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

[Pokemaniac]

I was completely unaware that the difficulty of ensuring backward compatibility could vary that much from game to game, it's very interesting. Does this mean that some games are particularly demanding in terms of RAM and power, or is that irrelevant?

I really wonder if the job offers posted by NERD about emulation are aimed at NSO or directly at backward compatibility of the current Switch with future hardware.

Emulation performance can be highly idiosyncratic depending on the platform and game. Certain features can be more difficult to emulate than others, and there's also the issue where some older cartridge-based platforms make fairly heavy use of coprocessors inside the cartridges.

NERD may be somewhat involved with BC for Switch games, but that's probably going to be more on Nvidia.

 

[Hermii]

i really think it’s too early to say there’s no gimmick, because most of the info we have is from the Nvidia/ spec side. That we haven’t heard anything from the Nintendo side, doesn’t mean there’s not going to be anything.

 

[Bosintang]

i really think it’s too early to say there’s no gimmick, because most of the info we have is from the Nvidia/ spec side. That we haven’t heard anything from the Nintendo side, doesn’t mean there’s not going to be anything.

I believe that there will be a camera, a basic one; it costs nothing nowadays. I don't see Nintendo going full VR with the base console, but a camera could allow some basic AR. Which I'm not interested in personally, but the console will probably make me happy just by being a more powerful system.

 

[barrend]

1. Reveal around February at the direct
2. Release date same with TotK
3. 400$/128gb/12GB/tsmc 6nm/ufs3.1
4. OLED price drop to 300$
5. New 3d Super Mario game (along with movie and theme park)
6. Sonic frontiers will finally run on 60fps with less pop-in

 

[CullenLX87]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

“
Sony is also likely to see supply chain issues for PS5 continuing to gradually resolve into 2023. Might next year be the year when stock of PS5 and XSX consoles finally stays on shelves for more than five minutes? Probably not until the back half, but it's on the cards at least – and that return to some semblance of supply chain normality may also let Nintendo finally push out a full-blooded update to the Switch hardware. The company has seemingly been sitting on an updated model for a couple of years because supply problems meant any launch would be a damp squib in commercial terms (and it's also hard to justify launching new hardware when your old system is consistently sold out).

That will be a particular relief to analysts who have been predicting new Nintendo hardware for a couple of years, and not looking great when the company proceeded to launch nothing of the sort (aside from the far less notable OLED screen upgrade). From what I can tell, the reports have actually been right all along – but Nintendo keeps choosing to push back its update schedule until the supply chain stars align.

Looking back to look forward: 2023 is shaping up to look familiar | Opinion

The end of the year is a somewhat arbitrary line in the sand, but it's a good moment to take stock of where we stand – …

www.gamesindustry.biz

 

[boodream]

When will we have our oficial prediction 2023 thread?

Everyone can make 6 predicitons.

6 why? Because it’s my lucky number. And we can check it out in December next year.

1) The Switch 2 will be announced during the next Nintendo direct and will be released on the same day as Tears Of the Kingdom, its price will be $400.

2) The next Mario Kart game will not be announced in 2023 as communication will be focused on the MK8 pass, but the next Mario Kart will be the first exclusive next-gen game.

3) During a Nintendo Direct, possibly during E3, Sakurai will announce both the Kid Icarus Uprising port and the arrival of Smash Bros. 64 on NSO later this year.

4) Metroid Prime 4 will be the last crossed-gen game edited by Nintendo and will not be released in 2023, but we will see a real trailer at the same time as a remaster of Metroid Prime including new content will be announced.

5) Detective Pikatchu 2, Pikimin 4 developed by NST and a new Mario game will be released at the end of the year but no new Donkey Kong game, although it will be teased this year.

6) 32GB cartridges will become much more common but 64GB cartridges will still not appear in 2023.

