Topic: Anyone else a bit unhappy with backwards compatibility?

I don't own a Switch, so it doesn't matter to me at all. I have nothing to compare it to. Even if I did, I doubt I would care much. People get so hung up on frame rates and ***** these days.

The Switch 2 is fully backwards compatible. All Switch 1 games I own play on the Switch 2.

What I am a bit disappointed with is the lack of Switch 2 updates for many of the games, that unlock resolution and framerates. Like one of my personal favorite games: Persona 5 Royal.

Nintendo is also slow with this, as can you image how much better Pokemon Legends:Arceus would look and play like with increased resolution and 60 fps. /sigh

You do know that your Switch 1 games working on the Switch 2 doesn't make it "fully backwards compatible" unless you own every Switch 1 game ever released, right? 🙂

The only games that might cause some issues are for example the Labo stuff, since the Switch 2 doesn't fit in those carton housings. Especially the VR headset, since the Switch 2 screen is quite a bit larger.

@Jeronan You do know Nintendo themselves publish a list of software that's not fully compatible (or not compatible at all) - and while it's a relatively small % of games it's definitely more than just Labo?

Not sure what you mean here - there are plenty of Switch 1 games which crash or have serious graphical issues or sometimes don't even open on Switch 2. A small number percentage wise, but still hundreds of games with issues.

While I would like more Switch 2 versions of games, I think the backwards compatibility is great. The best Nintendo has ever implemented IMO. I had never even heard of the 'compatibility layer' thing before, but I am 100% sold on it now. I have not noticed additional input lag on any of my Switch 1 games either.

@dmcc0 And to make matters worse, Nintendo doesn't update that list anymore. You have to look at a game's eShop page to see if it has issues. There is no longer an up-to-date central list of all games with issues.

They've also discovered more games with issues since the old list was updated. And, as we've seen in these forums, there are several games that have BC bugs that Nintendo is seemingly not aware of and these games are falsely advertised as having "consistent behavior with Nintendo Switch."

Nintendo also doesn't even have an official way for users to report bugs. It seems fixing BC issues is not a priority for Nintendo cause they already have your money.

This will be probably my last comment ever here.

So much anti-Switch 2 ***** and drivel on internet now. Of course many are disappointed now since they believed in all those outrageously faked claims about that witch-magic called "DLSS".

Too many believed in that with DLSS it could upgrade from 240p to 4K and that VRR will boost the fps to 200 or 400 etc. While in the real reality it's so much worser. But it's still a big upgrade over the OG Switch. But too many believed in that everything from the OG Switch will be upscaled automatically to 4K and with +60fps wile improving the textures too.

Just don't believe in everything on the internet. Youtubers, Twitters & co are just a bunch of cowardly scums who are willing to sell their own souls just to gaining some more views and clouts. They're constantly lying and uses faked pictures/rumors/news/personas well everything!

Switch 2 is an unreal upgrade over the OG Switch. But If you want's a true "next-gen" experience with 4K/8K, 60/200/400fps, ultra-settings and with a constant blinding ray-tracing on games who looks all the same, just buy a $10K PC or PS5 Pro & co instead then.

The internet is truly a disgustingly pathetic place now.
Just enjoy the life with your own requirements instead of constantly hating for 24/7 about everything.

That would be really nice. Maybe they think they would get too much spam 🤔

Very much agree. I love my Switch 2; honestly the best gaming device I've ever had. The occasional issues with compatibility can be annoying but it's pretty much inevitable that there will be a few issues translating from one device to another so I don't really hold that against the console.

@Keman unreal upgrade I would expect all first party switch 1 games to run at native 4k 60 FPS. Unless we’re talking splatoon 3 or arms that simply isn’t the case. It’s an improvement yes. But unreal? Nope.

@sixrings I don't think Keman meant literally unrealistic by saying unreal. 😆 Replace the word unreal with 'good'.

I’m happy for you that you find it to be the best console you’ve had. I would like to feel the same.

The battery life, display quality and poor ergonomics means I just use my OLED where games simply look better overall, at least the ones I still play, like Animal Crossing, TotK and Arceus. Switch 2 is in storage until something unannounced comes along, maybe the Ditto Pokemon game.

Personally I don't understand why someone who still has an OLED would put so much energy into complaining about Switch 2 BC. For the cases Switch 2 gives you an advantage, which are numerous, you have that. For cases where resolution scaling, portable screen quality or compatibility issues apply you still have the OLED

And especially with the resolution scaling bit, it's certainly overblown. Obviously games running at native screen resolution is better. But this has been a problem for gaming since we moved on from CRTs. Even on Switch there's no shortage of games running at 900p docked or similar. On Switch 2 there are games targeting 1440p docked which is functionally the same as a 720p -> 1080p scale

Obviously BC in portable mode applies a 720p -> 1080p scale almost universally and it's not ideal sure. But to suggest it's a complete deal breaker? I mean damn. You guys must never play games if running at sub-native on an LCD is a deal breaker

@skywake The subnative resolution of Switch 1 games on Switch 2 often looks REALLY, REALLY bad, for whatever reason.

It sucks, because, even if you own an OLED, it often means choosing between better handheld image quality vs. better performance.

