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

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Yeah, digging through codenames it is borderline impossible to find a correlation with an existing franchise, or even a collab with an existing one.
I think it might be a new IP, or it’s related to something in-game that we wouldn’t know about.
 
Noleth said:
Yeah, digging through codenames it is borderline impossible to find a correlation with an existing franchise, or even a collab with an existing one.
I think it might be a new IP, or it’s related to something in-game that we wouldn’t know about.
Click to expand...
Could be Kirby though
 
If a codename would be this obvious as a reference for the actual game, they wouldn't need to have a codename to begin with. ;]
 
TheBlueBerryJelly said:
Can we deduct through past console reveals if acknowledging it before the meeting through media channels or in the investors meeting is more like Nintendo's style?
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A full on reveal is definitely not in the play this week, maybe even for the whole summer.

Those like me who expect something, expect nothing more but a dry and clear-cut PR announcement.
Basically them just confirming "Yep, we do make a new console, planned to release in 2025."
 
Bonejack said:
If a codename would be this obvious as a reference for the actual game, they wouldn't need to have a codename to begin with. ;]
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Yeah... What it to me means is coming together and many participants. So a crossover with a sizable cast. But that can mean anything.
 
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TheBlueBerryJelly said:
Can we deduct through past console reveals if acknowledging it before the meeting through media channels or in the investors meeting is more like Nintendo's style?
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What we do know is that Nintendo is following a strategy where they want to announce/reveal the Switch 2 as late as feasible to protect Switch sales. That could mean that Nintendo sees it as feasible to just make a full on reveal in october 2024.

The only debate is if Nintendo will make a subtle PR announcement of the Switch 2 earlier or if we have to wait till october to hear anything about the Switch 2.

But most think they are trying to copy Switch reveal with an october trailer and a january 2025 blow out where they go in depth on the hardware and show all the launch games.
 
Regarding weak yen and Switch 2 production. Does Nintendo have any production lines in Japan itself or is everything regarding Switch 2 going to be made in China and Vietnam?
 
Jake said:
So, the investors meeting is happening at 3 PM Japan time, right? That would be 2 AM Eastern since Japan is 13 hours ahead.
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Should I stay awake and see the Code name and acknowledgment of an iteration of the Switch.

Or should I sleep early and play some Xenoblade the golden country.

But if the news is bland I’ll sleep disappointed, which isn’t good, as well or i there’s is acknowledgement I’ll sleep like an angel and live if blissful ignorance.


omg-knuckle-biting.gif
 
Steve said:
Should I stay awake and see the Code name and acknowledgment of an iteration of the Switch.

Or should I sleep early and play some Xenoblade the golden country.

But if the news is bland I’ll sleep disappointed, which isn’t good, as well or i there’s is acknowledgement I’ll sleep like an angel and live if blissful ignorance.


omg-knuckle-biting.gif
Click to expand...

Go to sleep like regular.
 
Steve said:
Should I stay awake and see the Code name and acknowledgment of an iteration of the Switch.

Or should I sleep early and play some Xenoblade the golden country.

But if the news is bland I’ll sleep disappointed, which isn’t good, as well or i there’s is acknowledgement I’ll sleep like an angel and live if blissful ignorance.


omg-knuckle-biting.gif
Click to expand...
Go to sleep, and expect to wake up to a nothingburger.
 
the most they will ever say at these events is "we have a new console in development, it will continue our business"

you already knew that. don't stay up late for that.
 
Individualised said:
What does this mean? Nintendo does not have a theme for console codenames.
Click to expand...
What I meant was that it's a codename that aligns with a setting where food can be served. It's a stretch but like... isn't basically everything we've tried to tie to the codename a stretch to an extent.

That said, you're right, Nintendo absolutely does not have a solid theme for their console codenames. Any theory i may have are still a stretch and were destroyed by the insane codenames like "NX". Basically not worth thinking about those names too hard.
 
Individualised said:
What does this mean? Nintendo does not have a theme for console codenames.
Click to expand...
Usually they do actually.

N64- Project reality, later called Ultra 64, meaning 64 bits.

GameCube- project dolphin, meaning insane water physics, since the early years had a lot of water themed games, like Windwaker, Sunshine and that one jet sky game.

Wii- project revolution, mostly because of motion control.

Wii U- project cafe was meant for more casual gamers, but that’s didn’t happen, since most of the Wii player based moved onto the mobile market.

NX- I don’t even know that.

