Why the Switch will be fine after other next gen consoles hit the market.

[logash]

I prefer original experiences tailor-made for the Switch. I honestly miss the days of PSP and DS where unique games were made for the hardware. Third party ports of AAA games on Switch are not for me so this approach would be what I prefer. I understand there are people out there that want to play those types of games on their Switch though so I'm not mad that they exist either. I just wouldn't mind if they go away and are replaced with more unique experiences.

 

[thomasmahler]

The Switch will be fine cause Nintendo and Indie Devs will continue to support the console with some great titles.

It's not 2006 anymore. Minecraft and Fortnite are the biggest games out there and those games sure aren't lookers. Graphics alone don't sell games.

 

[Ascenion]

None of these? I don't want PS4 Pro/Xbox One X power in 2022. Why aim for undercooked systems? Just launch a successor in 2022-2023 with the best Nividia has to offer.

 

[DontHateTheBacon]

I think it will end up being a typical Nintendo system next year; Nintendo exclusives and indies. And I think that's okay.

With both portable teams and console teams on the system, they'll have more quality exclusive titles to put out on Switch.

They've got a lot of IP that are still untapped.

 

[z0m3le]

Above PS4 level performance next year (even docked) is not feasible in the Switches form factor IMO. At least given the current state of Nvidia's mobile tech. Well... especially considering it has to use Nvidia's mobile tech with the 10 year partnership deal they just don't have anything at that level even in the pipeline.

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Hey bomblord! (from the pi4 talks).

We have no idea how Nvidia's GPUs will perform on 7nm in a few months, but they do have GPUs newer than the Tegra X1 with 512 ALUs, 640 ALUs and 768 ALUs. Nvidia is the most advanced and most high performance inside it's power usage in 16nm, 14nm and 12nm. There isn't an obvious reason that future GPUs from Nvidia would lose that performance edge in 7nm, so I'd say it's actually more likely than not.

In fact, if you look at what the move from 20nm to 16nm++ looks like on Tegra X1 in the new Switch model, it gains an 80% increase in battery life with the same performance of the old model. That is drastic. It also only takes ~1.4TFLOPs of Maxwell architecture, to match AMD's January 2012 GCN architecture found in the PS4. The docked performance on the go on these new models should also be possible on the new GPUs at at least the same battery life, as the old Switch could do that performance with about 2 hours of battery life, while this new Switch on a new process node should have a higher clock before hitting the efficiency rate curve, meaning that it should gain efficiency over the older model at the same higher clocks, so if it was a drop from 3 hours to 2 (a 33% reduction in battery life), the newer model should see less of an impact on it's battery life at that same 768mhz clock, basically it should be somewhere around 3.5 hours. All I'm getting at is that there is a lot of room in moving to 7nm to achieve something close to the PS4 in docked mode. We are already seeing it in other mobile chips too.

Lol Just by sheer power of the tech, many mature PS5/Scarlett games past the initial launch will run circles around late generation games like Death Stranding and TLOU Part 2. It's that initial launch period where we could see next gen games possibly not look that much better. I'm not sure that Nintendo would try to beef up the Switch to PS4/Xbone level instead of trying to come up with something else though. They aren't going to win any power contest, so you might as well try to leverage your creativity instead of trying to create a portable that doesn't come close to the HD twins.

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This might be true, but Switch doesn't need to stay the same device the entire next generation, iterative improvements could happen every 3 years, so by the mature years of the PS5/Scarlett, the Switch could offer 50% of those consoles performance, and who even knows if that is the limit here.

