Nintendo Switch Successor Announced

[Dcubed]

In this age of easily accessible 3D printing and AI image generation, today's fake consoles are gonna be wild

[Happenstance]

Looks uncomfortable 

[Julius]

Not that it adds any real credibility to it, but GVG think it's real. 

The original post has been taken down and the original posted has also apparently changed his name? 

This is going to be a long few days/weeks, I have no idea if this is real - like, it looks like a Switch? We expected it to look like a Switch, but I'm still surprised by just how much it looks like a Switch? - but

[Jimbob]

I think with all these "leaks and rumours" popping up, maybe Nintendo should just come out and say "we'll announce it when we're ready, chill"

[killthenet]

So it seems as if the photos of the PCB and joy con shells are legitimate, but of an older revision of the console (version 6 whereas it's apparently at version 8 now) and the renders aren't official renders but are made by someone who has had access to a prototype unit so should be close to the real design

All sounds plausible to me but could still turn out to be a fake, though I don't think it, it'll be too much longer until we find out (a few weeks at most)

[Dcubed]

14 minutes ago, killthenet said:

So it seems as if the photos of the PCB and joy con shells are legitimate, but of an older revision of the console (version 6 whereas it's apparently at version 8 now) and the renders aren't official renders but are made by someone who has had access to a prototype unit so should be close to the real design

All sounds plausible to me but could still turn out to be a fake, though I don't think it, it'll be too much longer until we find out (a few weeks at most)

Just gonna point out that custom PCBs are something quite commercially available now, through services like PCBWay.

Would be reletively trivial to make a custom PCB that looks real when making fake console photos these days...

2 hours ago, Julius said:

Not that it adds any real credibility to it, but GVG think it's real. 

This is going to be a long few days/weeks, I have no idea if this is real - like, it looks like a Switch? We expected it to look like a Switch, but I'm still surprised by just how much it looks like a Switch? - but

That's another reason why I don't believe it's real.  It looks too much like the existing model.  A lesson that they would surely have learned coming from the Wii U and 3DS (consoles that both suffered heavily in terms of sales & marketing from looking too much like their predecessors).

Edited September 18 by Dcubed

[killthenet]

@Dcubed the fact that the PCB doesn't have any components mounted does make it seem more likely to be fake too. 

All I'll say is that if this is the real design I wouldn't be disappointed

[Julius]

33 minutes ago, Dcubed said:

That's another reason why I don't believe it's real.  It looks too much like the existing model.  A lesson that they would surely have learned coming from the Wii U and 3DS (consoles that both suffered heavily in terms of sales & marketing from looking too much like their predecessors).

Yeah, it does just look too familiar, and I don't think it's at all easily distinguishable from the Switch. I'm firmly in Camp "Nintendo just give us a more powerful Switch and more great games and I'll be happy", but that silhouette is basically just a Switch XL – if you told me this was the Switch Pro, or I saw it without the context of potential Switch 2 leaks and you told me it was the Switch OLED, I'd believe you. 

While I'm with @killthenet in that if it were just this I wouldn't be disappointed, it all just makes me wonder what they actually could do to make the silhouette of this thing easily distinguishable from that of the Switch if it is assuming the same form factor. If they did try to make it easier to identify, surely it would need to be something to do with the look of the Joy-Cons, right? The main unit itself doesn't leave much room for tweaking. 

[killthenet]

I think the main way they'll differentiate it is the colour scheme on the console and the branding in the box and the marketing materials. 

It's funny that we're concerned that consumers won't be able to tell the difference when Apple release new iPhone models most years that don't look any different from the last one and they don't have trouble shifting any units. Why should it be any different in the video game industry when the upgrades are far more spaced out and meaningful? 

[Hero-of-Time]

3 minutes ago, killthenet said:

 

It's funny that we're concerned that consumers won't be able to tell the difference when Apple release new iPhone models most years that don't look any different from the last one and they don't have trouble shifting any units. Why should it be any different in the video game industry when the upgrades are far more spaced out and meaningful? 

Indeed.

I think it comes down to the naming convention. If you follow the PlayStation route and just stick the next number at the end of the console, much like Apple do with their phones, then it avoids confusion. It's when the naming gets weird (Wii-Wii U) that consumers get confused.

[Dcubed]

18 minutes ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Indeed.

I think it comes down to the naming convention. If you follow the PlayStation route and just stick the next number at the end of the console, much like Apple do with their phones, then it avoids confusion. It's when the naming gets weird (Wii-Wii U) that consumers get confused.

Also, those devices are incremental upgrades that come out every year.  Most people don't feverishly buy every new version of a phone that comes out, because they know that each one is a reletively minor upgrade over last year's model that runs all the same apps and does most things exactly the same (but just a bit faster or shinier).

It's very different when you're putting out a new generation of console hardware that has a completely new games library, being released 5-8 years after its predecessor.  You expect something massively different and new; so when it comes out looking almost the same as the previous console (especially after you already released several redesigns/refreshes of said hardware before), you have a Wii U/3DS situation on your hands.

The expectations of a new console vs a new phone are dramatically different.

Edited September 18 by Dcubed

[Ashley]

52 minutes ago, Julius said:

if you told me this was the Switch Pro, or I saw it without the context of potential Switch 2 leaks and you told me it was the Switch OLED, I'd believe you. 

It would be hilarious if rather than announcing a Switch 2 they announced the Switch Pro. 