Maybe the handheld codename are different, but console codename normally tells us something about what’s Nintendo headspace are, especially project cafe, since Nintendo leaned way to heavily on the Casual market, which was their downfall (also marketing, lack of games and a gimmick that no one used)
 
Steve said:
N64- Project reality, later called Ultra 64, meaning 64 bits.

GameCube- project dolphin, meaning insane water physics, since the early years had a lot of water themed games, like Windwaker, Sunshine and that one jet sky game.

Wii- project revolution, mostly because of motion control.

Wii U- project cafe was meant for more casual gamers, but that’s didn’t happen, since most of the Wii player based moved onto the mobile market.

NX- I don’t even know that.
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Your Dolphin and Cafe theories are a huge stretch, it's hard to imagine that "water physics" had anything to do with them using the name Dolphin. The only one with an actual meaning is "Revolution".

(Ultra 64 wasn't the codename for the N64; it was meant to be the final product name).
Steve said:
Maybe the handheld codename are different, but console codename normally tells us something about what’s Nintendo headspace are, especially project cafe, since Nintendo leaned way to heavily on the Casual market, which was their downfall (also marketing, lack of games and a gimmick that no one used)
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I don't think even Nintendo knew where they were heading with the Wii U.
 
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Noleth said:
I’m still feeling that at best we’ll get some form of “We have nothing to say on the matter for now.”
Nintendo is pretty keen on trying to keep focus on the Switch, and I wouldn’t be surprised if they say it’s their focus going into 2025 as well, despite having a very slim lineup.
Click to expand...

It's possible they say this. If the plan is to launch outside of the new fiscal year then I don't expect them to say anything in this report. However if the plan is to launch before April 2025 then we might get a simple statement that they plan to launch new hardware this fiscal year.

That's literally the full extent of what they'll say here though. I think people expecting a reveal or anything more are going to be in for a bad time.
 
Steve said:
Should I stay awake and see the Code name and acknowledgment of an iteration of the Switch.

Or should I sleep early and play some Xenoblade the golden country.

But if the news is bland I’ll sleep disappointed, which isn’t good, as well or i there’s is acknowledgement I’ll sleep like an angel and live if blissful ignorance.


omg-knuckle-biting.gif
Click to expand...
Go to sleep at a decent hour so you can wake up to the news that Nintendo did not acknowledge the existence of any new hardware whatsoever.

I truly hope I'm wrong. I feel there will be a very brief mention of new hardware coming this fiscal year, but I'm prepared for the possibility that they say nothing.
 
Interestingly, in China, Furukawa's style is known as "playing taiji" (no matter what kind of pointed questions shareholders or journalists ask, he can defuse them by answering them with irrelevant questions) 🤣.
 
Steve said:
Usually they do actually.

N64- Project reality, later called Ultra 64, meaning 64 bits.

GameCube- project dolphin, meaning insane water physics, since the early years had a lot of water themed games, like Windwaker, Sunshine and that one jet sky game.

Wii- project revolution, mostly because of motion control.

Wii U- project cafe was meant for more casual gamers, but that’s didn’t happen, since most of the Wii player based moved onto the mobile market.

NX- I don’t even know that.

Maybe the handheld codename are different, but console codename normally tells us something about what’s Nintendo headspace are, especially project cafe, since Nintendo leaned way to heavily on the Casual market, which was their downfall (also marketing, lack of games and a gimmick that no one used)
Click to expand...
Are you sure about Cafe?

I felt like the whole marketing around Wii U was that it was a Wii that ISNT just for casuals, its also for U, the hard-core gamer. That's what I felt the message of E3 2011 was, and thats even where the 'U' in the name came from. The casuals were already "secured" (they thought) by the Wii, the Wii U was going after the core, and they thought they could do it with:
Assassin's Creed
Tekken
CoD
Mass Effect
Darksiders 2
Batman
Unprecedented EA partnership
Ghost recon online
Zombi U

Too bad no one knew the console existed because the marketing budget was enough for one TV ad for the system's entire life, and the brand name "Wii" was the laughing stock of core gamers, so word of mouth was non-existent, and game journalists selfishly buried the console before it even launched.
 
Individualised said:
Your Dolphin and Cafe theories are a huge stretch, it's hard to imagine that "water physics" had anything to do with them using the name Dolphin. The only one with an actual meaning is "Revolution".

(Ultra 64 wasn't the codename for the N64; it was meant to be the final product name).

I don't think even Nintendo knew where they were heading with the Wii U.
Click to expand...
N64 was "Project Reality", because it was intended to be a gigantic graphical push.

