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StarTopic "Impossible Ports": List of games and their respective developers that push the Switch beyond its limits...

SiG

SiG

Chain Chomp
I'm trying to create a list of all Nintendo Switch games and developers who have ported a game from either last gen or current/"next" gen and have essentially created, as John Linneman from Digital Foundry would say, "bespoke" versions of the game for the system.

I'm doing so since I just so happen to have a huge collection of them and can't help but want to make a list of "unique Switch versions" that actually run from well, great, to "how is this even possible" to help anybody who wants to hunt down these particular games ported by some really talented developers.

Edit: It seems I've caused some confusion by listing games that should questionably run on the hardware, so instead I'll be separating the list into two divisions: "Impossible Ports" for titles that are quite demanding on current/next gen that people question if it should even be ported, and "Perfect on Switch" which are titles that are very well optimized for the hardware.

"Impossible Port" Award:

4A Games:
  • Metro Redux

Moon Studios:
  • Ori and the Blind Forest
  • Ori and the Will of the Whisps

Panic Button:
  • Warframe
  • Doom (2016)
  • Doom Eternal
  • Wolfenstein: The New Colossus
  • Wolfenstein: Young Blood

Rebellion Software:
  • Zombie Army 4

Saber Interactive:
  • Crysis Remastered Trilogy
  • The Witcher 3: Wild Hunt

Techland:
  • Dying Light Platinum Edition

QLOC:
  • Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice


"Perfect on Switch" Award:
(Note: These are NOT "impossible ports", but ones that are still very highly optimized for Switch and often times take advantage of unique feature sets found on the system)

ArcSys:
  • Dragon Ball FighterZ

Feral Interactive:
  • GRID Autosport
  • Alien: Isolation

Frontier:
  • Jurassic World: Evolution

Iron Galaxy:
  • The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim
  • Diablo III: Eternal Edition

New Blood Interactive:
  • DUSK

Nightdive Studios:
  • Doom 1 & 2
  • Doom 64
  • Quake
  • Turok 1 & 2

Panic Button:
  • Rocket League
  • Doom 3
  • Apex Legends

Rebellion Software:
  • Sniper Elite 3
  • Sniper Elite 4

Saber Interactive:
  • Vampyr
  • Ghostbusters: The Video Game
  • Mudrunner - American Wilds
  • Snowrunner
  • World War Z

QLOC:
  • Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
  • Mortal Kombat 11
  • Plants vs Zombies Battle for Neighborville
  • Tales of Vesperia

Stellar:
  • Burnout: Paradise Remastered
  • Need for Speed: Hot Pursuit Remastered

Square-Enix:
  • Dragon Quest XI: Echoes of an Elusive Age S

Turn Me Up Games:
  • Borderlands Collection

Safari:
  • Samurai Showdown

Virtuos
  • Starlinked: Battle for Atlas
  • Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age
  • Bioshock Collection


Not ports, but honorable mention:

Shin'En
  • FAST: RMX
  • The Touryst

I might be missing or overlooking a couple more. Feel free to mention them here. Do note that I'm looking for real good ports that are very well optimized!
 
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Saber:
Snowrunner
World War Z
Vampyr
Ghostbusters

Panic Button:
Rocket League

Aspyr:
Civilization VI

QLOC:
Plants vs Zombies Battle for Neighborville
Tales of Vesperia
Mortal Kombat 11

Stellar:
Burnout Paradise (it's 60 fps!)
Need for Speed Hot Pursuit

Virtuos:
The Outer Worlds
XCOM 2
Dark Souls
Bioshock Collection
Starlink
Final Fantasy XII

Engine:
Ni No Kuni II
Trails of Cold Steel games
Ys IX Monstrum Nox

Safari:
Samurai Shodown

Borderlands was done by Turn Me Up, not Panic Button.

Also Frontier did their own game: Jurassic World Evolution.
 
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I can't find who ported those:

Dragon Ball Z Kakarot
Jump Force
Captain Tsubasa
Dragon Ball FighterZ

None of them mentions any external studios in the credits, could be all in house games.
 
Apex Legends looks and runs pretty decent on Switch nowadays. I think it's ported by Panic Button.
 
9-Volt said:
I can't find who ported those:

Dragon Ball Z Kakarot
Jump Force
Captain Tsubasa
Dragon Ball FighterZ

None of them mentions any external studios in the credits, could be all in house games.
Click to expand...

Cyber Connect
Magic-Man said:
Apex Legends looks and runs pretty decent on Switch nowadays. I think it's ported by Panic Button.
Click to expand...

Panic Button. And they finally managed to get it to run respectably on the Switch.
 