[Julius]

3 hours ago, killthenet said:

I think the main way they'll differentiate it is the colour scheme on the console and the branding in the box and the marketing materials. 

Sure, I guess I was just thinking of how companies sometimes just like to adopt new silhouettes. I feel like it's almost like self-advertising – like the early days of seeing someone with a Switch out in the wild and you'd see kids going "woah, what's that?" You kind of lose that mystique. 

Like @Hero-of-Time says, call this thing a 'Switch 2' or something similar and Bob's your uncle, job's a good'un, the same silhouette just a bit bigger is absolutely fine. Stick a big ol' 2 on the back of that thing like a tramp stamp – just needs to be big enough to be really clear and leave room for no question that, at a glance, it's a Switch 2, and not just a Switch *something*. 

3 hours ago, killthenet said:

It's funny that we're concerned that consumers won't be able to tell the difference when Apple release new iPhone models most years that don't look any different from the last one and they don't have trouble shifting any units. Why should it be any different in the video game industry when the upgrades are far more spaced out and meaningful? 

Like @Dcubed says, I think the fact that phones are incremental, annual upgrades makes it a tough point of comparison, and fairly or not, people are used to spending less on consoles than they are phones. If they buy the new hotness? They want to feel it. I don't know how much you feel it if it's just a slightly large Switch which could be confused for a hypothetical Pro. 

I'm not concerned that consumers will get them confused, I guess the concern from a wider perspective would be that this thing won't have the impact of the Switch – which is a lot to ask for, of course, considering its success.

Even if you go the safe route of calling it the Switch 2 and advertising it as such - I've been over this before, but you could animate the Joy-Cons from a Switch logo into a '2' and get cute with it, use two clicks in ads and trailers rather than just the one, etc. - there is an inherent lack of newness which suddenly makes this thing so much more heavily dependent on its software lineup. There were those rumours, of course, that Nintendo delayed the Switch successor to 2025 to make sure that its lineup was ready, and even as someone who has always been firmly in Camp "Just give it more juice and slap a '2' on there!", if that's the decision they made, it is making far, far more sense to me now. 

Which then brings up the whole cross-gen debate – there is going to be a window where both the Switch and Switch successor are on the market at the same time, do Nintendo continue to release games which are then available on both, like what we saw with the transition from last gen to the current one with Xbox and PlayStation? Because if the hardware is essentially going to look and feel the same, but be more powerful, then the software is going to suddenly be a huge differentiator, both to more casual consumers weighing up which to get, but also, again, in terms of that self-sustaining advertisement – "mom, dad, that guy's playing the new Zelda on his Switch 2! I can't get it on my Switch! Can I get one for Christmas?", etc.

Do they just give it a final year then very firmly and without and question slam the door shut on the Switch? If the hardware volume is available for the Switch successor and it's selling, there's little reason they'll want to keep it around, unlike Xbox and PlayStation who both launched into COVID and had to contend with everyone experiencing delayed or stretched out development periods and so on. 

I'm really curious to see how they handle it, honestly I'm just as excited to see the marketing for it as I am the new games and console themselves purely because there's so much that can go right and wrong – Nintendo have been here before, so have they learned their lesson? 

2 hours ago, Ashley said:

It would be hilarious if rather than announcing a Switch 2 they announced the Switch Pro. 

Edited September 18 by Julius

[ArtMediocre]

They should probably call it the "Switch U", to make the circle of life complete.

[Julius]

Pyoro has just unprivated his Twitter account, after posting the below cryptic tweets earlier today. 

Either he's having a stroke, powering up, or...Soon™? 

[MindFreak]

Isn't that just snoring sounds? 

[Julius]

6 minutes ago, MindFreak said:

Isn't that just snoring sounds? 

[Ashley]

3 hours ago, Julius said:

Pyoro has just unprivated his Twitter account, after posting the below cryptic tweets earlier today. 

Either he's having a stroke, powering up, or...Soon™? 

[BowserBasher]

3 hours ago, Julius said:

Pyoro has just unprivated his Twitter account, after posting the below cryptic tweets earlier today. 

Either he's having a stroke, powering up, or...Soon™? 

Nah. His cat just walked over the keyboard and did that. 

[Hero-of-Time]

Someone has 3D printed the leaked images to show a size comparison to the Switch.

[Glen-i]

2 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Someone 3D printed the leaked images.

Fixed that for you.

[drahkon]

3 hours ago, Hero-of-Time said:

Someone has 3D printed the leaked images to show a size comparison to the Switch.

Remember kids: Bigger doesn't always mean better...

[Hero-of-Time]

20 minutes ago, drahkon said:

Remember kids: Bigger doesn't always mean better...

 

[Julius]

21 hours ago, Julius said:

Pyoro has just unprivated his Twitter account, after posting the below cryptic tweets earlier today. 

Either he's having a stroke, powering up, or...Soon™? 

PIH was unrelated to Switch (it was Pirates in Hawaii), so I guess anymore of these I'll just stick in another thread. 

RAH was Rent-A-Hero:

TGS is about to make this whole Switch 2 build-up so much busier on the leak-consuming side 

Edited September 20 by Julius

[Glen-i]

28 minutes ago, Julius said:

RAH was Rent-A-Hero:

Before anyone gets excited about that. It's being revived as a web3 game with NFT's.

Nice to see someone getting use out of that monkey's paw.