Dolphin is more nuanced - but it was also part of a brief trend, both 2001 devices were named for the sea at one point, Atlantis and Dolphin. Personally I think it's about the graphics, the early demonstrations were Wave Race and experimentation that led to Sunshine, water and water rendering was a major focus for the console even in development. The earlier codename is much clearer, N2000, Nintendo's new millennium console.

Revolution is self explanatory.

Café also means something - like... FamiCafé. It was "vibes based". A console that gives you the sense of a café. Early demonstrations to developers included the fact that it was intended to be extremely quiet and fit into any environment. "Café" as a vibe was part of their pitch to developers.

For the handhelds -

Dot Matrix Game, self explanatory. Dot Matrix LCD rather than static elements.

Color Game Boy/CGB, uh, yeah.

Atlantis, a mystery to be unfolded, perhaps? But then the more straightforward... Advanced Game Boy. Yeah.

Nitro, explosive. Big features, big appeal.

Centrair. See café - it's about vibe. Connections, modern design, portability.

NX - see above.

??? - ???
Maybe CMB/Coloumb to represent it being more powerful, the collaboration with Nvidia, the research that went into it, etc. but that's a total guess based on board IDs.

Whether we know them for certain or not, their code names do always mean something. If the code name for the NG Switch is something we haven't guessed, I think learning it would clue us in to something. Maybe it's, fuck it, "Magneto".
 
ziggyrivers said:
i don’t think there’s an empirical way to conclude whether or not the COVID pandemic/lockdowns boosted the Switch’s hardware sales.

There’s no way of knowing if the COVID era boost was really a one kind of thing, or if it was a phenomenon of the Switch reaching a higher peak before time because, with how consistently well the console is selling, it’s possible the Switch could have sold what it sold in the COVID year in two years or something like that.

Which leads me to think that, if not for COVID, the Switcj could have lasted an additional year as a very active console
Click to expand...

I only slightly disagree on that last part because of Tears of the Kingdom. It launched in 2023, but originally we were told in 2022, though no month was given. Then the delay happened so Nintendo could polish even further. Without Covid, it's difficult to say when it would've launched otherwise. Maybe in 2021, though 2022 would still be possible. Since we're in 2024 with Switch 2 potentially launching in 2025, without Covid, we might've gotten the Switch 2 only maybe a year or two earlier. I doubt it would've been in late 2021, or early 2022. Then again, the long suspected Switch Pro that was actually the Switch OLED might've been a clue towards Nintendo's plans pre-Covid.

crazybenjamin said:
I agree in a general sense, but putting myself in the shoes of shareholders, it wouldn't make sense for Nintendo to try to set the precedent of "Switch family transcends generations" until after they've acknowledged a next gen model.
Click to expand...

Who knows, though. Maybe that is precisely what they'll mention in tomorrow's briefing.

Dakhil said:
Assuming T239 did inherit the Optical Flow Accelerator (OFA) from T234, I do wonder if Nintendo and Nvidia were testing the viability of frame generation in handheld mode with clock gating enabled on the OFA? And Nintendo and Nvidia found that frame generation wasn't particularly feasible for handheld mode without making significant sacrifices in performance and/or image quality? (I believe LiC mentioned that DLSS 3 support wasn't found on NVN2.)
Click to expand...

Dakhil said:
I was talking specifically about Nvidia's frame generation, which uses the Optical Flow Accelerator (OFA). And officially, Nvidia's frame generation's only available on RTX 40 GPUs since the OFA on RTX 40 GPUs is much faster than the OFA on RTX 20 and RTX 30 GPUs.

Of course, nobody knows how capable the OFA on T234/T239 is. Saying that, I do think the OFA on T234/T239 isn't the same as the OFA on RTX 30 GPUs since optical flow does have automotive applications. But I also don't think that the OFA on T234/T239 is comparable to the OFA on RTX 40 GPUs.

I think AMD's frame generation on the other uses ALUs (e.g. CUDA cores, stream processors, etc.) to ensure compatibility with non-AMD GPUs.
I managed to find a chart from Nvidia comparing the OFA capabilities of RTX 20 (Turing), RTX 30 (Ampere), and RTX 40 (Ada Lovelace) GPUs, which is very interesting to say the least.
Click to expand...

Was it a week or so ago when the Bezel engine was reported to have a max frame rate of 240, which raised some eyebrows for sure. Is it possible the OFA is actually in Drake, and it would allow, similar to what DLSS can accomplish for higher resolutions, Frame Generation up to 240fps?

