Nintendo’s next console may feature DLSS and ray-tracing support

By Tomas Franzese September 7, 2023

An image of the Nintendo Switch - OLED Model Mario Red Edition. — Nintendo

New reports affirm the rumors that Nintendo has started to show its next-generation console — referred to colloquially by fans as Nintendo Switch 2 — behind closed doors at a recent video game industry expo. It reportedly featured tech demos highlighting features like Nvidia DLSS support and ray tracing.

Gamescom 2023 was held in Cologne, Germany, between August 23 and August 27. Nintendo attended the European game industry event, and shortly thereafter, rumors emerged that Nintendo had shown its next console behind closed doors. Now, new reports from Eurogamer and VGC are corroborating these claims.

Specifically, both sources say that Nintendo showed tech demos for its next game console in private during meetings with some other game developers at Gamescom. Both sources confirmed that an upgraded version of The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was shown off on this “Switch 2” hardware.

VGC also had a source who claimed that the impressive The Matrix Awakens Unreal Engine 5 tech demo — used to promote Epic Games’ new engine and the power of the PS5 and Xbox Series X back in 2021 — was also shown to developers and seemed to confirm that the new Nintendo system will support Nvidia’s upscaling DLSS tech as well as ray-tracing. Keep in mind that tech demos for systems often don’t make the transition to full-game releases.

Princess Zelda running The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild review — Nintendo

We don’t know much else about what was shown, although VGC claims that this system will be usable in a portable mode like the Nintendo Switch is. Currently, the launch window for Nintendo’s next new piece of hardware is expected to be sometime in fall 2024, although Eurogamer’s source stated that “Nintendo is keen to launch the system sooner if possible.”

Nintendo has not commented on these rumors, and is unlikely to ahead of an official console reveal. Still, the idea that the next Nintendo console is nearly upon us should be exciting for fans of one of the video game industry’s most storied companies.

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Tomas Franzese is a Staff Writer at Digital Trends, where he reports on and reviews the latest releases and exciting…

Gaming

Final Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom trailer features Ganondorf, minecarts, and mechs

Zelda holds a tear-shaped object in her hand in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom's final trailer.

Nintendo has released the final prelaunch trailer for The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom ahead of its release next month, and it gives us an awe-inspiring look at its story and impressive open world.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Official Trailer #3

Gaming

Don’t expect Zelda’s $70 price to become the new Switch standard, says Nintendo

Link looks at his hand in The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom.

The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom will be Nintendo's first Switch game to be priced at $70. News that Tears of the Kingdom, a sequel to one of the bestselling and most critically acclaimed titles on the system, will have an increased price compared to its predecessor came as a surprise over three-and-a-half years after its announcement. It also raised questions about what the future of pricing for Nintendo games will be, especially as Sony, Microsoft, and third-party publishers all upped the cost of their new games in recent years.
While Nintendo will release Tears of Kingdom at $70, a spokesperson for the company tells Digital Trends that this will not always be the case for its first-party games going forward.
"No," the spokesperson said when Digital Trends asked if this is a new standard. "We determine the suggested retail price for any Nintendo product on a case-by-case basis."
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom – Official Trailer #2
To get more insight into the price shift, I spoke to Omdia Principal Analyst George Jijiashvili, who explains what has caused the price of games to go up in recent years and how Tears of the Kingdom demonstrates that Nintendo will "remain flexible about first-party title pricing." Ultimately, Nintendo fans are finally starting to feel the impact of inflation that's been sweeping across the game industry, even if it's only "on a case-by-case basis" for now.
The price is right
Nintendo claims that not every one of its significant first-party game will be $70, and we can actually already see that in action. Preorders just went live for Pikmin 4, which launches on July 21, after Tears of the Kingdom, and it only costs $60. Still, Zelda's price tag indicates that going forward, Nintendo will at least consider raising the price of its most anticipated games to $70. But why start with Tears of the Kingdom?
When asked why it chose Tears of the Kingdom as its first $70 Nintendo Switch game, a Nintendo spokesperson simply reiterated that the company will "determine the suggested retail price for any Nintendo product on a case-by-case basis." Still, it's a surprising choice for Nintendo to make that pricing change to just one exclusive game almost six years into the Switch's life span. Jijiashvili thinks the choice to do this with Tears of the Kingdom was a pretty apparent one for Nintendo, although it won't apply to everything going forward.
"If you are going to make a game $70, it's going to be the follow-up to one of your most critically acclaimed and bestselling games ever," Jijiashvili tells Digital Trends. "I don’t think that this means that $70 will become the standard price for all major Nintendo releases. It's worth noting that Metroid Prime Remastered is priced at $40. It's clear that Nintendo will remain flexible about first-party title pricing."

It makes basic financial sense for Nintendo to ask for a little bit more for a game it knows will be one of the biggest releases of 2023. But what factors in the game industry and world's economy at large caused Nintendo to make this decision?
Priced Out
For more than a decade, people got comfortable with AAA video games being priced at $60. Of course, there were occasional exceptions to this rule, but it was seen as an industry standard until the dawn of the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X. Publisher 2K was one of the first to announce a price increase, and companies like EA, Sony, and Microsoft have all followed suit. Jijiashvili chalks this up to inflation-related pressure on game publishers.
"The games industry has already been experiencing a lot of inflationary pressure," he explains. "AAA games are much more expensive to make now than they used to be, but prices have actually been declining in inflation-adjusted terms -- if prices had risen with inflation since 1990, they would now be over $90. On top of that, we’ve had a big burst of general inflation, meaning that publishers are looking at big increases in everything from salaries to tools. It’s going to be really hard for most publishers to avoid passing on all those extra costs at some point."
Jijiashvili provided us with a graphic created by Omdia that "shows what the typical price points for each generation would look like if you adjusted for inflation." As you can see, the inflation-adjusted prices are only exponentially growing, and the big game pricing shifts the graph highlights were all technically not even enough to keep up with inflation when they happened.

Gaming

Everything announced at the February 2023 Nintendo Direct

Samus Aran stands tall in Metroid Prime Remastered.

Nintendo is the king of digital video game showcases, and the company jump-started its 2023 with another great show. This February 2023 Nintendo Direct gave us our best look at The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom yet, highlighted upcoming Nintendo Switch exclusives like Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon, Kirby's Return to Dream Land Deluxe, and Pikmin 4, and featured the shocking reveal and shadow drop of Metroid Prime Remastered. On top of all that, we learned thattwo new platforms are coming to Nintendo Switch Online.

We now have a clear idea of the Nintendo Switch's game lineup through the summer, so there's no doubt that this Nintendo Direct featured lots of notable announcements. As it can be hard to keep track of it all, we've recapped everything Nintendo announced during the February 2023 Nintendo Direct right here.