In the wake of the Switch 2 reveal, neither Nintendo nor Nvidia has gone into any detail at all about the exact chip inside the upcoming handheld—technically, we are still not sure what Arm CPU architecture or what GPU architecture it uses, how much RAM we can expect it to have, how fast that memory will be, or exactly how many graphics cores we’re looking at.
But interviews with Nintendo executives and a blog post from Nvidia did at least confirm several of the new chip’s capabilities. The “custom Nvidia processor” has a GPU “with dedicated [Ray-Tracing] Cores and Tensor Cores for stunning visuals and AI-driven enhancements,” writes Nvidia Software Engineering VP Muni Anda.
This means that, as rumored, the Switch 2 will support Nvidia’s Deep Learning Super Sampling (DLSS) upscaling technology, which helps to upscale a lower-resolution image into a higher-resolution image with less of a performance impact than native rendering and less loss of quality than traditional upscaling methods. For the Switch games that can render at 4K or at 120 FPS 1080p, DLSS will likely be responsible for making it possible.
The other major Nvidia technology supported by the new Switch is G-Sync, which prevents screen tearing when games are running at variable frame rates. Nvidia notes that G-Sync is only supported in handheld mode and not in docked mode, which could be a limitation of the Switch dock’s HDMI port.
Among the changes mentioned in yesterday’s Nintendo Switch 2 presentation was a note that the new console doesn’t just support MicroSD Express cards for augmenting the device’s 256GB of internal storage, but it requires MicroSD Express. Whatever plentiful, cheap microSD card you’re using in your current Switch, including Sandisk’s Nintendo-branded ones, can’t migrate over to your Switch 2 alongside all your Switch 1 games.
MicroSD Express, explained
Why is regular-old MicroSD no longer good enough? It all comes down to speed.
Most run-of-the-mill SD and microSD cards you can buy today are using some version of the Ultra High Speed (UHS) standard. Designed to augment the default speed (12.5MB/s) and high speed (25MB/s) from the earliest versions of the SD card standard, the three UHS versions enable data transfers of up to 624MB/s.
But most commodity microSD cards, including pricier models like Samsung’s Pro Ultimate series, use UHS-I, which has a maximum data transfer speed of 104MB/s. The original Switch uses a UHS-I microSD card slot for storage expansion.
Why have newer and faster versions of the standard—UHS-II, UHS-III, and SD Express—failed to achieve critical mass? Because for most consumer applications, it turns out that 100-ish megabytes per second is plenty. The SD Association itself says that 90MB per second is good enough to record an 8K video stream at up to 120 frames per second. Recording pictures and video is the most demanding thing most SD cards are called upon to do—give or take a Raspberry Pi-based computer—and you don’t need to overspend to get extra speed you’re not going to use.
Not all game releases will follow Nintendo’s pricing formula. The Switch 2 release of Street Fighter 6 Year 1-2 Fighters Edition retails for $60, and Square Enix’s remastered Bravely Default is going for $40, the exact same price the 3DS version launched for over a decade ago.
Game-Key cards have clearly labeled cases to tell you that the cards don’t actually hold game content. Credit: Nintendo/Square Enix
One possible complicating factor for those games? While they’re physical releases, they use Nintendo’s new Game-Key Card format, which attempts to split the difference between true physical copies of a game and download codes. Each cartridge includes a key for the game, but no actual game content—the game itself is downloaded to your system at first launch. But despite holding no game content, the key card must be inserted each time you launch the game, just like any other physical cartridge.
These cards will presumably be freely shareable and sellable just like regular physical Switch releases, but because they hold no actual game data, they’re cheaper to manufacture. It’s possible that some of these savings are being passed on to the consumer, though we’ll need to see more examples to know for sure.
What about Switch 2 Edition upgrades?
The big question mark is how expensive the Switch 2 Edition game upgrades will be for Switch games you already own, and what the price gap (if any) will be between games like Metroid Prime 4 or Pokémon Legends: Z-A that are going to launch on both the original Switch and the Switch 2.
But we can infer from Mario Kart and Donkey Kong that the pricing for these Switch 2 upgrades will most likely be somewhere in the $10 to $20 range—the difference between the $60 price of most first-party Switch releases and the $70-to-$80 price for the Switch 2 Editions currently listed at Wal-Mart. Sony charges a similar $10 fee to upgrade from the PS4 to the PS5 editions of games that will run on both consoles. If you can find copies of the original Switch games for less than $60, that could mean saving a bit of money on the Switch 2 Edition, relative to Nintendo’s $70 and $80 retail prices.
