Breath of the Wild 2 on Switch Pro? I’ll believe it when I see it
With as tight-lipped as Nintendo has been, we’re desperate out here for some news, any news, on highly anticipated releases like Breath of the Wild 2 and the elusive, possibly fictional Switch Pro. The Legend of Zelda sequel is back in the news, not because any new information about it has been released, but instead because there has been some conversation about the game looking so good, it had to be running on a second-generation Switch console.
At least that’s what some tech experts were saying on a recent episode of Digital Foundry Weekly. As originally reported by GamesRadar, the tech show’s hosts Richard Leadbetter, John Linneman, and Alex Battaglia analyzed the newest trailer for the game, and considered different graphical features like volumetric clouds and anti-aliasing, and how difficult they can be even on the current-gen consoles like the Xbox Series X.
Their conclusion is that it’s possible Breath of the Wild 2 could indeed be running on the unreleased, and even unannounced Switch Pro, which is indeed a different thing entirely from the Switch OLED that came out in October of last year.
Of course, they also pointed out that Nintendo might just be beefing up the footage to make it look better for the trailers, and that the actual gameplay will be a little more toned down so that it can run on the current Switch hardware. This practice has been in place in the industry for years now, so it wouldn’t entirely surprise me if that were the case.
We’ve also seen this exact conversation before — a few years ago, early trailers for Monster Hunter Rise got the same treatment, to the point that Capcom had to make a statement saying their game was indeed running on a normal Switch.
Here’s my take: these speculative conversations about games and console releases can be pretty hit or miss, but even if theories can get a little intense sometimes, I think it’s a really fun part of the industry. Sometimes hype can be fun just for the fun of it.
I may be questioning whether there really is a Switch Pro in our immediate future, but it sure can be interesting to think about. And if the game really just does look that good, we’ll be in for a treat when it finally comes out.