 

[Chackan]

I love the Switch because:

1)It combines both Home console and Handheld console and it's basically my dream console since...prolly the GameGear lol
2)It has a lot of 3rd party support and a lot of 3rd party games that I like come out on the Switch (Warframe, Overwatch, DbD, Friday 13th, Paladins, etc)
3)It has amazing Nintendo games (BOTW, Splatoon 2, DK:TF, Xenoblade Chronicles 2, Fire Emblem, etc)
4)It has amazing Switch exclusives (Octopath Traveler, Astral Chain, etc)
5)It is a great Indie machine, and I consider Indie games not only to be great BUT also required in this industry (Oxenfree, Darkest Dungeons, Cosmic Star Heroine, etc)
6)It is an amazing port machine, and I also thing ports are required in this industry. If not for anything else, but to safe gaming history and relive gems from other console generations (Onimusha, Final Fantasy, Deadly Premonition, Bulletstorm, etc)

What I'm worried about:

Points 2 and 4. And obviously this drives sales and is part of the reasons that make a console successful or not.

Already we see some games missing, like Capcom RE Engine games or basically almost everything EA, or even most recent SquareEnix games (KH, FF15, FF14, etc). It is a shame, but I do have a PS4 so I can play any game that doesn't come out on the Switch. But I would rather it did.

When Scarlett\PS5 do come out, the different in hardware will be abysmal. I don't mind at all playing Overwatch at 30fps, or MK11 with uglier graphics, but I do mind when games don't come out at all.

And it shows that devs only wouldn't launch a game on the Swich either because of exclusivity rights or hardware. So a lot of 3rd party games will stop coming to the Switch as soon as the two next gen consoles come out.

Only wait for this not to happen would be, in my opinion, for a Switch Pro\Switch 2, and I don't even think if PS4 Pro\X1X level of hardware would be enough.

 

[Deleted member 36708]

I've seen a lot of discussions all over the internet about how Switch will be in an awkward place next year. This just doesn't line up with my thinking, because Switch is currently in it's 3rd year and will be in it's 5th year within 6 months of next gen console's launch.

Whether a more powerful version of the Switch comes before 2022 or not, I think the current Switch won't be left out of cross-gen ports more often once these new consoles hit. Next year is largely going to be without other next gen consoles on the market. Both PS4 and XB1 sold about 4 Million consoles in their launch holiday, even if PS5 and XBnext sell 5 Million next calendar year, they won't hit 10 Million until fall 2021, 3rd party multiplatform games that are not cross-gen, won't come until at least holiday 2021 and Switch will be halfway through it's 5th year at that point.

In my eyes Nintendo has 2 very clear options with the Switch going forward:

OPTION 1: They can copy the 3DS product line and release a Pro model of the Switch next year. This is closely following the 3DS' timeline, with a 2DS launch in 2013 and the New 3DS line launching the following year in 2014. Nvidia will be using Samsung's 7nm process node at this point and that allows for performance similar to the XB1 in portable mode, and better than PS4 performance when docked. At least in theory. This also opens the door to an iterative process, something Iwata seemed to indicate he was planning to do with the platform, meaning that every 3 years or so, Nintendo would release a more powerful Switch model, setting up a 2nd iteration of the Switch in 2023.
(Just to give an idea about performance, I'm estimating 1TFLOPs portable, 2TFLOPs docked, or 768 cuda cores at 650mhz portable or 1.3ghz docked)

OPTION 2: They can wait until Holiday 2021 - Holiday 2022 and release a Switch somewhere close to a portable PS4 and segment their platform, roll the dice on this new device being a success.
(~1.4TFLOPs portable, ~2.8TFLOPs docked. 1024 at 700mhz portable or 1.4ghz docked.)

Either way, they will address the PS5/XBnext generation before it really has a large chance to get off the ground this time, the PS4 was in it's 4th year when the Switch launched and had already reached 60 Million consoles by the end of the month that Switch launched in, if it had launched 2 years earlier, PS4 would have only shipped about 22 Million consoles. What I am saying is not that Switch 2 has a chance to outsell PS5 if it launches only 2 years after the PS5, what I am saying is that Switch 2 will be closely tied to next generation, whether Nintendo chooses option 1 or 2, and the current Switch will have no issue selling itself next year or even the year after, as multiplatform cross-gen ports shouldn't dry up until at least the year 2022.

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We will see OP. Who knows what Nintendo will do. I love the switch but they have a lot to fix with a "pro" version or the switch 2 whichever comes first.

