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Breaking news: Nintendo Switch games will be backward compatible on Switch 2! Okay, it’s hardly a huge surprise. But given Nintendo’s legendary unpredictability, it’s still great to get official confirmation on such an important feature. After all, Switch’s library is extensive and full of high-quality releases. What’s more, many of those titles struggle with performance given how underpowered Switch is compared to modern consoles. Switch 2, therefore, could give these wonderful games a new lease of life.
Predictably Unpredictable
It’s worth taking a quick step back and reaffirming that Switch 2 hasn’t even officially been announced yet! Nintendo has confirmed that a successor to Switch is on the way and that it will be announced by the end of March 2025. And that’s about it, really. The internet has dubbed it Switch 2, with leakers suggesting that might be the official name. But we don’t know that for sure. The console’s specs have been rumored, but again are confirmed. We’ve even had a game announcement tease the console before it has been revealed!
I reiterate this just to confirm how little we actually know about Switch 2, and just how unpredictable Nintendo are when it comes to releasing information. This makes it all the more surprising, therefore, that Nintendo’s president, Shuntaro Furukawa, just came out on Nintendo’s official Japanese X account and confirmed “Switch 2” will be backwards compatible:
” This is Furukawa. At today’s Corporate Management Policy Briefing, we announced that Nintendo Switch software will also be playable on the successor to Nintendo Switch. Nintendo Switch Online will be available on the successor to Nintendo Switch as well. Further information about the successor to Nintendo Switch, including its compatibility with Nintendo Switch, will be announced at a later date.”
It’s worth noting that, in usual Nintendo style, it’s not an absolute confirmation that all Switch games will be playable on Switch 2. But it’s an unusually direct statement from the notoriously vague company. And, for my money, it’s fantastic news for us gamers.
Switch and Play… Again
There’s no two ways about it: Switch has sold gangbusters. Nintendo have revealed that as of September 2024, in fact, Switch has sold over 146 million units. Not bad for an underpowered console, huh? And a slight improvement over the ill-fated Wii U’s 13.5 million lifetime sales. Ouch.
With such a huge install base, it’s no surprise that Nintendo has also sold a lot of Switch games. The latest sales figures indicate that nine Switch games have sold over 20 million units (counting Pokémon Sword and Shield as one game, and the same for Pokémon Scarlet and Violet). Mario Kart 8 Deluxe has sold a staggering 64 million units, and somehow continues to sell today. Super Smash Bros. Ultimate? Over 35 million units. These astonishing figures only serve to emphasize how successful Switch has been and why, therefore, it makes perfect sense for Switch 2 to make use of this software install base.
With major first-party single-player titles like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (32.29 million units) and Super Mario Odyssey (28.5 million units), backward compatibility perhaps isn’t such a pressing issue. Surely everyone has played those masterpieces by now! But for the more multiplayer-focused games, such as Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, many players will have invested considerable time into mastering the mechanics and developing an ecosystem of friends to play with. Being able to transfer that over to Switch 2, at least initially until worthy successors are developed, makes a lot of sense.
Give Me A Boost
I must admit, I’ve never loved the Switch console. The Joy-Cons are too small and plasticky for my liking. The screen (at least on my original console) is too small and yet the resolution is still poor. And I really dislike the dock and its habit of scratching the console’s screen.
One thing I do adore about Switch, though, are its games. Nintendo has long been a master of producing whimsical first-party titles of unparalleled creativity. How the company continues to innovate with its major franchises, maintaining the levels of quality that other developers must envy, is beyond me.
That said, there’s no escaping the fact that Switch is by far the weakest console on the market. Somehow, Nintendo and their partners still frequently manage to optimize their games so that they, well, work on Switch. Getting Tears of the Kingdom to function at all, for example, was a minor miracle.
But there are definitely times when Switch’s extremely dated hardware shows and it struggles. Even first-party games are prone to horrendous frame-rate dips when there’s too much happening on screen. And third-party games are even more susceptible to issues.
Switch 2 will no doubt be a significantly more powerful console than its predecessor. Even if it can’t meet the standards of the current generation of home consoles – understandable given it’ll likely be a hybrid handheld like Switch – it should still pack enough power to greatly improve the performance of the Switch game library. If Switch 2 can give these already wonderful games a new lease of life, it’ll allow us to experience the best possible versions of the games we missed from the last eight years or the ones we want to replay. That, for me, is why Switch 2’s confirmed backward compatibility is so important. Now can we please get an official announcement, Nintendo? My body is ready.
