Nintendo is reportedly planning to launch its a lot desired follow-up to the Nintendo Change within the second half of 2024. Sources conscious of the Zelda writer’s next-gen console reportedly advised VGC that it could be transportable, just like the Change, however most particulars are nonetheless snugly beneath wraps.
Nintendo itself has been exceedingly coy about the way forward for its {hardware}, typically bowing out of specifics when requested. Earlier this summer time, for instance, when traders requested if the Change, which got here out in 2017, was approaching its end-of-life, president Shuntaro Furukawa targeted on the longevity of its software program as a substitute of suggesting it could ever get replaced by a unique console.
“By no means earlier than in {hardware} has software program bought at such a tempo,” he mentioned. “Like final yr’s Pokémon Scarlet and Violet and this yr’s The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom; Nintendo Change titles bought greater than 10 million items within the first three days of their launch.”
Regardless of promoting over 125 million, the Change set up base has slowed its development during the last 12 months. The {hardware} has additionally struggled to maintain up with some massive new releases like Xenoblade Chronicles 3 and Pokémon Scarlet and Violet, although 2023’s The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom confirmed the present Change can nonetheless ship a GOTY-worthy blockbuster with lovely visuals and good efficiency.
Learn Extra: Nintendo’s Considering About How Followers Will Transfer To Its New Console
Might the Change Professional come out in 2024?
VGC’s steered launch window traces up with a Nikkei report from earlier this yr pointing to the same timeline primarily based on Nintendo’s present negotiations with half suppliers. And Nintendo beforehand mentioned throughout a Might earnings name that the corporate wasn’t planning any vital new {hardware} refreshes earlier than the tip of its 2023 fiscal yr in April 2024.
Regardless of how guarded the corporate is, sources inform VGC that Nintendo is engaged on a console which may have “an LCD display screen, as a substitute of the extra premium OLED, so as to carry down prices,” and that “may also settle for bodily video games through a cartridge slot,” VGC writes. Sources didn’t make clear whether or not the potential new console can be backwards suitable with Change titles, a large boon to everybody who has invested lots of of {dollars} into their present Change recreation libraries. Nintendo didn’t instantly reply to Kotaku’s requests for remark.
Based mostly on the main points given, this spherical of next-gen Nintendo rumors appears fairly completely different from what followers have been anticipating up till now. In 2021, Bloomberg reported that Nintendo already created 4K Change Professional improvement kits (Nintendo publicly declared these “[false] claims”) and handed them out to sure builders, which actually makes the prospect of shopping for a {hardware} refresh with a worse LCD display screen annoying.
Learn Extra: Report: Video games In The Works For 4K Nintendo Console That Doesn’t Formally Exist
No matter Nintendo is engaged on, you most likely gained’t get it this yr. Sorry about that.