 

[Deleted member 5159]

It'll be fine because there are already two consoles with better graphics on the market. If better graphics were a primary incentive for lots of people not to buy a Switch, wouldn't they already not be buying it? Are "even better" graphics really going to sway minds that are already inclined toward Switch?

And, Switch will get updates in a couple of years to close the gap further.

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It's simple really.

The concerns about the difficulty of Switch getting PS5/Scarlett ports is overblown because it already gets very few PS4/XBO ports and those aren't the games selling the system.

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we done here

 

[z0m3le]

we done here

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If it was just about the Switch selling. This thread is not about the Switch selling, it's about 3rd party support continuing to come to the Switch.

 

[TubaZef]

I think we'll see a Switch 2 by 2022, with performance around the base XB1 docked, which should be enough for most things. A "Switch Pro" could happen in the mean time but I don't think we'll see a huge bump in power.

The Switch is in a much better position than previous Nintendo underpowered consoles because
1) It's also a portable and people seem to be pretty ok with worse graphics if they can get portability
2) there's a bigger market for indie games that don't require all that power and in fact, can be even better enjoyed on a portable device. So even if big 3rd party AAA games don't come to the Switch, indies should keep it's library filled.

 

[Comic Obsessed]

It will be fine in 2020.

I REALLY hope there is a revision in 2021 though.

 

[Gianko]

i think the situation is not all roses. now the switch is selling a lot not only because it's a nintendo console (it runs all their brands and pokemon) but because it's seen as the most powerful portable console too and it's attracting lots of " traditional gamer"
now the Switch can run downgraded current games (see The Witcher or Doom) but next year or two? the gap will be big too big. If they want to be in the race and capitalize on this console model, they need to upgrade at a PS 4 +
or they have to change with something else.

 

[monstar]

Successor in 2025, 2024 at the earliest. The Switch still has a lot of life in it

 

[Hermii]

The Switch will be fine cause Nintendo and Indie Devs will continue to support the console with some great titles.

It's not 2006 anymore. Minecraft and Fortnite are the biggest games out there and those games sure aren't lookers. Graphics alone don't sell games.

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Well said.

 

[Owlet]

Does anyone else have a hard time seeing Nintendo go back to a non portable console after this?

Maybe they'll continue making upgraded switch lite style consoles, but after using a Switch so much I can't see myself going back to a home Nintendo console personally.

 

[Bomblord]

Hey bomblord! (from the pi4 talks).

We have no idea how Nvidia's GPUs will perform on 7nm in a few months, but they do have GPUs newer than the Tegra X1 with 512 ALUs, 640 ALUs and 768 ALUs. Nvidia is the most advanced and most high performance inside it's power usage in 16nm, 14nm and 12nm. There isn't an obvious reason that future GPUs from Nvidia would lose that performance edge in 7nm, so I'd say it's actually more likely than not.

In fact, if you look at what the move from 20nm to 16nm++ looks like on Tegra X1 in the new Switch model, it gains an 80% increase in battery life with the same performance of the old model. That is drastic. It also only takes ~1.4TFLOPs of Maxwell architecture, to match AMD's January 2012 GCN architecture found in the PS4. The docked performance on the go on these new models should also be possible on the new GPUs at at least the same battery life, as the old Switch could do that performance with about 2 hours of battery life, while this new Switch on a new process node should have a higher clock before hitting the efficiency rate curve, meaning that it should gain efficiency over the older model at the same higher clocks, so if it was a drop from 3 hours to 2 (a 33% reduction in battery life), the newer model should see less of an impact on it's battery life at that same 768mhz clock, basically it should be somewhere around 3.5 hours. All I'm getting at is that there is a lot of room in moving to 7nm to achieve something close to the PS4 in docked mode. We are already seeing it in other mobile chips too.

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Hi z0m3le! (weird thing to be remembered for but cool)

They certainly have the capability to shrink their current architecture I was more referring to the fact nothing really exists right now (or has even been suggested in their roadmaps) that would hit that level of performance in the power and thermal constrains the switch form factor requires.