Nintendo will also use some Switch 2 Edition upgrades as a carrot to entice people to the more expensive $50-per-year tier of the Nintendo Switch Online service. The company has already announced that the upgrade packs for Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom will be offered for free to Nintendo Switch Online + Expansion Pack subscribers. The list of extra benefits for that service now includes additional emulated consoles (Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo 64, and now Gamecube) and paid DLC for both Animal Crossing: New Horizons and Mario Kart 8.
This story was updated at 7: 30pm on April 2nd to add more pricing information from US retailers about other early Switch 2 games.
With the promise of new hardware capable of 1080p, 120 frames per second, HDR, and even mouse capabilities, the Switch 2 is getting attention from developers eager to make up for lost time—and stake out a place on a sequel to the system that sold more than 150 million hardware units.
Elden Ring Tarnished Edition, Yakuza 0, Hitman: World of Assassination, Cyberpunk 2077, Street Fighter 6, Hogwarts Legacy, and Final Fantasy 7 RemakeIntergrade stood out as games from the near-to-middle past slated to arrive on the Switch 2.
Final Fantasy 7 Remake,Street Fighter 6, Civilization 7, and Cyberpunk 2077 are due to arrive at launch on June 5, with the rest arriving in 2025.
Notable independents (most notably Silksong)
Proof of life.
Credit: Nintendo/Team Cherry
Proof of life. Credit: Nintendo/Team Cherry
The cruel games industry joke, ever since Silksong’s announcement in 2019, is that the game, originally intended as DLC for acclaimed platformer/Metroidvania Hollow Knight, is always due to be announced, never gets announced, and resumes torturing its expectant fans.
But there it was, for a blip of a moment in the Nintendo Switch 2 reveal: Silksong, coming in “2025.” That’s all that is known: it will, purportedly, arrive on this console in 2025. It was initially due to arrive on PC, PlayStation, and Xbox when it was announced, but that remains to be seen.
Another delayed indie gem, Deltarune, a kinda-sequel to Undertale, purports to land all four chapters of its parallel story on Switch 2 at the console’s launch.
Other notable games from across the studio-size spectrum:
Hades 2 (2025)
Split Fiction (at launch)
Bravely Default: Flying Fairy HD Remaster (at launch)
Enter the Gungeon 2 (“Coming soon”)
Two Point Museum (2025)
Human Fall Flat 2 (“Coming soon”)
The legally distinct game that sure looks like Bloodborne 2
The hero of this sanguine tale. FromSoftware
The next original game from FromSoftware, maker of beautifully realized finger-torture titles like Elden Ring and the Dark Souls series, is a Nintendo Switch 2 exclusive, The Duskbloods. The trailer, with its gore-etched hands, gothic churches, and eldritch/Victorian machinery, certainly stood out from the Kirby and Donkey Kong games around it. The game arrives sometime in 2026.
Implausible: Long-suffering Earthbound fans have been hoping for a new game in the series (or even an official localization of the Japan-exclusive Mother 3) for literal decades now. Personally, though, I’m hoping for a surprise revisit to the Punch-Out series, following on its similar surprise return on the Wii in 2009.
Screen
This compressed screenshot of a compressed video is by no means the resolution of the Switch 2 screen, but it’s going to be higher than the original Switch.
Credit: Nintendo
This compressed screenshot of a compressed video is by no means the resolution of the Switch 2 screen, but it’s going to be higher than the original Switch. Credit: Nintendo
Likely: While a 720p screen was pretty nice in a 2017 gaming handheld, a full 1080p display is much more standard in today’s high-end gaming portables. We expect Nintendo will follow this trend for what looks to be a nearly 8-inch screen on the Switch 2.
Possible: While a brighter OLED screen would be nice as a standard feature on the Switch 2, we expect Nintendo will follow the precedent of the Switch generation and offer this as a pricier upgrade at some point in the future.
Implausible: The Switch 2 would be the perfect time for Nintendo to revisit the glasses-free stereoscopic 3D that we all thought was such a revelation on the 3DS all those years ago.
C Button
C-ing is believing.
Credit: Nintendo
C-ing is believing. Credit: Nintendo
Likely: The mysterious new button labeled “C” on the Switch 2’s right Joy-Con could serve as a handy way to “connect” to other players, perhaps through a new Miiverse-style social network.
Possible: Recent rumors suggest the C button could be used to connect to a second Switch console (or the TV-connected dock) for a true dual-screen experience. That would be especially fun and useful for Wii U/DS emulation and remasters.
Implausible: The C stands for Chibi-Robo! and launches a system-level mini-game focused on the miniature robot.
New features
Credit: Nintendo
Likely: After forcing players to use a wonky smartphone app for voice chat on the Switch, we wouldn’t be surprised if Nintendo finally implements full on-device voice chat for online games on the Switch 2—at least between confirmed “friends” on the system.
Possible: Some sort of system-level achievement tracking would bring Nintendo’s new console in line with a feature that the competition from Sony and Microsoft has had for decades now.
