Shoulder
Koopa
They valued Gamecube BC until the Wii U (or that other Wii hardware design if we want to get pedantic) and Wii (and Wii U) until the Switch. They supported DS (and 3DS) until the Switch.
There can and will be reasons that backwards compatibility will have less value than cost. We just haven't seen (and may never see) where that happens for the current Switch.
None of my 3DS, DSi, Wii, or Wii U eShop (or whatever it was called in each instance) purchases are downloadable and work on the Switch. None of my Wii U discs or 3DS cartridges work on the Switch.
They found reasons to drop backwards compatibility.
Just to add to this whole BC talk, what Nintendo does value is their IPs, whether that means legacy titles, or current. And if they can find a reason to incorporate older titles onto new systems whether through emulation, or native support, they'll make it work.
But more than that, we're also in this age of hardware where everything is more standardized rather than bespoke and custom like it used to be. Nintendo considered on continuing using the same PowerPC 750 CPU (though heavily modified yet again) that they'd been using since the GCN era even after the Wii U with Mont Blanc, though it never appeared to make it out beyond the drawing stages.
In today's world of hardware, there's less emphasis on unique or special sauce hardware, and that leads to more off-the-shelf parts in a relative sense. T239 is custom, but its mother chip, the Tegra Orin, is not some super special custom one-off chip either. We're not dealing with a Super FX chip, or a small pool of EDRAM anymore. Those days are long gone, for better or worse.
For the future of Nintendo's platforms, I think their intention is to provide continued support for legacy software because they know it makes them money, plus there's a literal library of thousands and thousands of games. I just booted up Golden Sun on NSO last night, and personally think it's cool I don't have to break out my GBA SP, or my Wii U to play it. I want that kind of legacy experience to continue, and I believe Nintendo knows that.
The Virtual Console was kind of the beta version of NSO.
I really feel like some of the hatred or dislike toward VR is unjust and sensationalist. It feels biased and extra. When we talk about other emerging technologies still in its infancy, We say "Oh, This is cool but they need to figure out XYZ first before its consumer or mass adoption ready". For VR I see A LOT of "fuck this thing, its terrible and will never be good" type of takes.
I understand the criticisms like fidelity, convenience, and price but I do not understand the vitriol behind some comments I've seen.
I was watching CNET's video review on the Apple Vision Pro headset, and an interesting thought had occurred to me.
Perhaps we're thinking of VR all wrong here. We talk about it being the next big thing in gaming, but I still have trouble with that because it's too expensive, too bulky, and as it stands, too niche. It will get more popular in time, but I don't see it being the next revolution in gaming.
What I do see it having a rather useful, and perhaps underrated ability/feature is in its use for content creation, and productivity work. It's potential use in Video and Photo Editing, especially with a view that is as large as your eyesight is would be glorious. Suddenly, multi-tasking becomes an even greater feature, especially in the current era of multi-monitor desk setups (I have three screens for my setup at work, and love it).
Remember Minority Report? THAT is where I see VR in the future. All we need are the finger gloves for 99.9% precise gestures rather than what we have now.