Topic: The Nintendo Switch Rumor and Speculation Thread

May seemed to work for them last year with ToTK, so I can easily see a May launch for the successor next year. And that would still give them enough time for a marketing push even if they held off the announcement until the new year (though I suspect manufacturing will still start this year). IIRC they stated in their financial Q&A back in late 2023 that they wouldn't need as long a marketing push this time as they did for the Switch.

Think it needs to be April or May. June is the beginning of summer and I think I am right in saying games during this period often don’t do particularly well. So sounds risky to launch a new console during the summer period.

@FragRed
Probably worth looking back at when they've launched previous pieces of hardware. Obviously there aren't a lot of recent examples given the Switch existing. Switch in March, Lite in September, OLED in October. And before that we had launches either at the tail end of the year (Wii/Wii U) or early on (3DS). But if you go back further through the history of hardware releases..... it's a fairly wide spread. The only month they tend to skip is January really

For the three months in question:
April: GB in JP, DSi outside of JP
May: GC PAL
June: SNES EU, N64 JP, DS Lite outside of JP, GBA outside of JP

@MarioBrickLayer All the recent revitalised SEGA ip games will come to Switch 2 too.

@FragRed I want it to come out in April, but can it if they don't announce it until January? I don't know what the minimum amount of time needs to be to run a marketing campaign and launch?

@GrailUK That's a good point, and whatever this major new development they are working on will probably come too.

GTA6 is the test, I think if that comes over there is no reason why any other game released up to now can't come too.

@MarioBrickLayer Outside of the initial reveal trailer and Switch Presentation, the marketing campaign for Switch didn't start until the Super Bowl, less than a month before launch.

Today's society doesn't need long marketing campaigns in the run up to the system's launch.

@IceClimbers you may be right, I have never worked in Marketing so I don't know what the strategies are.

If it launched in April I imagine they could sell 10m units to core Nintendo fans by the end of June and then they could be building up a stockpile for a another 10m-15m units across the holidays supported by a longer marketing campaign?

Going to share some of the current hype over at Famiboards. From this Chinese article here
https://www.moneydj.com/kmdj/news/newsviewer.aspx?a=3cb5741c-...

Basically it says that Weltrend, who make power delivery circuitry, have said in their earnings call that their "initial shipments" for "new models of PS5, XBox, and Switch" will cause a rebound in orders in Q3. For them that's July to September. If they're doing large shipments for new Switch models in that period? Then presumably mass manufacturing is going to happen not long after

And mass manufacture will set a timer on everything. Because when you're in that phase there will be leaks, unavoidable, so they have to announce it not long after. Certainly within a couple of months. Then on the release side stockpiles of hardware are a dead weight. Sunk costs, no return. You can't sit on that for too long so once they pull the trigger I think it's fair to guess that the hardware will be out within 6 months or so

So IMO this is the timeline range this sets out:
July-October: Manufacture start
Now-December: Reveal (though December is dead so could maybe stretch to January)
March-July: Launch

That's all very consistent with the other recent putative leaks. If there is actually a direct moved to late August like the one rumour said, I feel like the timeline will be all but confirmed (at least the announcement half)

Interesting. Yeah an H1 release seems pretty likely for Switch’s Successor and this seems to point towards that more. I still think the Direct will be in September, but possibly a reveal in October? I feel like November/December will be busier for Switch 1 marketing, so a reveal beforehand seems plausible.

@skywake Doesn't that info lean more towards a new Switch 1 model for the holiday season, maybe a Switch Lite OLED? I mean PS5 Pro is heavily rumoured for the holiday season and Xbox has 3 new Series X|S models announced for the holiday season.

@Grumblevolcano
With the amount that people have been pouring over every screw and plastic moulding for any hint of Switch 2 information? I think it's fairly safe to assume that if there was something along those lines we would've heard something. Also I'd note that the "6 month" bit I put in there was more of a theoretical upper bounds than anything else, PS/XB have far less reason to push the limits of that given they're launching revisions/different SKUs rather than entirely new platforms

Not to say that there isn't space to take a pessimistic reading of that article. I would say the more realistic pessimism might argue that one component being procured doesn't mean there aren't other bottlenecks. Or possibly you could argue about whether the translation of "new models" is being applied correctly. I don't mind those takes TBH

..... I'm just, a bit more optimistic I guess. Also it's increasingly hard not to see a schedule that ends with a first half of 2025, post March given how many of the ducks appear to be lining up that way

Pricing guesstimations by industry analysts are wild. Some saying as much as $500? Which I think prices it out of being an easily replaceable toy for kids and children. That's a hobbyist price, a tough sell for parents.

@Magician Even as a hobbyist that's...woof. I mean, it's certainly possible since Sony and Microsoft did it. It'd also be a very Nintendo thing to do, but...I really hope that's just a bad guess. If something were to happen to my base Switch, even without a warranty, I could still feasibly get it replaced. $500 though... I think I speak for most of us when I say we don't have that kind of cash at our disposal.

I don’t think it’s $500, $400 is a much more obvious pricing. expecting $500 and tech that matches PS5 is unreasonable for a handheld at this time. Nintendo wants a more affordable but still strong enough console, so I think $400 is a great in-between.

@PikminMarioKirby I think $400 is the magic number too. A good way to show that "Yes, the hardware is significantly stronger, but you don't have to sell your internal organs to afford it." (At least, not all of them XD) A perfect price-point for both the enthusiast and the casual family.

I'd be willing to bet it's $400.

It's interesting to see some discourse on Twitter that it needs to be $300-$350 though. I honestly thought it was consensus that $400 is a good price for it based on the leaked specs and taking inflation and rising manufacturing costs into account.

@Novamii @IceClimbers Yeah $400 definitely seems like right outcome. It's not overly expensive, nor extremely powerful, but it is more affordable and still pretty powerful for a handheld.

A couple of things I noticed about the Direct on the museum. Firstly, when they were showing the wide shot there was a fairly conspicuously empty section on the far right of the Switch section. Nothing but what appeared to be a small screen:

And then when they were panning over the video panel showing the history of Mario games they cut here:

I don't think it would be that unexpected for them to have some Switch 2 stuff in this museum. So I think we can mark October 2nd, the day this museum opens to the public, as a potential deadline for a Switch 2 reveal

edit: also re-reading my post I home I am right because it's clear we're collectively starting to lose our minds

@skywake As for the first photo, that is very intriguing. Maybe there's room for more Switch games? It's hard to tell exactly what that is in the middle of the empty spot.

For the 2nd picture, that's something I noticed, too. I think this was just for an effect though. Since the camera was panning right, they wanted it to stop showing once it got to the end (so it doesn't show any emptiness)

I still think Switch's Successor will be announced in October, maybe around a week or so after the Nintendo Museum officially opens. September is a possibility, but then again Echoes of Wisdom and a potential Nintendo Direct would make that hard to fit in the schedule. I guess we'll have to wait and see!