 

[karmitt]

Not sure why I broke down my predictions in this way, but here goes:

1. Announced January 2023; Released (17) March 2023
2. Launch Titles: Metroid Prime Remake, unannounced third party exclusive (multi platform w/ Drake support), 4K patches for select evergreens
3. Pricing: $400 USD; OLED price dropped to $300; Lite $200 and Redbox discounted, removed from marketing (I could also see $450 with no price drops anywhere)
5. Announced with 3D Mario or Donkey Kong; Releasing end of 2023; TotK enhanced on its release in May
6. Announced with Dragon Quest XII trailer; Drake and PS5 only; Releasing 2024

 

[Deleted member 887]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

The company has seemingly been sitting on an updated model for a couple of years because supply problems meant any launch would be a damp squib in commercial terms

I actually don't think this is true, unless there was a plan for the OLED to feature and upclocked Mariko, and that plan was abandoned. It seems pretty clear a Drake based device couldn't have launched earlier than Orin, and despite the pandemic, Orin launched on time.

 

[ILikeFeet]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

Looking back to look forward: 2023 is shaping up to look familiar | Opinion

The end of the year is a somewhat arbitrary line in the sand, but it's a good moment to take stock of where we stand – …

www.gamesindustry.biz

they continue to make up shit about how things work

 

[Stinky Horse]

I actually don't think this is true, unless there was a plan for the OLED to feature and upclocked Mariko, and that plan was abandoned. It seems pretty clear a Drake based device couldn't have launched earlier than Orin, and despite the pandemic, Orin launched on time.

incredibly believable though. It's been their portable strategy since the 90s.
Although I'd replace 'Mariko' with a more ambiguous 'X1 derived chip' to be fair, which under that traditional strategy would be developed at the same time as the next generation system was being developed.

 

[Hermii]

incredibly believable though. It's been their portable strategy since the 90s.
Although I'd replace 'Mariko' with a more ambiguous 'X1 derived chip' to be fair

I believe if Nintendo ever had a plan to upclick Mariko, they would have done it in 2019 on lite and v2.

 

[Stinky Horse]

I believe if Nintendo ever had a plan to upclick Mariko, they would have done it in 2019 on lite and v2.

Maybe, but doing that so soon would be an unprecedented event. Still, if the Switch had flopped they might have used Mariko a bit differently, it was obviously in deep in development in 2017 with how early it appeared in firmware.

 

[Deleted member 887]

incredibly believable though. It's been their portable strategy since the 90s.
Although I'd replace 'Mariko' with a more ambiguous 'X1 derived chip' to be fair

I mean, sorta? Nintendo overclocked the CPU in the DSi and the New 3DS but both existed to support new hardware features involving cameras. They've never overclocked the GPU like that.

Nintendo certainly wasn't held back from delivering a more powerful system by supply chain issues. They shipped the Lite and the OLED after all. Meanwhile, Drake development started in 2019 and there is every indication that its release date was always tied to Orin.

The idea that Nintendo had a planned hardware refresh they postponed because of the supply chain holds zero water.

 

[Pokemaniac]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

Looking back to look forward: 2023 is shaping up to look familiar | Opinion

The end of the year is a somewhat arbitrary line in the sand, but it's a good moment to take stock of where we stand – …

www.gamesindustry.biz

Nintendo definitely hasn't just been sitting on anything, at least when it comes to more powerful hardware. This seems like a case of assuming hardware works the same as software.

 

[Sol]

3. 400$/128gb/12GB/tsmc 6nm/ufs3.1

There is no way that a 128 GB Drake unit, with an OLED display, 12 GB of RAM, UFS 3.1, and fabricated on a TSMC 6nm node will sell for $400.

If those specs are accurate we're looking at $500.

To get to $400 Drake would likely have 64 GB of storage, 10 GB of RAM, TSMC 7 nm node, and the same I/O as the current Switch.

 

[Heron]

I believe that there will be a camera, a basic one; it costs nothing nowadays. I don't see Nintendo going full VR with the base console, but a camera could allow some basic AR. Which I'm not interested in personally, but the console will probably make me happy just by being a more powerful system.

