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A reader warns caution over the supposed power of Nintendo\u2019s new console and predicts the reality will be very different to current rumours.<\/p>\n
I don\u2019t want to be a Debby Downer but we\u2019ve all been here before. A new console is on the horizon and its specs get leaked, convincing everyone that it\u2019s more powerful than Skynet. Then the official specs get released and they\u2019re nowhere near as good, but the publisher starts making wild claims of it being a hundred times more powerful than the last one and using weird technobabble, that everyone suddenly pretends to be an expert on, to prove it.<\/p>\n
Then game trailers and tech demos start to appear and they look incredible and amazing. But when the console and its games finally come out, well\u2026 they\u2019re never quite what the hype pretended. It happens every single time and I\u2019m not even mad about it, but let\u2019s not pretend it\u2019s not going to happen with the Switch 2.<\/p>\n
The current rumours are that it\u2019s at least as powerful as PlayStation 4 and somewhere close to an Xbox Series S, which straight away sounds impossible for a portable that\u2019s going to cost less than \u00a3400 (which is presumably what Nintendo\u2019s aiming for). A prototype version was apparently demoed at Gamescom and though nobody but developers have seen it, apparently it was running The Matrix Awakens demo almost like a PlayStation 5.<\/p>\n
For anyone that doesn\u2019t know, The Matrix Awakens demo only worked on Xbox Series X\/S and PlayStation 5 and was made to show off Unreal Engine 5 (it\u2019s not available to download anymore, I think for licensing reasons). Again, the idea that a sub-\u00a3400 hybrid portal is going to get anywhere near that sort of performance is, to me, impossible to believe.<\/p>\n
Especially as the only evidence for this is second-hand accounts of people that were eyeballing a mock-up device that was specifically designed to impress publishers and developers. You couldn\u2019t imagine a less reliable set of circumstances.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m not suggesting anyone is trying to be dishonest here but Nintendo has said nothing official about any of this and eyewitness testimony is always the least reliable. We haven\u2019t even got a leaked shaky cam video filmed on potato yet, which usually accompanies these sort of rumours.<\/p>\n
The secret of Nintendo\u2019s success, when it comes to hardware, is simplicity, for the sake of both reliability and price. They are not going to suddenly abandon that to make an \u00a3800 console and they can\u2019t wave their magic wand to make a super-powerful one that is somehow much cheaper.<\/p>\n
So please, everyone, temper your expectations, for your own sake and, most importantly, for the sake of arguments to come on the internet.<\/p>\n
I do not look forward to those, not once technerds start getting into the specs and measuring pixels, and all the other meaningless nonsense that is somehow needed to tell you whether something looks good or not.<\/p>\n
I certainly hope the new console will be a bigger technological leap forward than is normal for Nintendo, who wouldn\u2019t want it to be, but I don\u2019t care if it\u2019s not. Graphics have never mattered for Nintendo games before and they won\u2019t ever again. If they are good then that\u2019s a great bonus, if they\u2019re not then that\u2019s as expected.<\/p>\n
But let\u2019s not spend the next two years arguing over what graphics the Switch 2 can put out, let\u2019s just sit back and see what games it can play host to.<\/p>\n
By reader Taylor Moon<\/strong><\/p>\n