Implausible: After killing it off for the Switch generation, we’d love it if Nintendo brought back the Virtual Console as a way to buy permanent downloadable copies of emulated classics that will carry over across generations. Failing that, how about a revival of the 3DS’s StreetPass passive social network for Switch 2 gamers on the go?
Nintendo may be getting ready to make its Switch 2 console official. According to “industry whispers” collected by Eurogamer, as well as reporting from The Verge’s Tom Warren, the Switch 2 could be formally announced sometime this week. Eurogamer suggests the reveal is scheduled for this Thursday, January 16.
The reporting also suggests that the reveal will focus mostly on the console’s hardware design, with another game-centered announcement coming later. Eurogamer reports that the console won’t be ready to launch until April; this would be similar to Nintendo’s strategy for the original Switch, which was announced in mid-January 2017 but not launched until March.
Many things about the Switch 2’s physical hardware design have been thoroughly leaked at this point, thanks mostly to accessory makers who have been showing off their upcoming cases. Accessory maker Genki was at CES last week with a 3D-printed replica of the console based on the real thing, suggesting a much larger but still familiar-looking console with a design and button layout similar to the current Switch.
On the inside, the console is said to sport a new Nvidia-designed Arm processor with a much more powerful GPU and more RAM than the current Switch. Dubbed “T239,” Eurogamer reports that the chip includes 1,536 CUDA cores based on the Ampere architecture, the same used in 2020’s GeForce RTX 30-series graphics cards on the PC.
Nintendo’s Joy-Con Charging Stand (Two-Way) seems useful, but it’s coming out at a strange time in the console’s lifecycle.
Nintendo
The stand can charge the Switch Online NES controllers, something that Nintendo’s charging grip can’t do because the handles get in the way.
Nintendo
The charging stand can be removed from the stand part to maximize flexibility.
Nintendo
Nintendo’s Switch launched in March 2017, and all available information indicates that the company is on track to announce a successor early next year. It’s that timing that makes the launch of Nintendo’s latest Switch accessory so odd: The company has announced a first-party charging cradle for Joy-Con controllers, which up until now have been charged by slotting them into the console itself, via Nintendo’s sold-separately Joy-Con charging grip, or with third-party charging accessories.
The Nintendo of Europe account on X, formerly Twitter, announced that the charging accessory—formally called the “Joy-Con Charging Stand (Two-Way)”—will be released on October 17. It will work with both Joy-Cons and the Switch Online wireless NES controllers, and the charging cradle can be separated from its stand (where it looks a lot like the Joy-Con charging grip but without the grip part).
Power is provided via a USB-C port on top of the stand, which can either be connected to one of the Switch dock’s USB ports or to a separate USB-C charger. Other Switch controllers, including the Pro Controller and the SNES and N64 replica controllers, are charged via USB-C directly.
The Verge reports that the accessory has only been announced for Europe and Japan so far, though it will presumably also come to North America at some point. Pricing hasn’t been announced yet, either.
Switch 2 is around the corner
Why would Nintendo release a new first-party charging accessory for your old console just months before it’s slated to announce its next-generation console? Rumors about the design of the Switch 2 could hold some hints.
Accessory makers and others with firsthand knowledge of the Switch 2 have suggested that the new console will come with redesigned Joy-Cons with additional buttons and a magnetic attachment mechanism. This would likely make it impossible to attach current-generation Joy-Cons, which physically interlock with the Switch and its various accessories.
But reporting also suggests that the Switch 2 will retain backward compatibility with digital and physical Switch games, which could justify retaining some kind of backward compatibility with existing controllers. This new Joy-Con charging cradle could provide current Switch owners a way to continue charging Joy-Cons and NES controllers even if they can no longer be attached to and charged by the console itself.
But that’s just speculation at this point. It could just as easily be the case that Nintendo has to keep the Switch going for one more holiday season, and it’s eager to sell every accessory it can alongside the shrinking but still significant number of consoles it will sell between now and the time the Switch 2 is released. Nintendo recently announced new games in the Legend of Zelda and Mario & Luigi series, which will give past and future Switch buyers a reason to keep their Joy-Cons charged in the first place.
Nintendo has taken pains to make old controllers compatible with new consoles before. Most Nintendo Wii consoles came with built-in GameCube controller ports, which enabled backward compatibility with GameCube games and also allowed GameCube controllers to be used with compatible Wii games like Super Smash Bros. Brawl. Wii remotes also continued to function with the Wii U.
One thing we don’t know about the Switch 2’s backward compatibility is whether it will provide any kind of graphical enhancements for Switch games. Several titles released in recent years, including newer Pokémon titles, have suffered from performance issues. Nintendo had reportedly planned to release a more powerful “Switch Pro” at some point in 2021 or 2022, but the update was apparently scrapped in favor of the more modestly updated OLED Switch.