That's interesting, because one of the few predictions with Switch that I got right was that they'd remove the camera to keep the bezels small and reduce prices. The 3ds and Wii U cameras were so cheap, poor quality and totally underused that I couldn't imagine the expense being worth it at the time.

Now that cheap sensors are of decent quality they might reconsider. But you're still so much better off using a smartphone for anything AR related, and people are so sensitive to bezel size indicating build quality / expensiveness that again, I can't see it.

If anything the Switch was Nintendo removing all the bells and whistles they possibly could and letting the software speak for itself.

 

[Shiba]

When will we have our oficial prediction 2023 thread?

Everyone can make 6 predicitons.

6 why? Because it’s my lucky number. And we can check it out in December next year.

1. New Switch won’t launch with TOTK only the special edition OLED and people will shift to EOY 2023 since that makes the most sense even though the same was said about launch with TOTK.

2. TOTK will get some complains on the technical side and with some asking why as new Switch wasn’t release by then

3. First major information of the new Switch and will come out around summer-fall

4. Nintendo will do a mention of the next device that points it to not release in 2023

5. Switch will not launch EOY 2023, cycle will repeat that early 2024 will be a good time to release, etc

6. Prime 4 will be revealed to be a new switch cross-gen title.

 

[LiC]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

Looking back to look forward: 2023 is shaping up to look familiar | Opinion

The end of the year is a somewhat arbitrary line in the sand, but it's a good moment to take stock of where we stand – …

www.gamesindustry.biz

They. Can't. Sit. On. Hardware.

Why do people, in this case an author writing for Games Industry Dot Business, think this is possible? I have yet to see someone attempt to justify it; they just throw it out there and clearly don't think about it for even five seconds.

Hardware can be delayed. The extent of a hardware delay is the few months Nintendo delayed the original Switch because they needed time for the games lineup. But "sitting on it" for "a couple of years?" The implication being not only that they delayed it by a couple of years, but they delayed it indefinitely waiting for factors like the supply chain or Switch sales to change? Complete bunk. Not how it works. There are too many moving parts outside of Nintendo's control, third parties making games they intend to release and make money on, and a hardware spec that was intended to release at a certain point in time that's now sitting there so when it launches it's who knows how many years older than it was supposed to be, and what they paid for.

Of course, we know for a fact that the currently rumored/leaked Switch hardware can't have possibly been produced earlier than late this year. But even without that, the story of sitting on hardware is just not realistic.

 

[Nintendojitsu]

It's fine to have skepticism, but nah, it's always the same uninformed and low effort drive-by post, "It's not happening next year... keep your expectations in check..." It's like they didn't read the first post summary, or thread marks for the actual evidence before posting. There's clear evidence that it's in production, as well as actual hardware leaks from a breach and other things posted online by hardware/software developers for Drake (T239, 12 SM, 128 bit buswidth, 8 core A78 CPU)

Reading the OP should be mandatory like agreeing to a ToS.

 

[barrend]

There is no way that a 128 GB Drake unit, with an OLED display, 12 GB of RAM, UFS 3.1, and fabricated on a TSMC 6nm node will sell for $400.

If those specs are accurate we're looking at $500.

To get to $400 Drake would likely have 64 GB of storage, 10 GB of RAM, TSMC 7 nm node, and the same I/O as the current Switch.

Is it really that big of a difference in terms of money? I mean, 450$ could make more sense but I didn't anticipated that the 7nm node is so much cheaper than 6nm (In my understanding 128->64ufs3.1 & 12->10gb ram shouldn't affect the price for more than 20-30$. Or am I wrong?).

 

[Mr Swine]

When will we have our oficial prediction 2023 thread?

Everyone can make 6 predicitons.

6 why? Because it’s my lucky number. And we can check it out in December next year.