Though perhaps it seems rather overkill, but between that Bezel update tweet, and now the continued talk of OFA made me think if those two are related. That said, I have doubts the Drake CPU would even have the grunt to render games at such a high frame rate, even with frame generation.
 
Concernt said:
N64 was "Project Reality", because it was intended to be a gigantic graphical push.

Dolphin is more nuanced - but it was also part of a brief trend, both 2001 devices were named for the sea at one point, Atlantis and Dolphin. Personally I think it's about the graphics, the early demonstrations were Wave Race and experimentation that led to Sunshine, water and water rendering was a major focus for the console even in development. The earlier codename is much clearer, N2000, Nintendo's new millennium console.

Revolution is self explanatory.

Café also means something - like... FamiCafé. It was "vibes based". A console that gives you the sense of a café. Early demonstrations to developers included the fact that it was intended to be extremely quiet and fit into any environment. "Café" as a vibe was part of their pitch to developers.

For the handhelds -

Dot Matrix Game, self explanatory. Dot Matrix LCD rather than static elements.

Color Game Boy/CGB, uh, yeah.

Atlantis, a mystery to be unfolded, perhaps? But then the more straightforward... Advanced Game Boy. Yeah.

Nitro, explosive. Big features, big appeal.

Centrair. See café - it's about vibe. Connections, modern design, portability.

NX - see above.

??? - ???
Maybe CMB/Coloumb to represent it being more powerful, the collaboration with Nvidia, the research that went into it, etc. but that's a total guess based on board IDs.

Whether we know them for certain or not, their code names do always mean something. If the code name for the NG Switch is something we haven't guessed, I think learning it would clue us in to something. Maybe it's, fuck it, "Magneto".
Click to expand...
You've put things into a new perspective for me! Maybe I was just blind to it.
 
The Wii U codename was Café, because instead of deciding to go with this strategy, they should've gotten a coffee and thought about it again.
 
LiC said:
Seems it's lost on some observers that this is just a list of the things they discuss in every publicly available financial results briefing and Q&A.

People: Nintendo doesn't tell anyone about their unannounced plans that doesn't need to know about them. Developers and publishers need to know specs and release window to prepare games, suppliers need to know production timeline to create or procure components, but investors don't need to know anything for any reason. If and when hardware is discussed at non-public meetings, it's in the same generalities as it is in the public Q&As, like "the launch of new hardware is an important subject for our business because..." or "when we design new hardware we always try to..." or explaining how they want to use Nintendo Accounts to create a smooth transition. They aren't telling them when it's going to launch or any kind of other details about it.
Click to expand...

Holding 400 meetings to repeat the same publicly available info is...something I can totally see Nintendo doing lol a huge waste of time but a gesture of respect I guess.

On the other hand, maybe there was some reason (at one point) every analyst was "predicting" it would be released in late '24. Tinfoily? Little bit.
 
,, the Switch 2 will releases in 2024, for the exception of Brazil, which will arrive in 2025’’

But in all honesty I would love to either get the name of the system or better yet the codename. Like Drake is Nvidia, but what are Nintendo calling it, the answer is something like.
  • Switch revelations
  • NX2
  • Project advance
Like I need some droplets 💧 to get me going for the remaining of the year.

But the answer is most likely sadly ,we’re are always developing hardware’’
 


Have this been talked about already here?

Technically not hardware, but with the timing, I wonder if this game being developed is slated for Switch 2 (if there's any truth to this)
 
darthdiablo said:


Have this been talked about already here?

Technically not hardware, but with the timing, I wonder if this game being developed is slated for Switch 2 (if there's any truth to this)
Click to expand...

So, remembering that midori did confirm the switch2 release in Q1 2025, my inclination is that yes, she was referring to the switch2.
 
Hosermess said:
Holding 400 meetings to repeat the same publicly available info is...something I can totally see Nintendo doing lol a huge waste of time but a gesture of respect I guess.

On the other hand, maybe there was some reason (at one point) every analyst was "predicting" it would be released in late '24. Tinfoily? Little bit.
Click to expand...

Those 400 "meetings" are every contact they had with investors over the year. They have a lot of investors, so that ends up being a lot of meetings. They have to answer questions at these meetings, and yeah, they're going to give the same non-answers they give at the public Q&As to questions about future hardware.

In fact, they have to give the same non-answers. Giving information preferentially to some investors before it's made public could be considered insider trading if those investors act upon it (ie increase or decrease their shareholdings). Given the impact the Switch 2 announcement could have on the share price, it's the last thing they'd want to risk insider trading charges on by letting slip to investors.
 
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