 

[GemmolSwitchPS4]

It'll be fine because there are already two consoles with better graphics on the market. If better graphics were a primary incentive for lots of people not to buy a Switch, wouldn't they already not be buying it? Are "even better" graphics really going to sway minds that are already inclined toward Switch?

And, Switch will get updates in a couple of years to close the gap further.

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best post with the most sense, I say the same but people will think what they want

 

[Deleted member 18400]

None of these? I don't want PS4 Pro/Xbox One X power in 2022. Why aim for undercooked systems? Just launch a successor in 2022-2023 with the best Nividia has to offer.

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Have you met Nintendo? They make great consoles, but what you are asking is not how they do business.

 

[maximumzero]

The Switch is Nintendo's ninth generation platform. It'll have it's typical 5 to 6 year cycle and then be replaced in 2022 or 2023 by their tenth generation platform.

Nintendo hasn't been concerned about hardware power in almost 20 years at this point, I don't see them suddenly having a heel turn.

 

[z0m3le]

Hi z0m3le! (weird thing to be remembered for but cool)

They certainly have the capability to shrink their current architecture I was more referring to the fact nothing really exists right now (or has even been suggested in their roadmaps) that would hit that level of performance in the power and thermal constrains the switch form factor requires.

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Well I also read the dolphin emulator forums, and you were all over that thread about the pi4, still crossing my fingers that we will see some big performance gains there eventually.

We didn't see the Tegra X1+ on any road maps either, now there is a shield tv pro coming out in a couple weeks.

We still have that Nikkei article about a next generation Switch device not coming out this year from April, that talked about it being the device after the Switch Lite. It had new features and stuff so it was a different product than the one we got, and the source sounds like someone in Nintendo's R&D, so that's pretty interesting.

 

[martincrimson87]

The switch will be fine for the same reason my 2013 mid end PC will be fine until 2022. True next gen start by then and the bulk of a console catalog is comprised of indie games that do not tax the hardware

 

[Wink784]

It'll be fine cause the install base can't be ignored. By now there are so many types of games and business models within the space that multiplatform games are are not a deciding factor. As rerelease and port console of older titles Switch still has a mountain of options (and we know these sell too). Add to that first party and indie support and there'll already be too many options. Not to mention that publishers releasing for next gen might also look at Switch as a reliable console to put side projects on because it establishes itself as the next Nintendo handheld more than a competing console in the next gen race and the DS line didn't suffer from not having day and date releases of CoD available.
Nintendo has since the Wii days been trying to carve out a niche for themselves outside of the competition's reach and when it's going as well as the Switch does they have no reason to push out a successor at a Wii U replacement rate. It'll go on with what it's doing just fine.

 

[MP!]

they have to release something sooner... (Which means since they hate me ... they'll probably let switch fizzle out of existence)

I am anticipating something new next year or the year after... 2020 or 2021...
Could be a switch
Could be something else
the switch lite may be part of the result of Having merged their hardware teams... and I wouldn't rule out making a TV only version of this platform.
A new switch seems likely though in the next 2 years... a new something will come by then I'd expect...

really I'd like them to iterate every 3 years because it broadens the abilities of the platform...

 

[sxiebonjour]

More serious gamers usually have PC or and consoles for 3A games along with Switch.
Casual players usually care more about fun/uniqueness of games than horse power. Switch should be all good when next gen drops.

I do think it should have more power tho. Some games that would have been perfect on the system are throttled by performance, bloodstained for instance.

 

[Lusamine]

It'll be fine cause the install base can't be ignored. By now there are so many types of games and business models within the space that multiplatform games are are not a deciding factor. As rerelease and port console of older titles Switch still has a mountain of options (and we know these sell too). Add to that first party and indie support and there'll already be too many options. Not to mention that publishers releasing for next gen might also look at Switch as a reliable console to put side projects on because it establishes itself as the next Nintendo handheld more than a competing console in the next gen race and the DS line didn't suffer from not having day and date releases of CoD available.
Nintendo has since the Wii days been trying to carve out a niche for themselves outside of the competition's reach and when it's going as well as the Switch does they have no reason to push out a successor at a Wii U replacement rate. It'll go on with what it's doing just fine.

