed video is because there are accelerators in GPUs that are specialized in decompressing certain video formats like MP4 (and now AV1) and make incredibly quick work of the necessary calculations to do it, which means less raw power from the CPU or GPU itself to do it. This is why, when brand-new audio and video compression formats are introduced, they tend to make CPUs and GPUs stress and heat up substantially; they lack these little helpers who know how to do it much faster and easier.
One such accelerator in an Nvidia GPU is called a ray-tracing core (or RT core for short), which can more easily process lighting effects, which are a large strain on a GPU otherwise. RT cores were introduced in the Turing architecture in 2018 and Nvidia has made great improvements on them even in just the past 3 years. AMD chips can do ray tracing, as well, but AMD (as of 2021) lags behind Nvidia in efficiency and performance in this regard.
Another accelerator is called a Tensor core, which more easily process AI algorithmic calculations. These are the accelerators that enable DLSS, the tech that allows a lower-res image to be up-rezzed while looking nearly identical to if the image were generated at that higher resolution. DLSS and Tensor cores have also seen dramatic improvement and iteration by Nvidia, by virtue of their desire to be a leading chip maker for autonomous driving tech, but it has had significant benefits to visual outputs, as well. AMD is also developing similar technology, but again, not at the same rate as Nvidia.

It is a stroke of good timing on Nintendo's part that they are able to obtain a custom design that makes use of these well-developed technologies, as it provides these accelerators that allow it to output an image that it otherwise could not at a hybrid device's power usage. Additionally, PS5 and Xbox Series do not feature these more-performant technologies due to their chips being designed prior to AMD's advancements in these fields to keep up with Nvidia, which is why we are discussing a hybrid console outputting a 4K image and potentially being able to achieve something close enough to Xbox Series S that it has dramatically closed the gap between the new Nintendo hybrid hardware and current home consoles that was much harder with Switch and PS4.

TL; DR - it's that much more performant because the GPU is "cheating" and was designed to use shortcuts to achieve a similar result in ways current home consoles were not.

 

[Jet Jaguar]

What's the realistic RAM amount looking like and the resultant bandwidth? I know the OG Switch was bottlenecked due in part to its bandwidth (iirc 25GB/s)

 

[LukasManak22]

The Switch is not going anywhere. They will make sure that this is just "another family member of Switch consoles" and when time is right they will try to put all the people to Drake and slowly start to stop supporting the original Switch. Something like iPhones work, the days of "generations" are over, I would say. Only one problem I have with this is that: Nintendo, don't try to mess up the marketing with this, we know how it turned how with Wii U etc. So that people would not be confused that the latest first party 2024 game does not play on the OG Switch, try to make the transition as clean as possible, the good branding for the Drake will do a lot.

 

[Gay Bowser]

The Switch is not going anywhere. They will make sure that this is just "another family member of Switch consoles" and when time is right they will try to put all the people to Drake and slowly start to stop supporting the original Switch. Something like iPhones work, the days of "generations" are over, I would say.

Yep. The only company in the console space who seems like they’re sticking with traditional generations is Sony, and even for them the PS4 Pro was sort of a half-step toward more frequent, iterative upgrades.

Only one problem I have with this is that: Nintendo, don't try to mess up the marketing with this, we know how it turned how with Wii U etc. So that people would not be confused that the latest first party 2024 game does not play on the OG Switch, try to make the transition as clean as possible, the good branding for the Drake will do a lot.

That’s why I like “Nintendo Switch Series 2.” It’s a Nintendo Switch first and foremost, but it’s clearly the next version. And, crucially, it scales: the next system can simply be the Series 3. Going into prefix/suffix land with New Switch or Super Swich or Switch Ultra or Switch Max gets into pretty messy territory. “This game requires Series 3 or newer” is easier than needing to have a chart on the back of every game box due to each console having different branding (“wait, is the Switch Max better than the Switch Ultra, or worse?”). And those prefix/suffix names also sort of imply that the new Switch is not the “real” Switch 2, when it pretty clearly is. There’s no “actual” Switch 2 coming out two years after this.

 

[Bonejack]

Yep. The only company in the console space who seems like they’re sticking with traditional generations is Sony, and even for them the PS4 Pro was sort of a half-step toward more frequent, iterative upgrades.

