Backward compatibility has been one of the Nintendo Switch 2‘s major talking points, but Nintendo has revealed the console doesn’t natively run Switch games. Instead, Nintendo designed its own emulator to run original Switch games on the new console, as it shares no hardware with its predecessor.
In Ask the Developer Vol. 16: Nintendo Switch 2: Part 4, three Nintendo execs — Takuhiro Dohta, Kouichi Kawamoto, and Tetsuya Sasaki — explained how the decision came to be. Kawamoto said, “Right from the beginning, we wanted the new system to be able to play Switch games, but back then, we were told there’d be technical challenges.”
The team went on to explain that the Switch and Switch 2 aren’t compatible on a hardware level, but at the same time, it’s not full emulation, either. Dohta says, “If we tried to use technology like software emulators, we’d have to run Switch 2 at full capacity, but that would mean the battery wouldn’t last so long, so we did something that’s somewhere in between a software emulator and hardware compatibility.”
A detailed explanation would be too technical and outside the scope of this story, but to put it simply, the Nintendo Switch 2 “translates” the data from the Switch game in real time. However, the same hardware boosts that enable the Switch 2 to perform at a higher level than the original also pose obstacles for some Switch games.
Nintendo cautions that not all Switch games will be compatible with Switch 2, especially if those games were designed with the physical dimensions of the Nintendo Switch in mind. In reference to the Switch library, Sasaki said, “We’re checking them all, one by one. More than 10,000 games in total.”
Kawamoto added, “Even with all those checks, it might not be that all Switch games run perfectly in time for the launch of Switch 2, but we will continue our efforts so that we can support as many Switch games as possible. Of course, it’s not physically possible to support certain games like the Nintendo Labo Toy-Con 04 VR Kit, which was designed to fit the dimensions of the Switch hardware, as the sizes don’t match.”
The full interview is an interesting read and goes into much more depth on Nintendo’s behind-the-scenes decision-making. While many Switch games will be compatible with the Switch 2 at launch, not all will — although Nintendo is striving to make as much of its library accessible as possible.