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How many "side projects" from traditional 3rd parties exist right now?

 

[Deleted member 4346]

The Switch is a portable console with minimal AAA third-party support. You may see even less AA third-party support when the next Playstation and Xbox consoles come out (putting the Switch two generations behind) but the portability hook is still there. I think Nintendo will be ok. Switch is never going to be market leader but it's still successful and popular.

 

[jroc74]

It'll be fine because there are already two consoles with better graphics on the market. If better graphics were a primary incentive for lots of people not to buy a Switch, wouldn't they already not be buying it? Are "even better" graphics really going to sway minds that are already inclined toward Switch?

And, Switch will get updates in a couple of years to close the gap further.

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This.

They have a handheld device, are the only ones with one. They continue to carve their own niche that works well for them.

Whatever they do, it should be related to the Switch.

 

[MP!]

Most of the reason Switch is currently left out of current gen games is because of the game card pricing and 64GB cards either not being ready or being much higher priced.

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from what I know about switch development ... it's also that it just adds another layer of complication to development. It's not so much that the switch is under powered either... it's more along the lines of major studios already stretched thin trying to manage multiple builds of their game and the switch hardware is still just different enough to be at the bottom of the importance list... the power gap is there... but it's more so trying to keep builds stable on 3 nearly identical platforms and one not so identical one. (PC, xbox, ps4, Switch)

More power would definitely help reduce the amount of work it takes to port a game to switch, and keep it from being on the chopping block of development. But they need to keep iterating or their install base will be for nothing.

I personally think that the more iterations they have, the more people will migrate away from the base model of the switch and the less important it becomes. Then it won't be held down by the weakest link of base model's portable mode. The faster they can do that the better.
Though I suppose devs could always make games that only ran in Docked mode on base... or Nintendo could make other power profiles... I just think it would be a good Idea, now that the idea is tried and tested... to move on, investing in the platform more and building it up... leaving OG switch behind.

Ok. Even if it sees more, I don't think it changes anything. From 5 games a year to 10.

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There are easily 5 more games I would have liked to see on switch and would have been well received and helped the value proposition of the switch

Think if
RE 7
Kingdom Hearts 3 (along with the whatever collection)
RDR2
DMC5
AC Odyssey
all came to switch

Even if it amounted to only 5 titles more in a year that would be a HUGE benefit to the platform. (likely it would get more just by doubling bandwidth... let alone redesigning the hardware completely)

 

[Wink784]

...publishers releasing for next gen might also look at Switch as a reliable console to put side projects on because it establishes itself as the next Nintendo handheld...

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How many "side projects" from traditional 3rd parties exist right now?

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How many did it need to become successful? How many were on 3DS? As long as there's a significant install base there'll be publishers attracted to the platform.

 

[cardboardboxer]

I do think it should have more power tho. Some games that would have been perfect on the system are throttled by performance, bloodstained for instance.

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This is a great point, I can't wait for the Switch 2 not for AAA ports but for unoptimized indies. Hopefully the Switch 2 can play a game like RIME without problems.

When it comes to AAA games and the Switch 2 most people seem to forget that the next generation will include game streaming. The Switch 2 can not even be as powerful as the current PS4 and still play PS5 games if Nintendo includes some hardware to facilitate better game streaming in the Switch 2.

Hell if Stadia isn't a huge success maybe Google makes back part of that investment by partnering with Nintendo to offer a Nintendo streaming service that streams AAA PS5-level games to the Switch 2. They already use Google servers for the cloud saves, the relationship is there.

 

[Pokemaniac]

Successor in 2025, 2024 at the earliest. The Switch still has a lot of life in it

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The Switch not getting a successor by March 2023 would be nearly unprecedented. Nintendo still sticks to the more standard 4-6 year console cycles.

