Topic: Oz codename meaning?

There was leak today that the codename is Ounce.. or Oz. Why would they be calling it Oz internally? In The Wizard of Oz, in the book, Dorothy and her friends have to wear glasses within the Emerald City. These glasses augment the city.

Combine this nugget of info with the new patent by Nintendo in September for an AR headset that renders peripheral vision around your TV like Illumiroom, and we may now know what the new hybrid system is and what new form of hybridization Nintendo is pursuing.

It would be funny if it's called OZ because the metaphorical Wizard behind the curtain (DLSS I suppose) is making the console punch way above it's weight.

Dolphin didn't really have anything to do with the GameCube, Atlantis didn't really have anything to do with the GBA, Nitro didn't really have anything to do with the DS, Café didn't really have anything to do with the Wii U. A codename is usually just a codename.

Oz clearly is a shortening of ooze.

It will be first liquid-based gaming system.

@CinnamonRobin The codenames for homeconsoles usually carry some sort of philosophy to them.
Cafe (Wii U) referred to a social experience with Miiverse.
Revolution (Wii) referred to a revolutionary controller.
Dolphin (GC) had flippers for shoulder buttons.
Project Reality (N64) was about creating 3D worlds.
???(SNES) erm...don't actually recall the SNES having one. A bunch of letters and numbers maybe.
Gamecom (NES) is pretty obvious.

Granted their handhelds are named more like cars.

I suspect it's like any development it's probably the development stage of the system coming into production and marking their progress.

If you're living anywhere where the metric system holds sway, "Ounce" is most likely to refer to measures of illicit substances.

Ah well, I'm sure that we'll find out what Nintendo have been smoking soon enough.

Oz must be ocarina zelda hint 🤪🫣

I always thought Dolphin came from the leap in hardware tech that made more realistic water rendering viable. There's a reason why Sunshine was set where it was

Anyways, I'm not sure the codename means much. Could be as simple as "well Switch was NX so let's make this one O.. something.. OZ sounds good"

Fun fact about the Dolphin nickname for GameCube, the GameCube can float. They made it with a handle to be portable and made it float in case, like you accidentally dropped it in the ocean or wanted to play in the bathtub or whatever.

I think the hologram thingy would be cool, but maybe it's just because it is very light and portable?

I like the idea that they just +1'ed both letters but thought 'OY' was stupid so went with OZ 😆

In all seriousness, the whole point of using codenames is that you don't give anything away about the product that's being developed in secret. As such, they're ideally completely arbitrary and any meanings attached to previous ones are most likely just people reaching for something after the fact.

The only pattern I can see is that they're all English words.

@Matt_Barber There is the ideal of codenames and then the reality. I know at least for a lot of companies codenames end up being puns and/or inside jokes... so although it might mean something we might never know what.

I don't know why they would call it a secret name if it's just a Switch 2. This would at least imply the system is not another tablet and won't be named as part of the Switch line (avoiding the mistakes of WiiU).

@darthkermit They always have codenames for consoles in development, including Wii U (Project Cafe) even though it ended up continuing the Wii name.

Yes, even if you're looking at something that's not a radical departure in form factor, it'll still be developed in secret under a codename, as they want the competition to know as little about it as possible prior to it going into production. Leaks are obviously going to happen, with there being thousands of people involved, but they're less likely to get tied to it being the Switch successor if all anyone's heard is an innocuous code word.

It's the same with Microsoft and Sony. The Series X was developed as Project Scarlett and the PS5 was known in development as Prospero. Sega used to name their development consoles after planets, going from Mercury to Neptune, although only the Saturn was released that way.

Also, the name chosen to market a console under is often decided relatively late in the day. Nintendo may yet be mulling over their options, as Switch 2 isn't a foregone conclusion.

Actually, it's somewhat interesting that Nintendo hasn't referred to the console by its codename publicly, they've just called it 'the successor to the Nintendo Switch'. GameCube, Wii and Switch were all publicly announced using their codenames (Dolphin, Revolution, NX) before their final names were revealed, but the Wii U wasn't; the codename Project Cafe was leaked rather than officially announced, as far as I know. So that's actually something 'Oz' has in common with the Wii U, which could be interpreted as evidence that it will use the Switch name, in case there was any doubt about that.