I'm certain a lot of PS users would love to disagree with you here. Cough*GoWPS4*Cough**Cough*HorizonPS4*Cough

 

[Z0m3le]

What's the realistic RAM amount looking like and the resultant bandwidth? I know the OG Switch was bottlenecked due in part to its bandwidth (iirc 25GB/s)

It's 8GBs, 12GBs or or 16GBs... of those choices, the most readily available LPDDR5 chip size is 6GB chips, which would result in 2 chips (just like the current Switch) for 12GB @ 128bit (this bit bandwidth is confirmed in the API, not the capacity) the speed from this depending on how the chip is clocked would result in 88GB/s-102GB/s, it should be clocked lower in handheld mode, I'd venture to guess we are looking at 12GB @ 102GB/s when docked and as low as 68GB/s in portable mode, though could be higher.

 

[Bonejack]

It's 8GBs, 12GBs or or 16GBs... of those choices, the most readily available LPDDR5 chip size is 6GB chips, which would result in 2 chips (just like the current Switch) for 12GB @ 128bit (this bit bandwidth is confirmed in the API, not the capacity) the speed from this depending on how the chip is clocked would result in 88GB/s-102GB/s, it should be clocked lower in handheld mode, I'd venture to guess we are looking at 12GB @ 102GB/s when docked and as low as 68GB/s in portable mode, though could be higher.

 

[Gay Bowser]

I'm certain a lot of PS users would love to disagree with you here. Cough*GoWPS4*Cough**Cough*HorizonPS4*Cough

Right, they’re doing the cross-gen thing that everyone else is. I was sort of thinking more hardware. Like, they’re the only hardware vendor I can see who might try to keep their platform around for seven or eight years before replacing it, slowly dropping it in price perhaps, with a “PS5 Pro” in the middle that is new hardware but explicitly not a new generation. Whereas, with Microsoft, I think their “mid-gen upgrade” hardware is just going to be their next system, and they’ll just keep releasing new Series #S and #X consoles with the best technology they can include at roughly those same price points about every four years or so. And Nintendo will probably do about the same. I think their goal is going to be to always have reasonably fresh hardware so they don’t have the same wax and wane cycle that longer consoles generations traditionally have.

 

[CocaFormula]

Once again, I reiterate I like the idea it could be a bit of both like the GBC or New 3DS but a larger and possibly continuous magnitude as if it's Nintendo's Android or iOS and every console is just running a version of it.

Something about the concept of NX rubbed me that way when hearing about it, though I could be mistaken.

Can we finally discuss the flagship colour the new hardware will launch with. OG was grey. Oled Model was White.

Wonder if theyll keep the neon.

I say matte black, or some kind of magnesium finish

Once again, I reiterate I like the idea it could be a bit of both like the GBC or New 3DS but a larger and possibly continuous magnitude as if it's Nintendo's Android or iOS and every console is just running a version of it.

Something about the concept of NX rubbed me that way when hearing about it, though I could be mistaken.

Yeah I mean, going from what we kinda know, it was never going to be a simple Pro as it will have exclusives (albeit only third party maybe).
If it's really releasing H1 2023 it's also definitely NOT replacing OG Switch, so no "successor" either.

The only possible variable that we don't know, is if it's going to coexist with original Switch until they are BOTH replaced by a new platform, or if they are going with a soft transition discontinuing OG and Lite after a while, making Drake the new default platform.

I am slightly leaning towards the first option, but there is no debate that we will have at least a GBC/N3DS phase for sure IMHO.

 

[Bonejack]

Right, they’re doing the cross-gen thing that everyone else is. I was sort of thinking more hardware. Like, they’re the only hardware vendor I can see who might try to keep their platform around for seven or eight years before replacing it, slowly dropping it in price perhaps, with a “PS5 Pro” in the middle that is new hardware but explicitly not a new generation. Whereas, with Microsoft, I think their “mid-gen upgrade” hardware is just going to be their next system, and they’ll just keep releasing new Series #S and #X consoles with the best technology they can include at roughly those same price points about every four years or so. And Nintendo will probably do about the same. I think their goal is going to be to always have reasonably fresh hardware so they don’t have the same wax and wane cycle that longer consoles generations traditionally have.

Dunno if Sony can keep this up, no matter how much or not Jimbob believes in generations.

MS can do whatever they want without really looking at Sony given their main focus is the platform as a service. And Nintendo has the advantage of doing their hardware for their own games.

 

[Gay Bowser]

If it's really releasing H1 2023 it's also definitely NOT replacing OG Switch, so no "successor" either.

just to play devil’s advocate: why definitely not?