 

[MP!]

Successor in 2025, 2024 at the earliest. The Switch still has a lot of life in it

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5 years after PS5 and Scarlet launch?

 

[UltraMagnus]

Few things

1.) Current Switch can be supported long after Switch 2 launches if Nintendo wants. The 3DS was supported for 2 years past the Switch launching, effectively giving it a product cycle of 2011-2019. Switch 1 can be too, in fact this is much easier for Switch/Switch 2, because Switch 2 will be able to share Switch 1 games most likely. So you can make a Kirby Switch game for 2023 if you want, and it could run on Switch 2 too, no problem.

2.) "PS4 level power" is a wildly broad term. The current Switch is "XBox 360" tier power especially in undocked mode (153 GFLOPS) but it can run current gen games like The Witcher 3 and Overwatch and DOOM. Architecture of the system makes a big difference, even if Switch 2 is PS4 tier power, it likely will be a much more modern Ampere based design and more able to actually accomodate PS5/XB2 ports.

 

[Ragnarok Flames]

It'll be fine because there are already two consoles with better graphics on the market. If better graphics were a primary incentive for lots of people not to buy a Switch, wouldn't they already not be buying it? Are "even better" graphics really going to sway minds that are already inclined toward Switch?

And, Switch will get updates in a couple of years to close the gap further.

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i highly doubt that.

 

[monstar]

The Switch not getting a successor by March 2023 would be nearly unprecedented. Nintendo still sticks to the more standard 4-6 year console cycles.

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The original GB lasted from 1989 to 1998, and the DS from 2004 to 2011. A 7-8 year cycle is not that unusual for their portable consoles and the Switch seems to be doing great numbers

 

[Pokemaniac]

The original GB lasted from 1989 to 1998, and the DS from 2004 to 2011. A 7-8 year cycle is not that unusual for their portable consoles and the Switch seems to be doing great numbers

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The original GameBoy is an extreme outlier which actually lasted all the way to 2001 because Nintendo had no meaningful competition in the handheld space at the time.

The gap between the DS and the 3DS was also much closer to 6 years than 7. The DS launched November 2004, while the 3DS launched March 2011.

 

[unicornKnight]

It'll be fine because there are already two consoles with better graphics on the market. If better graphics were a primary incentive for lots of people not to buy a Switch, wouldn't they already not be buying it? Are "even better" graphics really going to sway minds that are already inclined toward Switch?

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I totally agree, market has constantly shown that the mass doesn't care that much about graphics. For me the main reason I'd want a stronger Switch isnt the graphics but rather easier ports of demanding games.

 

[Hasan Ali Almaci]

Of course its gonna be fine - Nintendo portables arent really affected by other homeconsoles.
Where else are you gonna play Animal Crossing ?

Nintendo is gonna be able to get more aggressive with the pricing of hardware and software by next year as well.

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r
Oh so they are not able to be more agresive with pricing right now?

 

[night814]

There's definitely a stronger model somewhere in the pipeline, maybe the holiday after the next console launches. They can ride out their very stable and strong sales of hardware and software well into next gen if games keep getting released at the pace they have been for Nintendo both first and third party releases.

 

[skeezx]

i think it's 50/50... yeah, "horsepower" doesn't have to matter but that's the natural trajectory of the industry. otherwise we'd still be playing wii fit with grandma or whatever

developers get bored and don't want to work within too constricting of headroom. publishers don't want to pour money into keeping your favorite system humming along unless it's easy money for them. so playing armchair nintendo exec i'm bullish on the Pro/2.0 coming sooner rather than later

 

[Pasedo]

I think one of the main propositions of the Switch is it gives people the opportunity to play AAA games they missed out on in previous gens and enables them to do so in more convenient portability fashion. Because this model is so successful they don't need hardware which runs the latest games. That's for Xbox and Ps4 to compete in that space. At some point though when the tech catches up we will get the best of both worlds but that's probably 2 gens away.