Thank god for that bug in the code of Hyrule Warriors that makes it 1080p undocked lol

@Ralizah
I would assume there will be scenarios where you're getting double scaling. For example if there was dynamic resolution scaling to a target window of 720p which then on Switch 2 gets scaled up to 1080p. Which is not great. But this wouldn't be true for most games

The way some people describe it it's supposedly rendering all Switch games in BC unplayable when they lack dedicated updates. And from my experience that's certainly not the case. Something like Animal Crossing for example, I assume it hits full 720p on Switch. On Switch 2 playing it in handheld it was fine. If you look for it you can see it but if you weren't looking for it you wouldn't notice. In any case, certainly not unplayable. It's a 720p to 1080p upscale, it's hardly the end of the world

I think the more glaring thing going back to Switch titles via BC is just how much less forgiving I am of image quality issues. Because on Switch if there were issues I'd just mentally note "yeah, but it's the Switch so oh well". But now my standards are higher and I think "why am I playing this with these issues when I have better looking titles on this same system?"

@topsekret I actually think it makes sense for them not to waste resources updating the list, and just direct people to the eshop page for specific games - as long as the eShop info is correct.

The list is only really for people who already have a library of Switch games and are upgrading to Switch 2 - they can see at a glance how many of their games have issues. If you already have a Switch 2 and want to pick up a game, I'd argue it's more efficient to just check the current status on the eShop rather than dig out a list. The bigger issue here is as @FishyS says, that the eShop info isn't always accurate and there is apparently no way to report problems.

@dmcc0 Why not both? They are the ones manually entering the compatibility status into each game's eShop page. It would be trivial to design an automated process so when a game is flagged as having BC issues on the eShop, it also gets added to a master list on their server, which would be displayed on a dedicated webpage. They could put it in a nice table that would let you sort by game title or by date that the issue was discovered. Then they wouldn't need to keep manually editing a list in a Word document and exporting a pdf file (which is what they were originally doing).

EDIT: Alternatively, the eShop already supports the ability to filter games by certain criteria. They could easily achieve this functionality by just adding a filter for games with Switch 2 BC issues.

"The list is only really for people who already have a library of Switch games and are upgrading to Switch 2 - they can see at a glance how many of their games have issues."

So now that the Switch has launched, there will no longer be people with large libraries of Switch games interested in upgrading to Switch 2 that would like to see at a glance all the games that have issues? Bad take.

Also, as someone who does already own a Switch 2 and has several hundred Switch 1 games, I would like a central location I can view all games with issues. As new issues are still being discovered, it would be much more efficient for me to periodically view a central list of games. It's pretty inefficient for me to manually search each game in my collection one at a time to see if it has issues.

I don't understand why you're arguing that it's a good thing that Nintendo doesn't have such an obvious helpful feature.

I have a 2TB microSD express filled to the very last GB with NSW1 games, all of which not only run fine, they benefit from the extra power and either smooth out framerate at 30fps no longer dropping, or max out framerate at 60fps, as well as maxing dynamic resolution which no longer drops.

If there's one criticism I have its the fact they chose not to output the docked image in handheld mode, which the NSW2 easily has the power to do, and since NSW1 games max at 1080p 60fps docked, and NSW2 handheld can do up to 1080p 120fps, it could have easily done it. Even a chipped NSW1 OLED can do it, proving it's possible.

Even so, by and large I'm more than happy with the BC. Running Monster Hunter Stories and Stories 2 at 60fps, Mario Rabbids Kingdom Battle 60fps, Trials of Mana 60fps, Ni No Kuni 2 60fps, Bayonetta 3 at stable 60fps and resolution actually sharp in handheld thanks to not dropping to 480p, Bravely Default 2 and Octopath Traveler 2 at a stable framerate, Crysis 1, 2 and 3 at a stable framerate, Dragon Quest Builders 2 60fps (a game which had horrible stuttering on NSW1), Resident Evil 5, 6, Revelations and Revelations 2 60fps, all the Legend of Heroes Trails games and all the Ys games at a stable framerate without stuttering or frame drops, etc.

And there's countless others. Sometimes its a smaller improvement, like the 7 different Assassin's Creed games which mostly held 30fps on NSW1, but did have some drops here and there, which now run with a flatlined framerate graph. Same for Red Dead Redemption, Metro 2033 and Last Light, Sniper Elite 4, Zombie Army 4, etc. Oh, and Fire Emblem Warriors Three Houses runs 60fps- a huge improvement, and Hyrule Warriors Age of Calamity runs at a stable framerate- a game virtually unplayable on NSW1.

And thats not to even mention games receiving NSW2 updates like Pokemon Scarlet and Violet, now running at 4k (I think?) and 60fps. Zelda Link's Awakening and Echoes of Wisdom both running at a locked 60fps- both of which had massive stuttering issues bad enough to turn me off from continuing to play them on a stock NSW1.

So is BC perfect? Well no, it never is. But I have yet to find a single game in my library that doesnt play at least as good as on NSW1, and 95% of the time the games play better, sometimes drastically so.

@topsekret I'm not really arguing for or against them having such a feature, just that I can see why they don't. Whether it's a trivial task or not to pull the list of games from the eShop, presenting it in a web interface is going to take resources - for initial setup and to maintain it - and they've obviously decided that it's not worth it as the info is available elsewhere. The average Switch 2 user/buyer isn't buying (or doesn't have) 100s of games, so checking whatever game they are interested in on the eShop works for them just fine.

For those that do have 100s of Switch games, the (possibly outdated) list is there - but how many people are going to delay buying a Switch 2 just because some of their existing Switch games don't work? You've already got a Switch 2, so it obviously wasn't a big enough issue to prevent you buying a Switch 2. There's no value for Nintendo creating a website for people like you that have a large collection, but already have a Switch 2. It's entirely plausible you could check the website once, see nothing in you collection has any issues, then never visit again.