Early Nintendo NX boot animation and logo found within Mario Kart 8 Deluxe prototype dump
Back in 2015, before Nintendo was ready to fully unveil the Nintendo Switch, the console was teased as the codename NX. Nintendo kept up the secrecy for a while, continually hyping the NX console for well over a year until they debuted the finalized system as the Switch in late 2016. After that, the NX joined the list of in-development Nintendo monikers such as Revolution and Cafe, never to be used again.
Now, years later, we get to refamiliarize ourselves with the NX, thanks to the leak of a prototype game. An early development build of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was dumped, with a build date two days prior to the reveal of the Switch's final name, which occurred on October 20, 2016. This supposed beta came from what is claimed to be an early EMMC ODIN board, with footage already uploaded to YouTube.
In addition to the Mario Kart 8 prototype, which has a debug menu and numerous in-development options, was a short boot animation. Many are familiar with the snap of Joy-Cons heard when you boot a Switch, but before that was the final design, Nintendo had a working NX logo and animation, which haven't been seen before. The MK8D prototype is already running on emulators via a patch, and is currently being datamined.
The Nintendo Switches Codename was the NX and this was an early Logo / Boot Up animation used during development of the Console ( It was found in the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Prototype ) This was never seen outside Nintendo pic.twitter.com/B1bS5zCKOu
— @pfkelly.bsky.social 📯🦝 CORPONATION Out TODAY (@PaulFelixKelly) November 20, 2022
