After months of leaks and speculation, Nintendo have finally shown us Switch 2. Gaming’s worst kept secret appears to be a safe bet of a console, with little in the way of surprises.
Though the trailer is light on detail – it’s not even a real console in it, but a CGI model – it did show several features.
The most notable of these is the mouse functionality of the JoyCons. That may not sound hugely exciting, but Nintendo’s designers always find remarkable ways to exploit controller features, so it will be interesting to see what they can do with this.
There’s the new magnetic controller connectors. Again, not super exciting, but fiddling about with controller pairings is one of the biggest bugbears on the original Switch, so nice to see some improvement there.
Then there was a glimpse at what seems to be a new Mario Kart. Everyone likes Mario Kart, and though it’s not as big news as a new Mario or Zelda, it’s certain to attract people to the system. Interestingly the camera zoomed way out of the action at one point. Perhaps a suggestion of more open, explorable levels?
We were then told that the new system will play new exclusive titles and be backward compatible with nearly all Switch games, which everyone was basically expecting.
So that’s pretty much it for now. We’ll know more at the next Nintendo Direct, and there will be events around the world to launch the system.
Opinions seem to be divided. The Switch is hugely successful, and a bigger, better version seems like a surefire hit. There wasn’t much in the way of ‘wow’ factor though. Never mind. We look forward to learning more in the coming months.