1. Nintendo announced new Switch Revision in February direct and goes on sale in March. last big push for the old aging Switch hardware. More of a cost saving thing ( like Sony did with PS5)

2. Nintendo reveals Drake on March 2024 and urges people to wait for June Direct “Lot’s of surprises are coming, stay tuned!“

3. Drake release in August 2024 for $449, 12GB Ram and 128GB storage

4. Metroid Prime 4 is one of the launch games

5. features new Joy cons with analog triggers

6. Nintendo releases BoTW Deluxe edition with the game running at 60fos and at 4K via DLSS

 

[RaymondBryce]

GA102 is the 3090. Not the Tegra. But the Tegra in question explicitly references Nintendo names (NVN, Hovi, etc)

GA10F, not GA102F. The second part of your post is too vague to answer, but see https://famiboards.com/threads/futu...nology-speculation-st.55/page-517#post-413799

Thanks! And apologies for the typo in my post. I was under the impression that GA10F was the T239's GPU, but was told elsewhere that we had no way of knowing that.

Appreciate both your inputs

 

[LiC]

Thanks! And apologies for the typo in my post. I was under the impression that GA10F was the T239's GPU, but was told elsewhere that we had no way of knowing that.

Appreciate both your inputs

It's certain that GA10F is the GPU in the T239 SoC. But some have tried to argue that T239 itself isn't necessarily what NVN2 (and therefore the new Switch model) is meant to use, which is what my threadmarked post is about.

I didn't even get into all the evidence that's in there, just what I thought was a good topline summary. Fact is, anyone claiming we don't know for sure what NVN2's intended target is ("it also mentions other chips!") has never actually looked at the source and is just reinterpreting things second- or third-hand.

 

[Hocot8]

Reading the OP should be mandatory like agreeing to a ToS.

Yeah...no. There are people like myself that find it hard to absorb all of that information so sometimes we'll need a quick/simplified run down like I did in September. There is something called sensory overload.

 

[Bakuboy]

i really think it’s too early to say there’s no gimmick, because most of the info we have is from the Nvidia/ spec side. That we haven’t heard anything from the Nintendo side, doesn’t mean there’s not going to be anything.

Personally I would like to see more accurate motion controls, maybe a similar technology used by Sony for PS Move/ VR with a camera and lights on the controllers?

However I suspect not enough people care about this for Nintendo to invest in it. As a lazy nerd, I love fitness games on Switch and the lack of accuracy in motion controls annoys me.


Also, no one talks about this, but I still think the Switch is the perfect console for VR, you would only need some cheap $ 30 plastic goggles, ideally a 1080p screen and you're good to go. This way, Nintendo could have an unbeatable price-perf ratio and dominate. Again, I think unfortunately not enough people care.

 

[Skittzo]

Anybody read this from today’s GI Biz article:

Looking back to look forward: 2023 is shaping up to look familiar | Opinion

The end of the year is a somewhat arbitrary line in the sand, but it's a good moment to take stock of where we stand – …

www.gamesindustry.biz

That's a remarkably uninformed take from them... Feels like people lose their critical thinking skills when it comes to Nintendo and business.

 

[mariodk18]

1. Nintendo announced new Switch Revision in February direct and goes on sale in March. last big push for the old aging Switch hardware. More of a cost saving thing ( like Sony did with PS5)

2. Nintendo reveals Drake on March 2024 and urges people to wait for June Direct “Lot’s of surprises are coming, stay tuned!“

3. Drake release in August 2024 for $449, 12GB Ram and 128GB storage

4. Metroid Prime 4 is one of the launch games

5. features new Joy cons with analog triggers

6. Nintendo releases BoTW Deluxe edition with the game running at 60fos and at 4K via DLSS

This is one of the most depressing things I have ever read.

 

[Dekuman]

This is one of the most depressing things I have ever read.

I'm H2 2023 so it's only a short hop into 2024. I am not ruling this out, but if it's a 2024 game, I think the launch window will be interesting.