H1 2023 is six years since the release of the nintendo switch. that’s basically the same amount of time as there was between nintendo ds and nintendo 3ds, or nintendo 3ds and nintendo switch, or super famicom and nintendo 64, or wii and wii u. a lot of nintendo hardware successors come out before the six year mark: there were only five years between n64 and gamecube, for example, or between gamecube and wii.

 

[Skittzo]

Couldn't help but cringe a bit at these past couple pages.

@Magic-Man you seem to agree this will be a Switch 2 AND a revision at the same time, so I'm not sure why you've been arguing so vehemently against the idea that it's a Switch 2. It's (likely) both.

It doesn't have to be shoehorned into any pre-existing market position, it can be positioned in a brand new way just like the original Switch was.

 

[Gay Bowser]

It doesn't have to be shoehorned into any pre-existing market position, it can be positioned in a brand new way just like the original Switch was.

ding ding ding

I fully expect the debate of “wait, is it an all-new system, or is it ‘version two’ of the existing system?” to continue even after Nintendo reveals the thing.

People don’t deal with paradigm shifts very well. I remember people arguing that the iPhone wasn’t a “real” smartphone, it was just a fancy feature phone. In retrospect it was the first real smartphone in most ways that mattered.

 

[Hermii]

What's the realistic RAM amount looking like and the resultant bandwidth? I know the OG Switch was bottlenecked due in part to its bandwidth (iirc 25GB/s)

I just want to add to what z0mb1e saiid that bandwidth is still expected to be a bottleneck, that’s just one of the caveats of mobile hardware.

 

[LoneRanger]

Who cares how Nintendo markets its next hardware.

What matters is that if this next machine will have exclusive titles like PS4/XOne ports that are hard to put on OG Switch. Or even PS5/XSeries titles.

And also, how current Switch games will look.

 

[Bonejack]

Who cares how Nintendo markets its next hardware.

What matters is that if this next machine will have exclusive titles like PS4/XOne ports that are hard to put on OG Switch. Or even PS5/XSeries titles.

And also, how current Switch games will look.

3rd party, likely.
Nintendo games, doubtful.

Ultimately, going by my limited knowledge in this case, games won't look better if the system doesn't have the option to "force" DLSS on games that don't have it "in" them.

You could see improvements for games with unlocked framerates, but for a game to really show improvements, Nintendo / whatever dev needs to release a "Pro patch".

 

[Z0m3le]

Couldn't help but cringe a bit at these past couple pages.

@Magic-Man you seem to agree this will be a Switch 2 AND a revision at the same time, so I'm not sure why you've been arguing so vehemently against the idea that it's a Switch 2. It's (likely) both.

It doesn't have to be shoehorned into any pre-existing market position, it can be positioned in a brand new way just like the original Switch was.

We know games are coming for at least the next 2 years for the current Switch, we are also possibly getting Drake in just 7 or 8 months. The reality is that generations haven't had a purpose since last gen's hardware agnostic approach to game development, generations are just something familiar, but no one is actually doing them anymore, the PS5 is doing exactly what phones do, 1 development pipeline that will eventually drop older hardware, this is more a decision for individual developers...

Generations are dead, because games no longer need to target individual platforms, they are all very similar now and days, and performance baselines have grown so much that only Switch really seems to be left behind now and days and that is largely to do with CPU performance, which won't be a problem with Drake.

I just want to add to what z0mb1e saiid that bandwidth is still expected to be a bottleneck, that’s just one of the caveats of mobile hardware.

Yep, though 102GB/s if it is the case, will be a lot better than 25GB/s, the GT 1030 for instance only had 48GB/s, and will only be a little slower (1.13TFLOPs) than Drake in portable mode (1.41TFLOPs if 460MHz), so bandwidth might not actually be much of a problem thanks to efficiency gains, but it should still be the lowest performing part, at least outside of the storage solution if that isn't UFS.

 

[Paxie]

Drake is going to be a different architecture, with massive leaps in GPU and CPU power, launching at least 7 years into the Switch's life. I'm sorry, I personally cannot understand how the Drake is a Pro. With "mid-life" comments Furukawa made in 2021, that would mean the Pro is launching 2 years before a new gen is introduced. If it's a new gen though, that would instead become a short 2 year cross-gen period. At most, Nintendo will market it as a Pro the same way they marketed the DS as a third pillar

 

[kvetcha]

Yes, at least with the way it was showcased today, having to run certain frames at the highest native quality possible would probably create a big performance hit on the hardware the new Switch would be running on. The feature currently seems to be predicated on the idea that any card running it will have plenty of local resources available to handle it.

fwiw, the generated frames are based on post-DLSS upscaled frames, so they do not need to be rendered at native resolution. That's where the '7/8ths of all the pixels are DLSS-generated' statement comes from.