9-Volt said:
Saber:
Snowrunner
World War Z
Vampyr
Ghostbusters

Panic Button:
Rocket League

Aspyr:
Civilization VI

QLOC:
Plants vs Zombies Battle for Neighborville
Tales of Vesperia
Mortal Kombat 11

Stellar:
Burnout Paradise (it's 60 fps!)
Need for Speed Hot Pursuit

Virtuos:
The Outer Worlds
XCOM 2
Dark Souls
Bioshock Collection
Starlink
Final Fantasy XII

Engine:
Ni No Kuni II
Trails of Cold Steel games
Ys IX Monstrum Nox

Safari:
Samurai Shodown

Borderlands was done by Turn Me Up, not Panic Button.

Also Frontier did their own game: Jurassic World Evolution.
Click to expand...
Thanks. Corrected.

Did Virtuos ever fix Dark Souls and The Outer Worlds? I heard those ports weren't particularly good/great.
 
kimbo99 said:
Cyber Connect
Click to expand...
Yeah, they seem to be all in-house projects, CC2 did Kakarot, ArcSys did DBFZ and Tamsoft did Tsubasa. Except Jump Force. Spike chunsoft doesn't do ports in house iirc.

SiG said:
Thanks. Corrected.

Did Virtuos ever fix Dark Souls and The Outer Worlds? I heard those ports weren't particularly good/great.
Click to expand...
The Outer Worlds yes, Dark Souls, no. The Outer Worlds runs much more stable now, framerate is ok. Dark Souls had a sound compression problem and hasn't been addressed. Other than sound, DS is a fina port.
 
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9-Volt said:
I can't find who ported those:

Dragon Ball Z Kakarot
Jump Force
Captain Tsubasa
Dragon Ball FighterZ

None of them mentions any external studios in the credits, could be all in house games.
Click to expand...
Do these run and play great, or are they "Dark Souls on Switch" tier?

I'm looking for games that are very well optimized. Virtuos has been kind of a hit or miss, but Final Fantasy XII TZA was an excellent port. Dunno if The Outer Worlds is good enough to make it to the list post-patch. I'd need to see some comparisons and performance metrics first... Especially having played Dying Light and just being wowed by how well that game was optimized.

I didn't have an issue with L.A. Noire, but I'd put it together with Dark Souls in the "passable" tier, which isn't what this list is about. (It's more about stellar ports that perform great and are very well optimized.)
 
SiG said:
Do these run and play great, or are they "Dark Souls on Switch" tier?

I'm looking for games that are very well optimized. Virtuos has been kind of a hit or miss, but Final Fantasy XII TZA was an excellent port. Dunno if The Outer Worlds is good enough to make it to the list post-patch. I'd need to see some comparisons and performance metrics first... Especially having played Dying Light and just being wowed by how well that game was optimized.
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Yes they're all great ports. DBFZ especially a miraculous port, looks and runs very sharp on Switch. Jump Force is surprisingly good as it suffers more on home consoles.

The Outer Worlds received couple of patches and I think it deserves to be there. Dying Light is on another level but Virtuos's portfolia is really close. XCOM doesn't have the severe framerate problems that PS4 had, Starlink runs and looks great, Bioshock games plays much better than their platforms of origin.

Only gen 7 games runs locked 60 fps on native resolution are Burnout Paradise and Diablo 3. None of the gen 8 games achieved that feat.
 
SiG said:
Was Nightdive responsible ofr Doom 1 & 2 on Switch?

I know Panic Button did Doom 3.
Click to expand...
Yes, Quake too from Nightdive.

Also a mistake, only Kakarot from Cyberconnect. DBFZ from ArcSys and Captain Tsubasa from Tamsoft. They are in house ports.

Couldn't find who did Jump Force.
 
Quoted by: SiG
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9-Volt said:
Yes, Quake too from Nightdive.

Also a mistake, only Kakarot from Cyberconnect. DBFZ from ArcSys and Captain Tsubasa from Tamsoft. They are in house ports.

Couldn't find who did Jump Force.
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Last I saw the Switch version of Capt. Tsubasa was really rough (performance issues). Is it much better now?
 
SiG said:
Last I saw the Switch version of Capt. Tsubasa was really rough (performance issues). Is it much better now?
Click to expand...
Yeah, it had frequent resolution drops and it's gone. Pretty stable now. It is a downport after all, kept its good looks during the transfer.
 
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SiG said:
Panic Button:
  • Wolfenstein: The New Order
Click to expand...
Fairly sure this hasn't actually been ported to Switch, though it'd be great to see. I'd assume you're thinking of The New Colossus, pretty confusing that they have such similar names.
 