I already feel like Drake will launch with Mario in the window. And that's why H2 2023 makes sense. Movie comes out next Spring, so they can have a game out by fall.

Obviously, you can also make the argument it could be an H1 2023 release since the release date of the movie is April, but H1 will be BOTW2's time. my feel year next FY is the year of Mario for them. Universal theme park is coming online, movie is coming out. The only thing missing is a new game.

Granted... if you want to be more depressed, it could be a Switch game runnin gat 30fps (unstable) .

 

[Deleted member 887]

That's interesting, because one of the few predictions with Switch that I got right was that they'd remove the camera to keep the bezels small and reduce prices. The 3ds and Wii U cameras were so cheap, poor quality and totally underused that I couldn't imagine the expense being worth it at the time.

Now that cheap sensors are of decent quality they might reconsider. But you're still so much better off using a smartphone for anything AR related, and people are so sensitive to bezel size indicating build quality / expensiveness that again, I can't see it.

If anything the Switch was Nintendo removing all the bells and whistles they possibly could and letting the software speak for itself.

Ironically, what I remember most from the launch reveal was doom and gloom from folks who thought that it was more bells-and-whistles than ever, and thought that the SKU was overpriced and that HD Rumble, the IR camera, the Wii Motion Controls That Seemed To Just Exist For Arms And 1-2 Switch, and that Nintendo needed to cut 50 bucks out of the price and cut the bullshit or it would fail miserably

 

[Nintendojitsu]

1. Nintendo announced new Switch Revision in February direct and goes on sale in March. last big push for the old aging Switch hardware. More of a cost saving thing ( like Sony did with PS5)

2. Nintendo reveals Drake on March 2024 and urges people to wait for June Direct “Lot’s of surprises are coming, stay tuned!“

3. Drake release in August 2024 for $449, 12GB Ram and 128GB storage

4. Metroid Prime 4 is one of the launch games

5. features new Joy cons with analog triggers

6. Nintendo releases BoTW Deluxe edition with the game running at 60fos and at 4K via DLSS

There is some good here but predictions should never contradict themselves.

 

[Bakuboy]

When will we have our oficial prediction 2023 thread?

Everyone can make 6 predicitons.

6 why? Because it’s my lucky number. And we can check it out in December next year.

1. Launch May 23
2. Name "Ultra Nintendo Switch"
3. Fully backwards compatible with paid 4K enhancement patches for 1st party
4. Some games will look better than on PS5 thanks to DLSS
5. Metroid Prime 4 trailer
6. Some cross-gen 1st party games, some Ultra-exclusives

 

[Serif]

1. Nintendo announced new Switch Revision in February direct and goes on sale in March. last big push for the old aging Switch hardware. More of a cost saving thing ( like Sony did with PS5)

Didn't they already do this with a silent revision to the OLED internals / smaller packaging for the redbox? I'm skeptical they would need to announce a cost saving revision if there's no change to the externals.

 

[Bakuboy]

There is no way that a 128 GB Drake unit, with an OLED display, 12 GB of RAM, UFS 3.1, and fabricated on a TSMC 6nm node will sell for $400.

If those specs are accurate we're looking at $500.

To get to $400 Drake would likely have 64 GB of storage, 10 GB of RAM, TSMC 7 nm node, and the same I/O as the current Switch.

Has there been new information on RAM? Because I really don't think it will be 12, 8 is much more likely.

 

[Bakuboy]

Ironically, what I remember most from the launch reveal was doom and gloom from folks who thought that it was more bells-and-whistles than ever, and thought that the SKU was overpriced and that HD Rumble, the IR camera, the Wii Motion Controls That Seemed To Just Exist For Arms And 1-2 Switch, and that Nintendo needed to cut 50 bucks out of the price and cut the bullshit or it would fail miserably

Yeah, especially Arlo was so funny, he claimed they absolutely needed to have all Wii U exclusives ported in the first months, and VC from NES to N64 day one, $ 250.

