During the Direct at the start of the month, Nintendo laid out their plans for breathing new life into a number of Switch games through a series of free and paid updates. So far we have a number of titles confirmed to be receiving free updates, with the focus being a mixture graphical and performance upgrades, as well as adding support for features like GameShare. Though some of the titles shown aren’t necessarily headliners, I was pretty happy to see both Link’s Awakening and the most recent Pokemon releases in Scarlet and Violet present. These are games that really do need that performance kick, and I’m glad I won’t be needing to pay for it.

The other titles that have been announced are:

• Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury
• Super Mario Odyssey
• The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom
• Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker
• New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe
• Game Builder Garage
• 51 Worldwide Games
• ARMS
• Big Brain Academy: Brain vs. Brain

When it comes to the paid updates, titled "Switch 2 Editions" by Nintendo, the content you’re going to get seems to vary a little more. On one end of the scale we have Super Mario Party Jamboree and Kirby and the Forgotten Land. These games will feature improved graphics and framerate, with Mario Party specifically naming support for 1440p on the TV, and 1080p in handheld mode. On top of this though, both are getting a seemingly-substantial bit of additional content. For Jamboree this comes in the form of new modes and minigames to make use of the Switch 2’s new features. Though something quite small on paper, the camera support for online parties is something that actually has me quite excited. Mario Party is a game that can get surprisingly heated when playing with friends, and a good amount of that can be diffused as you see them holding back a laugh while your world falls apart around you. Kirby’s update adds a new story: Star-Crossed World. This appears to be a DLC expansion in the purest form, adding new levels with a really striking visual theme.

You can either upgrade your existing Switch game, or buy a new Switch 2 Edition with everything on the cartridge.​

On the other end of the scale we have Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom. Both of these games aren’t getting any new content, but will support “improved performance in higher resolution”. The varying amounts of detail for each game on Nintendo’s official page is odd, but that’s what we’re working with. Beyond that the games are getting HDR support and a new service within Nintendo’s mobile Switch app in Zelda Notes. You can think of the latter there a helpful tool for your time in Hyrule, allowing you to better track your progress and navigate the terrain. It does seem somewhat handy, though I can imagine most of the people who will be getting access to this are already very familiar with the land, these games being eight and two years old respectively.

Breath of the Wild is in some ways the most notable title of this lineup for it already having DLC to purchase in its Expansion Pass. Since the original announcement of a new release for the game, including a boxed physical version, fans have been left speculating as to whether this DLC will be packaged in for a definitive release. After an interview with IGN, it’s sadly been confirmed that this is not the case. Though the cartridge will contain both the original Switch game and its Switch 2 upgrade without the need for an additional download, you will still be left needing to fork out a further £17.99 for the full experience. This does sting slightly more for the fact Nintendo have released a definitive version of Breath of the Wild in the past that included the DLC on-cartridge, even if it was limited to Asia. It may be of little solace to some, but it is worth mentioning that the upgrades for both Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom will be free to download for Nintendo Switch Online Expansion Pack subscribers. This could be setting a trend for the more substantial graphical upgrades that don’t necessarily add extra content to be added to NSO, but that is just speculation from me at this point.

Update 18th April:
As a minor addition to the information above, it has been confirmed via Marvelous' FAQ page for Rune Factory: Guardians of Azuma that the Nintendo Switch 2 Edition cartridges will be compatible with original Switch systems. According to the page, you "simply insert the card into either a Nintendo Switch or Nintendo Switch 2 console, and the correct version will launch automatically." On the same page, Marvelous also confirm a 64GB game card is being used.

