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The similarities between the Nvidia Shield and Nintendo Switch have been pointed out countless times since the console's launch. Especially due to the Tegra X1 chip. When it was revealed that select Nintendo Wii games would be ported to the Shield (for China only), it got people wondering how well they would run, and if its emulation would be passable enough for use on the Nintendo Switch.

Digital Foundry, a team of reporters that are dedicated to finding how well games run thanks to frame-by-frame comparisons, have decided to tackle Super Mario Galaxy for Nvidia Shield, to test how well the game runs. You can see their entire analysis in the video above.

If you'd rather see a written report, the parent company of Digital Foundry--Eurogamer has done an in depth article on it as well.

Based on our tests, Nintendo and Nvidia's emulation work has a lot in common with Xbox One X's enhancement of Xbox 360 games, in that Super Mario Galaxy benefits from a 3x increase in resolution on the X and Y axis, resulting in a 9x boost to pixel count overall. That yields a curious 1920x1404 resolution - a 30 per cent boost over standard 1080p that's downscaled to the display output. It's a curious state of affairs, but almost certainly down to the fact that Wii games usually operate at around 640x480, with the emulator stretching out the horizontal resolution for widescreen support. The emulator effectively works in reverse, running natively on the X axis and downscaling the vertical instead.

There are other aspects of the presentation worthy of comment too. Looking at Xbox 360 titles enhanced for Xbox One X, we often see a mixture of upscaled 2D bitmaps and vector-based fontography that scales up to the emulator's chosen resolution. Super Mario Galaxy has native type and even some native resolution bitmaps that are subtly different to the originals, while other elements are still based on the 480p core art from the Wii release. It's unclear whether this game received a Chinese launch originally, so there may well be new artwork injected here - there's certainly proof here of a clear improvement over the Western code running under the Dolphin emulator.

Source

 

[comput3rus3r]

Looks great. However lack of Wiimote makes the star bit aiming too difficult. Now if they could come out with a sensor bar adapter for switch and give it wiimote support that would be awesome.

 

[the_randomizer]

But we also need to keep in mind, the Shield and Switch run at different clock speeds, so I doubt it would run this well on Switch without sacrifices.

Edit: Hopefully more is known at E3.

 

[matthi321]

i hope the dolphin team can get this code

 

[kevin corms]

Looks great. However lack of Wiimote makes the star bit aiming too difficult. Now if they could come out with a sensor bar adapter for switch and give it wiimote support that would be awesome.

There's at least one switch game that uses a joycon to emulate the wii mote.

 

[comput3rus3r]

There's at least one switch game that uses a joycon to emulate the wii mote.

maybe the movement but not the pointer. I still very much like my wiimote+nunchuck setup for many wii games.

 

[mbcrazed]

Looks great. However lack of Wiimote makes the star bit aiming too difficult. Now if they could come out with a sensor bar adapter for switch and give it wiimote support that would be awesome.

No need! The right joycon has an IR sensor on the bottom!

 

[chrys]

Since the wii is more powerful than the gamecube how about we try to run a GC emulator on the switch?

 

[kevin corms]

maybe the movement but not the pointer. I still very much like my wiimote+nunchuck setup for many wii games.

I hear ya, but the pointer actually works.

 

[RedoLane]

It'll take some time until we can run Super Mario Galaxy on a futuristic microwave.

 

[BvanBart]

Oh well... this is nice and all. But the question everyone is asking: When will this be released on the Switch

 

[shaunj66]

I wish there was a way to get these on a regular Shield. It's such a great device.

 

[deinonychus71]

Come on Nintendo, give us Super Mario Sunshine, give us Melee... give us Timesplitters 2...

 

[the_randomizer]

I wish there was a way to get these on a regular Shield. It's such a great device.

Region locking is a BS practice, stupid exclusivity.

 

[Yepi69]

I got a question, how can anyone play Super Mario Galaxy without a pointer? Using the touchscreen while playing the game would be cumbersome? I know you can just ignore the star bits or pick them up yourself but I'm actually curious on how they're gonna emulate the pointer without a Wii Remote and the IR sensor.

 

[Kioku]

I got a question, how can anyone play Super Mario Galaxy without a pointer? Using the touchscreen while playing the game would be cumbersome? I know you can just ignore the star bits or pick them up yourself but I'm actually curious on how they're gonna emulate the pointer without a Wii Remote and the IR sensor.

Gyro comes to mind.

 

[Yepi69]

Gyro comes to mind.

Oh yeah, completely forgot about it.

 

[I_AM_L_FORCE]

I wish there was a way to get these on a regular Shield. It's such a great device.

Apk.

 

[pedro702]

I got a question, how can anyone play Super Mario Galaxy without a pointer? Using the touchscreen while playing the game would be cumbersome? I know you can just ignore the star bits or pick them up yourself but I'm actually curious on how they're gonna emulate the pointer without a Wii Remote and the IR sensor.

if you see the video he says at any time you move the left analog the pointer appears on screen so like FPS games left analog stick makes the pointer appear and move and right stick moves your character.

 

[the_randomizer]

if you see the video he says at any time you move the left analog the pointer appears on screen so like FPS games left analog stick makes the pointer appear and move.

Prob with that is the more precise parts of levels (like where you have to drag Mario to precise points) will be a royal PITA to pull off