Enlarge/ These symbols might not mean anything to you now. But give it a few runs, and you might lose a few minutes strategizing this ship’s ideal next turn, based on this image alone.
But there is always one type of game that is installed and ready to go for the next trip or idle couch moment: a roguelite deck-builder. Cobalt Core is the latest game in that slot, and it’s on Steam for Windows (and definitely Steam Deck) and Switch. It’s the most fun I’ve had in this particular obsession since Monster Train. Cobalt Core stretches into other genres, like perfect-knowledge turn-based tactics and space battle, but it’s cards and randomness down to its electric-blue center.
Launch trailer for Cobalt Core.
A few years ago, I didn’t know what a “roguelike deck-builder” was or what either of those compound phrases meant. Then, one day, there was a sale on Slay the Spire. That 2019 game refined the fusion of two game mechanics: constant failure against randomized encounters (ala Rogue, but with a “lite” gradual progression) and the refining of a deck of combat-minded cards (as in Magic: The Gathering, Dominion, and Netrunner). You attack and defend against increasingly tough enemies with your cards, you gain and upgrade and ditch cards as you go, you lose, and then you get slightly better tools on your next do-over.
Done well, roguelike deck-builders are a potent mix of luck, immediate and long-term strategy, and the slow dopamine drip of chained-together victories. I’ve lost entire work months to them, cumulatively. They should come with a warning label.
Cobalt Core has all those addictive elements plus a few more things to do with your cards. For one, there is space jockey positioning. You move your ship left and right against your opponents, lining up beam emitters and missiles, targeting weak points, and dodging. You do this with perfect Into the Breach-like knowledge of the opposing ship’s actions: it’s going to fire from this bay for 2 damage, use this bit to upgrade shields, and so on. This leaves you with the decisions of when to take hits versus dodging, where to launch drone cannons, whether to attack now or wait for better cards next hand.
A mid-battle scene, with your ship (on bottom) in the midst of delivering a hull-smashing attack, just before the enemy’s multiple red beams rain down.
Brace Yourself Games
You pick your battles in Cobalt Core, and also choose repair shops, random happenings, and mid-level bosses.
Brace Yourself Games
The cards you’re offered depend on which cremates you picked for this run, and each has a distinct discipline.
Brace Yourself Games
The cover art for Cobalt Core, which makes you really not want to get your new friends blown up.
Brace Yourself Games
On top of working those elements into fine shape, Cobalt Core cleverly embraces them in its plot and theming. Your ship is made up of quirky characters, each of whom adds their cards with unique play styles to your deck. You fight ship after ship, encounter celestial oddities, warp from sector to sector, then fight the titular object. When you beat it, you … do something, in space and time, it seems, then start over with imperfect memories of prior loops. Each win or notable loss unlocks new crew, cards, and memories, enough of which might explain what exactly is going on in this heady quantum plot.
What’s largely drawn me in is how neatly the game’s battles and runs fit into a casual gaming schedule. A single battle is usually less than five minutes, a sector of fights maybe 15–20, and a couple sectors plus a boss fight 30–40 minutes, though the decisions and early sections get faster as you learn them. You can save and exit anytime, even mid-battle, and it’s a fast-loading game. On the Switch or Steam Deck—for which this game is Verified and a real battery-saver—it makes for a generous couch, waiting room, or travel experience.
I’ve still got a lot to unlock in Cobalt Core after 10 hours of play, and could easily see myself hitting the 100-plus I put into Slay the Spire and Monster Train (or at least the 50 I threw into Inkbound or SteamWorld Quest). It helps that there’s much more singular personality and style in CobaltCore than other procedural card battlers. And humor, too, lots of it, accompanied by appealing 16-bit-esque graphics, making the grind for new cards and esoteric achievements feel far less grinding.
It’s also impressive how much character-building the game pulls off in service of pixel portraits that never move but frequently react, quip, and express their quantum confusion. I typically feel nothing for different characters in these games. But I’ve got a soft spot for the gunner Riggs, and feel bad when I skip him for, say, movement or hacking options.
My major complaint about Cobalt Core, this deep into its clutches, is that its soundtrack is catchy. This is normally a positive, but given how regularly I’m dropping in for a round or two or 10, I find my mental synth deck replaying the melody lines from a few different tracks. I can’t hum a single note from any of the orchestral-minded backings of my prior deck-builder obsessions, but these tunes are burrowing deep inside.
Cobalt Core is currently on sale (on both platforms), and its base price is $20–$25. If you know you like picking cards, beating bosses, and a long, meticulous triumph, I have to imagine it’s a great value. Maybe too much of one.