To be fair though, the Wii U was a unprecedented failure, so I get people were desperate, you have to give folks at Nintendo cred for still having the self-confidence, or arrogance to say no, Breath of the Wild, MK8, Splatoon and Mario Odyssey are enough for the first year, we will play that Wii U port card for the rest of the generation.

 

[Deleted member 887]

Yeah, especially Arlo was so funny, he claimed they absolutely needed to have all Wii U exclusives ported in the first months, and VC from NES to N64 day one, $ 250.

To be fair though, the Wii U was a unprecedented failure, so I get people were desperate, you have to give folks at Nintendo cred for still having the self-confidence, or arrogance to say no, Breath of the Wild, MK8, Splatoon and Mario Odyssey are enough for the first year, we will play that Wii U port card for the rest of the generation.

Switch had a perfectly reasonable opening year, and Nintendo were right that maintaining a long term pace was better than a glut of opening titles then letting folk wander off.

I'm quite curious what Nintendo's software strategy for NX2 is. One reason I'm not making a prediction is that I'm not entirely sure if Nintendo actually will launch H1. Drake is so meaty and we've heard so little, that I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo gives it a proper reveal next year, but holds it 8 months to give Switch a farewell and then rapidly move exclusives over to the new hardware, targeting the holiday.

 

[Deleted member 887]

Has there been new information on RAM? Because I really don't think it will be 12, 8 is much more likely.

There has been no new RAM info. I think @Sol is referring to the whole package that @barrend is predicting.

I wouldn't be surprised by 8GB - Orin Nano 8GB has the same memory bus as Drake. However, Orin Nano is considerably smaller than Drake as well. 8GB is arguably a little tight to hold the whole working set for the GPU and the CPU on a machine Drake's size.

 

[Bakuboy]

Switch had a perfectly reasonable opening year, and Nintendo were right that maintaining a long term pace was better than a glut of opening titles then letting folk wander off.

I'm quite curious what Nintendo's software strategy for NX2 is. One reason I'm not making a prediction is that I'm not entirely sure if Nintendo actually will launch H1. Drake is so meaty and we've heard so little, that I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo gives it a proper reveal next year, but holds it 8 months to give Switch a farewell and then rapidly move exclusives over to the new hardware, targeting the holiday.

The reason why I still think it's coming May is TotK. They can't have a better launch title.
Unless they have a new sandbox Mario with graphical quality similar to the movie or something like that, which is not so unlikely but I still think Zelda is a better launch title than Mario, Nintendo knows that it's the most hardcore fans that are early adopters.

So if it's not May 23, either TotK gets delayed again, or Drake launches in 2024 with another game.

 

[Bakuboy]

There has been no new RAM info. I think @Sol is referring to the whole package that @barrend is predicting.

I wouldn't be surprised by 8GB - Orin Nano 8GB has the same memory bus as Drake. However, Orin Nano is considerably smaller than Drake as well. 8GB is arguably a little tight to hold the whole working set for the GPU and the CPU on a machine Drake's size.

Nintendo is notorious for cheaping out on RAM, Capcom warned them about the Switch's 4 GB, and indeed, 2 GB of RAM for software in 2017 sounded ridiculously low, but it worked for many games, and caused a lot of problems for more ambitious, realistic titles. But Nintendo is not dependent on those so ultimately, they were right, and I think the same thing will happen on Drake, but it will be much less problematic.

 

[ReddDreadtheLead]

Nintendo is notorious for cheaping out on RAM

Revisionist history is at play here….

 

[kimbo99]

2024 release. Book it, don't @ me.

 

[LiC]

Switch had a perfectly reasonable opening year, and Nintendo were right that maintaining a long term pace was better than a glut of opening titles then letting folk wander off.

I'm quite curious what Nintendo's software strategy for NX2 is. One reason I'm not making a prediction is that I'm not entirely sure if Nintendo actually will launch H1. Drake is so meaty and we've heard so little, that I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo gives it a proper reveal next year, but holds it 8 months to give Switch a farewell and then rapidly move exclusives over to the new hardware, targeting the holiday.