 

[Deleted member 2551]

"I have no fucking clue of what is happening but let me tell you I AM DEFINITELY RIGHT"

 

[Dark Cloud]

The people who are concerned about Nintendos marketing lol. You’re getting a next gen like system. That’s the big deal here. What they want to call it or advertise it as is whatever. BC will be there going by Furukawa’s statements.

 

[Gay Bowser]

Just to add, and to remind people, I think one reason I think TSMC's N6 process node's still a possibility is because the one product that I think currently uses the Cortex-A78C is BlueField-3, which has up to 16 Armv8.2+ Cortex-A78 cores and is fabricated using TSMC's 7N process node.

The Cortex-A78C can support Armv8.4 and Armv8.6-A, and the Cortex-A78 can't.

Although having four clusters of 4 Cortex-A78 cores for a total of 16 Cortex-A78 cores is theoretically possible, I imagine there's too much latency from having four CPU clusters, which I imagine is a huge deal breaker for datacentre chips. So I think Nvidia used two clusters of 8 Cortex-A78C cores for BlueField-3 for that reason.

And TSMC has mentioned wanting to shift customers from TSMC's N7 process node to TSMC's N6 process node. The only difference between TSMC's N6 process node and TSMC's N7 process node, outside of lithography, with TSMC's N6 process node using EUV lithography and TSMC's N7 process node using DUV lithography, is 18% higher logic density, with performance and power consumption practically being the same between TSMC's N6 process node and TSMC's N7 process node. And I imagine there could be less work involved optimising the Cortex-A78C for Nintendo's specifications if Nintendo and Nvidia decide to fabricate Drake using TSMC's N6 process node since I imagine Nvidia already did most of the work optimising the Cortex-A78C for TSMC's 7 nm** process node with BlueField-3.

** → a marketing nomenclature used by all foundry companies

---

Anyways, Nintendo's six month earning release is on 8 November 2022. (A day after my birthday.)

Yeah, I think some version of TSMC’s N7 family of processes (which includes N6) is significantly more likely than either Samsung 8nm or TSMC N5 at this point. So not the best case scenario for hardware nerds, but certainly far from the worst. As for N7 vs. N6, they’ll just use whichever is cheaper, can get them the quantities they need, and has the long-term availability roadmap a product like this requires. My guess is that’s probably going to be N6, but we live in weird times.

I don’t think N5 was ever really in the cards, to be honest, so I won’t at all be disappointed. TSMC N7/N6 is a great node.

 

[daase ko]

Drake is going to be a different architecture, with massive leaps in GPU and CPU power, launching at least 7 years into the Switch's life. I'm sorry, I personally cannot understand how the Drake is a Pro.

We worked for years on partial statements from rumours that framed it like that. Now it stuck despite the nvidia leak that was illuminating.

 

[Terrell]

Ultimately, going by my limited knowledge in this case, games won't look better if the system doesn't have the option to "force" DLSS on games that don't have it "in" them.

You could see improvements for games with unlocked framerates, but for a game to really show improvements, Nintendo / whatever dev needs to release a "Pro patch".

Not to bring up this bugbear but... emulators are technically already capable of utilizing Tensor core technology/DLSS to upscale Switch games. It does this by having you run the game at standard resolution to train software on how things are supposed to look, it creates a "rescaling profile" from that data and Tensor cores can use that as a cheat-sheet to approximate how to render it at a higher resolution instead of having to do it on the fly. And this is just one user and one short playthrough. If you were to get multiple machines to play the game different ways for longer time periods (as I'm sure Nintendo could), you could generate a much MUCH more accurate "rescaling profile" that Tensor cores could use for Switch games and just include that data in a SUPER-lightweight patch, as these "rescaling profiles" aren't that heavy-duty in total bytes cuz they are, like I said, just "cheat-sheets" (largest I've seen still comes in at less than 500KB). And this is what the emulation community was able to achieve. Let's just get that into perspective. There could very well be a way to implement this without patching, but that would be the easiest for Nintendo. But a "Pro patch" may not be some massive undertaking.
As for frame rate, games with dynamic framerates benefit the most here, they would likely flip up to 60fps if no hard frame rate limit was set on the software, but I don't see that as a terribly difficult problem to surmount.

But anything beyond resolution and dynamic frame rates would definitely require a bit more work.