Both the Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom upgrades will be free to download for NSO+EP members.​

Though each of these four upgrades will cost you, the amount you’ll be paying varies from game to game. The information we currently have on pricing is a little scattered, so to summarise what has been confirmed for the upgrades:

• Breath of the Wild: 1000 JPY / $9.99 / Included with NSO+EP
• Tears of the Kingdom: 1000 JPY / $9.99 / Included with NSO+EP
• Kirby and the Forgotten Lands: 2000 JPY
• Super Mario Party Jamboree: 2000 JPY

In the UK we also have the physical versions of these four titles available to pre-order, each with the same price of £66.99 when ordered directly from Nintendo. Though this may seem like the cheaper pricing of the Zelda upgrades isn’t taken into account, it should be noted that both Kirby and Mario Party retail for £49.99 directly from Nintendo. This is £10 less than the £59.99 Zelda releases. From this we can assume the standalone upgrades will be around £7 for the Zelda games and £17 for the others, which isn’t too far off the confirmed standalone prices from Japan.

Four Switch games have been confirmed to be getting Switch 2 Edition upgrades.​

And that’s pretty much where we stand right now. Most of the key points have been clarified through a number of interviews, but one question I still have on my mind is whether the new physical versions of these games will make use of the increased read speeds that come with Switch 2 cartridges. If that is the case, users sticking with their original Switch games could be left with an inferior experience unless Nintendo decide to make your Switch cartridges act like a Game Key Card on the new system to make use of its faster internal storage.

Are there any upgrades you’re particularly looking forward to? Are there any games you’re hoping will get this treatment down the line? Let us know your thoughts below.

Nintendo Switch 2 Edition Overview

 

[PatrickD85]

Well let's say it's a all a bit of confusing this time. Nintendo could have done a better job in defining things, naming prices, etc etc. But still I'm really looking forward to the Nintendo Switch 2.

 

[Ligeia]

For how many years can Nintendo keep recycling Wii U titles ?

 

[Deleted member 671727]

On one hand i think its reasonable what nintendo is trying to do here... On the other hand. Paying for updates? Never.
Better hope that this will never come to the pc market. Everytime you upgrade your GPU you have to buy an GPU Update for every single game... Better not shouting that out loud

So why i think its reasonable? You need developers to adjust everything, and developers cost money. So yeah.
But everything inside my body is telling me that charging for an update is wrong! Totally anti consumer.

So in the end, i dislike what ninty is doing here.
It looks like they want to keep the old games desperately alive because they have zero launch titles. At least 0 to 1 that matter.
MP4 still has no release date, so i bet it will not be a launch title. Otherwise nintendo had already mentioned that.

If Nintendo will really launch the switch 2 only with mario kart (third party does not count) , it will be the worst new console ever in the entire gaming history.

 

[PatrickD85]

For how many years can Nintendo keep recycling Wii U titles ?

A lot has been ported, except for some edge cases, an the likes of Starfox Zero and Starfox Guard that come to mind.
Wooly World will probably be happening soon-ish.

But beside that what is there really left?

 

[Scarlet]

A lot has been ported, except for some edge cases, an the likes of Starfox Zero and Starfox Guard that come to mind.
Wooly World will probably be happening soon-ish.

But beside that what is there really left?

Wooly World was soft-confirmed to be coming to the Switch in the April 2nd Direct. They showed footage of it in the Switch games section.

 

[Purple_Shyguy]

sadly doom eternal is one of those not compatible games on switch 2 acording to nintendo compatibility list so unless bethesda updates it to fix it it wont even start on switch 2

Panic Button will fix it.

 

[PatrickD85]

Wooly World was soft-confirmed to be coming to the Switch in the April 2nd Direct. They showed footage of it in the Switch games section.

Yes exactly what I was alluding to
Keep in mind though that was only in the US Direct, in the UK Direct or my native Dutch Direct they did actually use Crafted World. But I hope they just release it for Switch. And yeah I have a Wii U with the game etc, but well the Wii U is really collecting dust (or well not being played at least)

Post automatically merged: Apr 13, 2025

Panic Button will fix it.

If any team does fix their games for NS2, they would.

