Developers are still struggling to get hold of Nintendo Switch 2 development kits after the console’s launch, according to new reports.
In the latest edition of Digital Foundry’s DF Direct Weekly podcast, hosts John Linneman and Oliver Mackenzie reported that they had been told by numerous developers that they were still unable to get hold of a development kit to make Switch 2 games.
According to Linneman, some developers were instead being told to make games for the original Switch for now, instead of specifically working on Switch 2-only titles.
“There’s been a lot of talk about this lately, that Nintendo seems to be almost discouraging Switch 2 development to some degree,” he said. “I’ve spoken with plenty of developers where they were told that their game, they should just ship it on Switch 1 and rely on backwards compatibility.
“There’s a lot of developers that are unable to get Switch 2 dev kits. We talked to a lot of devs at Gamescom this year, and so many of them said the same things. They want to ship on Switch 2. They would love to do Switch 2 versions. They can’t get the hardware. It’s really difficult right now.”
Mackenzie noted that Nintendo’s decision to send development kits to some studios but not others didn’t appear to always make sense in his opinion, citing indie title Chillin’ by the Fire, which was published by Oink Games and makes use of the Switch 2 camera, as one of the more unusual examples of a smaller studio being able to get a kit ahead of more established developers.
“I think they should [get more devkits out there], but I don’t really know what Nintendo’s mindset was with these sets of decisions,” Mackenzie said. “So I don’t really understand the strategy because, like you said, even now developers are struggling to get systems.
“And I know that some months ago when we were hearing things through the grapevine and talking to people, there were some weird exclusions with some big developers struggling to get kits for games. And there were some kind of weird inclusions as well. Some indies were included, which is nice to see.
“But there’s that campfire game, you know, the camera campfire game, and they’re getting kits. And some big developers, on the other hand, who developed AAA stuff, aren’t necessarily in the pipeline there for kits.”
The pair concluded that Nintendo’s alleged advice of releasing games on Switch and relying on backwards compatibility isn’t necessarily useful for games that push the original hardware to its limits. For starters, given that Switch’s output resolution is 1080p when docked and 720p in handheld, Switch 2’s output of 4K docked and 1080p in handheld means a less sharp image, before taking game performance into account.
“Considering the sales volume of Switch 2, it’s not like developers would be in a position where they didn’t want to support the new hardware,” Mackenzie said. “I think broadly speaking, developers do want to support the new hardware.
“But the thing that’s really stark to me too is, at this point, we’ve seen very few proper Switch 2 Editions post-launch. I don’t think we’ve seen any hardly at all, really, from third-party developers in particular. Obviously we saw No Man’s Sky, I think one or two other games in the mix there. But really, it’s been a very slow trickle of titles earning that Switch 2 Edition badge. So, yeah, I really want to see more movement on that front.
“I hope it’s a temporary thing. I hope that in a year or two, we’re looking back and we’re like, that was a really weird decision, but it was fixed in time. I hope that’s what we’re looking at in a little while.”
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