 

[Bonejack]

Not to bring up this bugbear but... emulators are technically already capable of utilizing Tensor core technology/DLSS to upscale Switch games. It does this by having you run the game at standard resolution to train software on how things are supposed to look, it creates a "rescaling profile" from that data and Tensor cores can use that as a cheat-sheet to approximate how to render it at a higher resolution instead of having to do it on the fly. And this is just one user and one short playthrough. If you were to get multiple machines to play the game different ways for longer time periods (as I'm sure Nintendo could), you could generate a much MUCH more accurate "rescaling profile" that Tensor cores could use for Switch games and just include that data in a SUPER-lightweight patch, as these "rescaling profiles" aren't that heavy-duty in total bytes cuz they are, like I said, just "cheat-sheets" (largest I've seen still comes in at less than 500KB). And this is what the emulation community was able to achieve. Let's just get that into perspective. There could very well be a way to implement this without patching, but that would be the easiest for Nintendo. But a "Pro patch" may not be some massive undertaking.
As for frame rate, games with dynamic framerates benefit the most here, they would likely flip up to 60fps if no hard frame rate limit was set on the software, but I don't see that as a terribly difficult problem to surmount.

But anything beyond resolution and dynamic frame rates would definitely require a bit more work.

I mean, that depends on a lot of "if's" that might cost Nintendo too much, and still require a little patch. I think it's just more likely that many games won't see any patches/improvements, Nintendo doing it for their evergreens and thirds on how viable they feel it is. For example, Capcom will sure have one for MonHun Rise as thats a sales monster.

 

[Lelouch0612]

If it's a Switch 2 they're not gonna sell the other Switch consoles alongside it. That defeats the entire purpose. You want people to buy the new hardware, not the old hardware. It's different when it's just another model like a Lite or an OLED, those aren't aiming to replace their predecessors.

The PS2 sold like 50m units after the PS3 launched.

They'll need to have affordable hardware to sell, since Drake is going to be on the expensive side. They won't cut away their audience.

 

[DXB-KNIGHT]

I don't think they've asked for the Switch though hence why some 1st party games has frame rate issues,
I'm looking at you Link's Awakening!

 

[Bonejack]

I don't think they've asked for the Switch though hence why some 1st party games has frame rate issues,
I'm looking at you Link's Awakening!

No you see, Nintendo actually wrote "Only for Capcom" on the second RAM embedded in the device. Only Capcom is allowed to use it, cause they asked for it.

 

[Jaytra]

I mean, that depends on a lot of "if's" that might cost Nintendo too much, and still require a little patch. I think it's just more likely that many games won't see any patches/improvements, Nintendo doing it for their evergreens and thirds on how viable they feel it is. For example, Capcom will sure have one for MonHun Rise as thats a sales monster.

Speaking of MonHun, it would be a huge get if the next mainline title (World 2/MH6) launched day one on Drake with the other platforms.

 

[Bonejack]

Speaking of MonHun, it would be a huge get if the next mainline title (World 2/MH6) launched day one on Drake with the other platforms.

That would be ideal for consumers, with full on crossplay between all platforms.

But after the massive success of Rise, i think Capcom is very happy keeping the strategy as it is by doing MH6 on PC/PS/XBOX and a few years later Rise2/Portable6 on Switch / Pro.

 

[Tentacle-tropes]

Because the long-term success of their future hardware might mean more to them than undisturbed sales the last holiday period of their current hardware so long as software sales stay solid.
I'm really not sure why that possibility isn't in consideration.

And, they have all of next year to do that. Why even complicate this current approaching holiday period. It’s always a consideration I just find it unlikely.

 

[ShaunSwitch]

That would be ideal for consumers, with full on crossplay between all platforms.

But after the massive success of Rise, i think Capcom is very happy keeping the strategy as it is by doing MH6 on PC/PS/XBOX and a few years later Rise2/Portable6 on Switch / Pro.

It has worked out really well. But I could see them releasing world 2 on switch as well if its not too demanding of a port job, it's extra sales after all.

I'm here hoping they drop iceborne on switch between the last content update for rise and the release of World 2. I already have World on pc but I'll buy another copy on switch without hesitation.

 

[Stinky Horse]

Capcom leak had something about mh ns G edition for early 2023. Might be long outdated info though, or maybe even just a port of Rise to other systems.

 

[10k]

This is what I want the Switch Advance to be.

 

[kvetcha]

This is what I want the Switch Advance to be.

A $400 cloud-only handheld?