 

[Deleted member 6730]

They will launch a new revision before that though. That's how Nintendo portables work.

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Get ready for Switch Lite XL.

 

[Malakai]

It's simple really.

The concerns about the difficulty of Switch getting PS5/Scarlett ports is overblown because it already gets very few PS4/XBO ports and those aren't the games selling the system.

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This. A million times over. the concern about PS5/Xbox Next ports is borderline concern trolling.

 

[Neoxon]

The original GB lasted from 1989 to 1998, and the DS from 2004 to 2011. A 7-8 year cycle is not that unusual for their portable consoles and the Switch seems to be doing great numbers

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But the problem is that the power gap will eventually grow to be too wide for most major third party companies to justify attempting ports of their newer games.

 

[Deleted member 9486]

I think they'll be fine, regardless of future hardware plans, as Nintendo just does their own thing and isn't directly in competition with the other two.

They have their own dedicated base that doesn't care much about non-Nintendo stuff, have a stranglehold on the dedicated portable gamers, and being so different are well positioned as a second platform for people who buy more than one.

They just need to keep making great games and providing things (like portability) that the others don't and they can largely not worry about the power of new systems from Sony/MS each time they jump to a new generation. Sure, they'll get fewer third party ports at times when the power gap widens, but it's not like things like Doom or MK11 have tons of people running out and buying Nintendo hardware. Those are largely just nice additions to the library for the Nintendo only crowd rather than major system sellers and Nintendo would rather people be buying more first party games anyway.

 

[shark97]

probably, nintendo competes for a somewhat different market

 

[Noisepurge]

They will do the Nintendo thing and just release something entirely different. I mean they already scrapped the "switching" with Switch Lite.

 

[blitzblake]

Here's my two hot takes;

1) even now, switch ain't getting ports day and date. Overwatch and Witcher 3 just released on it. I can't even remember what year those games released.

2) anything on the switch is being pared back to a shrub anyway. Doesn't matter if it was a large bush or a gigantic fucking hedge maze, just keep chopping back until it runs on the damn thing. 540p ain't no stranger to the switch.

 

[Deleted member 19702]

Whoever saying Nintendo shouldn't release a Switch successor because it won't make any difference are badly mistaken. It botters me also anyone who believe Nintendo "is on their own" and "can't compete against Sony and Microsoft", which is nonsense. They might say this but they can't escape from the fact they're competing against Sony and Microsoft for the gaming market share. It's crucial, for Nintendo to stay relevant in the biz, to make a Switch successor not that far from PS5/XBO2 because when both of them arrive Switch might feel obsolete in comparison, similar to what happened with Wii in it's late years with the imminent arrival of next-gen. Nintendo can make a more powerful machine than PS4, even able to run PS5 games at solid performances, by 2022. Anyone thinking otherwise are embracing the defeatist "Nintendo can't compete" phallacy.

 

[ShadowFox08]

There's three issues I have with your idea of a 2 TFLOP Pro hybrid releasing next year

1. Samsung's 7nm EUV wafers are releasing next year. The chances of switch using those wafers the very same year is very very low. Not even Sony and Ms use chips released on the same year, with Nintendo consistently/historically using chips they are at least two years, possibly due to pricing.
2. Pricing. So the technology is possible for 2 TFLOPs, which was supposedly proven by the Microsoft X surface tablet coming out next year, but it's expensive. Sure the switch pro won't be $900-1000, but I can't see it being priced anything lower than $400. Which I can't imagine Nintendo doing.

3. Additional power profiles. If the hybrid pro is at 2 TFLOPs in docked, then it could be 800 GFLOPs in handheld (if it keeps the 2.5x power difference as OG switch modes). But either way it doesn't matter what the power discrepancy is as it would be two additional profiles that are higher on top of the 3-4 profiles that already exist on the switch... And the switch pro would exist simultaneously with switch supporting the same games with half a dozen profiles could be too much for devs. Would Nintendo want to burden devs with a minimum of 4 profiles supported per game?