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9-Volt said:
Only gen 7 games runs locked 60 fps on native resolution are Burnout Paradise and Diablo 3. None of the gen 8 games achieved that feat.
Click to expand...
Burnout is 900p docked but is native in handheld, yeah. Diablo may not be native in either, definitely not docked if I remember right.
 
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Btw on Stellar section it should be Hot Pursuit not Most Wanted
There's even a apparently solid MW Vita port, which I'm considering buying, but it kinda makes sense for it to be the next Stellar Switch port so maybe I'll wait a bit
 
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Assassin's Creed Black Flag is another one for consideration, along with Crash Bandicoot 4, and Divinity Original Sin 2. Overwatch was weirdly criticised at launch but I thought it was an excellent port albeit at 30fps. Ori and the will of the wisps running at 60fps is a triumph.
 
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Both Ori games are extremely well optimized and look amazing on the Switch.

Dragon Quest 11s goes above and beyond any of those port jobs too, to actually provide a definitive edition of the game, while also looking like one of the most impressive Switch games.
 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Not sure who did the port but Techland partnered with someone else to do Dying Light 2 on the Switch they started and then moved to a partner as they needed to focus on Dying Light 2. They mention it in a Dev video.
 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Lukus99 said:
Not sure who did the port but Techland partnered with someone else to do Dying Light 2 on the Switch they started and then moved to a partner as they needed to focus on Dying Light 2. They mention it in a Dev video.
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That's because Dying Light 2 is actually the Cloud Version for Switch.
Lozjam said:
Both Ori games are extremely well optimized and look amazing on the Switch.

Dragon Quest 11s goes above and beyond any of those port jobs too, to actually provide a definitive edition of the game, while also looking like one of the most impressive Switch games.
Click to expand...
Do you know who are the devs behind the port?
 
SiG said:
That's because Dying Light 2 is actually the Cloud Version for Switch.

Do you know who are the devs behind the port?
Click to expand...
Square Enix, and the Moon Studios both did those ports in-house
 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Lozjam said:
Square Enix, and the Moon Studios both did those ports in-house
Click to expand...
I know Moon Studios was in charge of the Ori Switch version because it was an in-house port.
I'm not so sure about who handled Dragon Quest XI S per-se. I don't know if it was all S-E n-house or they were assisted by another studio.
 
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SiG said:
That's because Dying Light 2 is actually the Cloud Version for Switch.

Do you know who are the devs behind the port?
Click to expand...
Sorry it was a typo, I meant they partnered with another studio for the port of Dying Light 1 on Switch because they had to focus on development of Dying Light 2 internally.

Video where they talk about it here:

 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Lukus99 said:
Sorry it was a typo, I meant they partnered with another studio for the port of Dying Light 1 on Switch because they had to focus on development of Dying Light 2 internally.

Video where they talk about it here:

Click to expand...

There wouldn't be any information regarding who they partnered with, would there?

They mentioned for the most part that they personally supervised the port, which sounds pretty much like CryTek's scenario.
 
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Tony Hawk Pro Skater. It runs well as single player but split screen is a bit bad(can't really help it tbh)
 
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I wonder what Panic Button are going to bring next to Switch, they don’t have anything rumoured do they?

Dragonball Z Kakarot is a good port, played a bit of it this week and runs and looks great!
 
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I mentioned this over at the other place.

Crimzon Clover World Explosion is a vertical bullet-hell shmup. It first released on PC and arcade before the upgraded port on Switch.

Now this game has the best 2D graphics on Switch. The amount of action going on screen is insane!!


CE382C03FC5A0D5BEE2F7305834BCBAEA339E2B2

 
I'm not usually one to buy games to show support but Dusk is soo good and the port so impressive I'm inclined to do it.
 
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SiG said:
  • Doom 1 & 2
  • Doom 64
  • Quake
  • Turok 1 & 2
Click to expand...
Sorry, I'm a bit confused by this thread. How do the above (and a few more titles in the OP) qualify as "impossible ports"? I think of Doom/Eternal and the Witcher 3 and even Alien Isolation since despite running on the PS3, the Switch version actually looks better than the PS4 version.

But Quake and Doom 64 etc.?
 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Am I the only person who thinks GRID Autosport has better Labo controls than Mario Kart? That was honestly strange.

….am I the only person who has tried both with Labo?
 
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Jaded Alyx said:
Sorry, I'm a bit confused by this thread. How do the above (and a few more titles in the OP) qualify as "impossible ports"? I think of Doom/Eternal and the Witcher 3 and even Alien Isolation since despite running on the PS3, the Switch version actually looks better than the PS4 version.