Splatoon 3 is being supported until September 2024 and Metroid Prime 4 is still coming out on the current Switch. I don't see any possibility of a farewell to the current Switch models and move to exclusives in 2023.

 

[Sol]

Has there been new information on RAM? Because I really don't think it will be 12, 8 is much more likely.

Based on what's been said here, 8 would be too low for a system with the specs and features of Drake.

 

[karmitt]

Switch had a perfectly reasonable opening year, and Nintendo were right that maintaining a long term pace was better than a glut of opening titles then letting folk wander off.

I'm quite curious what Nintendo's software strategy for NX2 is. One reason I'm not making a prediction is that I'm not entirely sure if Nintendo actually will launch H1. Drake is so meaty and we've heard so little, that I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo gives it a proper reveal next year, but holds it 8 months to give Switch a farewell and then rapidly move exclusives over to the new hardware, targeting the holiday.

I mean there’s nothing on the line here in making a prediction - just some end of year fun. Mine is mostly my optimistic, best case scenario.

 

[ILikeFeet]

Nintendo is notorious for cheaping out on RAM, Capcom warned them about the Switch's 4 GB, and indeed, 2 GB of RAM for software in 2017 sounded ridiculously low, but it worked for many games, and caused a lot of problems for more ambitious, realistic titles. But Nintendo is not dependent on those so ultimately, they were right, and I think the same thing will happen on Drake, but it will be much less problematic.

nintendo is notorious for spending a lot on ram
it wasn't 2GB, it was 3GB. there was no 2GB format for the TX1

 

[LiC]

Why not.

1. Releases sometime in 2023
2. Costs not more than 450 USD
3. Same screen as the OLED model
4. Part of the Nintendo Switch family of systems
5. No Nintendo-published exclusives in 2023
6. Bottom text

 

[Bakuboy]

nintendo is notorious for spending a lot on ram
it wasn't 2GB, it was 3GB. there was no 2GB format for the TX1

It's 4 GB, I meant 2 GB for software because the OS uses 2 GB, from what I've heard.

 

[Ojoloco]

My prediction is exclusive ports of RDR2, the typical Capcomports, AC Valhalla and enchancements for Fortnite, Hogwarts Legacy, Kingdom Come deliverance, borderlands 3 and the witcher 3 switchports

 

[Skittzo]

It's 4 GB, I meant 2 GB for software because the OS uses 2 GB, from what I've heard.

This isn't true. The OS uses up to 1GB, less when disabling some features like video recording.

Capcom didn't "warn" them about using such little RAM, they requested that Nintendo put in more and lo and behold Nintendo did exactly that.

 

[LiC]

This isn't true. The OS uses up to 1GB, less when disabling some features like video recording.

Capcom didn't "warn" them about using such little RAM, they requested that Nintendo put in more and lo and behold Nintendo did exactly that.

Yeah. The amount available to games is 3285 MB*, so the OS is using at most 811 MB.

*Minus 96 MB for a maximum of 3189 MB when video capture is enabled.

I also think the narrative has become a bit off that Nintendo was planning for the memory size to be 3 GB but Capcom made them reconsider and go with 4 GB. The source of that information was a conference talk given jointly by Nintendo and Capcom, which was about the collaboration between them ahead of the Switch's launch. And it would have been a normal part of that process for Nintendo to solicit feedback on specs like the RAM. And I'm sure it's true that part of Capcom's feedback was that they wanted more RAM, and other developers probably said the same thing, but I doubt they told Nintendo anything they didn't already know in that case.

 

[Serif]

Why do the Switch OLED devkits have 2 GB more of RAM? 8 GB vs the 6 GB on existing devkits. I know more RAM is welcome for debugging's sake but I was wondering why they'd bother 4 years in, and with no other meaningful difference.