But Quake and Doom 64 etc.?
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I don't know if you've read my OP, but the intent was more lookking for games that are very well optimized, if not designed around the Switch's hardware capabilities. It's easy to mention all of Nintendo's 1st party titles which could easily ultilize all its gimmicks, despite some actually avoiding it. With that said, the aim is to find the most unique ports out there that bring out the best of the hardware.

Quake and Doom 64 aren't cutting edge games, but they do employ well optimized coding to bring out very solid 60fps performance, and also maximize the feature set use of the Switch console (gyro aiming, HD rumble). In addition, Quake on Switch also utilizes Mouse & Keyboard support after the recent patch.

The same in general could be mentioned of all of Nightdive Studio's Switch outings. They have a reputation of making quality console ports in the same vein as M2...

...which reminds me I almost forgot about M2. But I get what you're saying by in no way are they "impossible". Then again, so was Dark Souls, and there's no reason a port should be as sloppy as it was.
 
Quite a few of these don't really seem to fit under an "impossible port." Like, Doom 1 and 2, Dusk, Dragons Dogma Tales of Vesperia, Final Fantasy XII, Bioshock and Dragonball Fighterz aren't really demanding enough that they would be impossible to port.
 
KraftVenture said:
Quite a few of these don't really seem to fit under an "impossible port." Like, Doom 1 and 2, Dusk, Dragons Dogma Tales of Vesperia, Final Fantasy XII, Bioshock and Dragonball Fighterz aren't really demanding enough that they would be impossible to port.
Click to expand...
100% agree. I think Nintendo exclusive people just aren't used to getting that many ports, so they treat everything like a miracle.
 
Quoted by: SiG
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SiG said:
I don't know if you've read my OP, but the intent was more lookking for games that are very well optimized, if not designed around the Switch's hardware capabilities. It's easy to mention all of Nintendo's 1st party titles which could easily ultilize all its gimmicks, despite some actually avoiding it. With that said, the aim is to find the most unique ports out there that bring out the best of the hardware.

Quake and Doom 64 aren't cutting edge games, but they do employ well optimized coding to bring out very solid 60fps performance, and also maximize the feature set use of the Switch console (gyro aiming, HD rumble). In addition, Quake on Switch also utilizes Mouse & Keyboard support after the recent patch.

The same in general could be mentioned of all of Nightdive Studio's Switch outings. They have a reputation of making quality console ports in the same vein as M2...

...which reminds me I almost forgot about M2. But I get what you're saying by in no way are they "impossible". Then again, so was Dark Souls, and there's no reason a port should be as sloppy as it was.
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It seems like you had 2 separate ideas and combined them into one, resulting in this confusion.
 
Quoted by: SiG
1
Phosphorescent Skeleton said:
100% agree. I think Nintendo exclusive people just aren't used to getting that many ports, so they treat everything like a miracle.
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To be fair, quite a number of Switch naysayers have always rambled about "why bother with a Switch version?", and the truth is that some of these ports simply offer better performance than the previous generations and actual time and effort was spent into making sure these version made use of the hardware's features.

And yes, I'm a neurotic who bought The Witcher 3 on Switch just to prove a point.
Jaded Alyx said:
It seems like you had 2 separate ideas and combined them into one, resulting in this confusion.
Click to expand...

But okay, I think I indeed confused people by trying to combine "bespoke" with "impossible". I'll go ahead and revise the list to only include exceptionally performing and demanding titles that typical nayways would say "the Switch couldn't handle that".
 
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I finished Dying Light this weekend and it was Virtuous that helped with Techland with the port, it said it in the credits.
 
Ninjadom said:
I mentioned this over at the other place.

Crimzon Clover World Explosion is a vertical bullet-hell shmup. It first released on PC and arcade before the upgraded port on Switch.

Now this game has the best 2D graphics on Switch. The amount of action going on screen is insane!!
Click to expand...
What is this game doing on switch??
I never saw it in the shop neither have seen any news of the announcement.
Shocking because it's far from a shovelware.
 
If we're considering ports that are particularily well done and not just technically impressive? I think we should also give Devil May Cry 3 Switch its dues for the exclusive new features (two player co-op, real-time weapon switching). Considering how old the codebase is? And how much of that original PS2 source code is probably lost to time? It's really impressive that they managed to get that working.

Also considering that no other version of DMC3 has attempted this (and with how mediocre the DMC1 & DMC2 ports are in general), that deserves a shoutout I reckon!

THPS 1&2 Remaster definitely fit the bill from a technical standpoint though, as do the Crash and Spyro ports.
 
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daase ko said:
What is this game doing on switch??
I never saw it in the shop neither have seen any news of the announcement.
Shocking because it's far from a shovelware.
Click to expand...
The game released exactly one year ago on the eShop. It got a trailer from the publisher but Nintendo didn’t push the trailer out themselves.

 
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