 

[SDA]

I doubt my GOAT Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope will ever get this treatment. Shame, because that is a great game.

 

[PatrickD85]

I doubt my GOAT Mario + Rabbids Sparks of Hope will ever get this treatment. Shame, because that is a great game.

I feel that pain. Both Mario+Rabbids titles where awesome.
Ubisoft sadly seems to be oh-so focused on making Assassin's Creed clones every year or so now ... as that makes them moooooore money. Shame though David Soliane deserved so much more.

 

[SDA]

I feel that pain. Both Mario+Rabbids titles where awesome.
Ubisoft sadly seems to be oh-so focused on making Assassin's Creed clones every year or so now ... as that makes them moooooore money. Shame though David Soliane deserved so much more.

I hardly care about Ubisoft anymore now. The game is good, the company behind it is a completely different story.

 

[Bladexdsl]

so they want to charge nearly as much as the ps5 pro, charge you for game updates which barely improve the game anyway, release with the worst launch lineup in gaming history and to top it all off the useless thing isn't even as powerful as the ps5! they truly are the next apple since they don't even make consoles anymore it's just fucking tablets!

 

[Moogley]

Yeah, I really can't imagine why anyone who has been gaming for more than 5 years would buy into this $10 upgrade nonsense. The games are 7 years old, they were made for an aging chipset even back then, so I'm not gonna cash in my IRA to put the map on my phone, which is ironically the biggest feature they cut from the Wii U version to prevent the Switch one from looking bad.

It's all part of modern Nintendo's cycle of theorizing, withholding, and then paywalling creative features as "bonuses" instead of just deploying them in the base products like they used to.

It's really important for people not to buy these upgrade packs, not just because of the low use case but ESPECIALLY if they have a high use case. Because if they sell, there will be no limit to the number of fun features they will cut from new releases, only to sell them to us later as "additional content."

 

[BraveDragonWolf]

All I care about is that they finally announced the new Kirby Air Ride game.
Because since last year and the year before, I've always knew they were planning something.

Spoiler

...Too bad I won't be able to be apart of any of this.

 

[pedro702]

On one hand i think its reasonable what nintendo is trying to do here... On the other hand. Paying for updates? Never.
Better hope that this will never come to the pc market. Everytime you upgrade your GPU you have to buy an GPU Update for every single game... Better not shouting that out loud

So why i think its reasonable? You need developers to adjust everything, and developers cost money. So yeah.
But everything inside my body is telling me that charging for an update is wrong! Totally anti consumer.

So in the end, i dislike what ninty is doing here.
It looks like they want to keep the old games desperately alive because they have zero launch titles. At least 0 to 1 that matter.
MP4 still has no release date, so i bet it will not be a launch title. Otherwise nintendo had already mentioned that.

If Nintendo will really launch the switch 2 only with mario kart (third party does not count) , it will be the worst new console ever in the entire gaming history.

sony has made many ps4 to ps5 upgrades way before nintendo ever did...

 

[The Real Jdbye]

10 bucks isn't a lot of money by any means, but for a minor patch to enable improved resolution/framerate that probably takes them all of 20 minutes to make, I think they could've sold them for $5 and included them (current and future) for free with NSO if you commit to a 1 year plan. A small gesture like that would show that they care about their most loyal subscribers.

All in all, it's not what I hoped for. I imagined that some games would receive patches to better utilize the Switch 2 hardware, but I really hoped that backwards compatibility would enable full clock speeds out of the box so that any demanding Switch game would be able to at least achieve higher resolutions with dynamic resolution scaling, and more stable framerates.
Since they've chosen to charge money for the patches, it seems very unlikely they'll also enable higher clock speeds for regular Switch games, as that would lead to less sales (or in their mind at least it would)

We can probably expect most 1st party games that would benefit from it to receive patches, but what about all the 3rd party games that probably won't? 3rd party games tend to struggle more than 1st party ones.

There's been no mention of a patch for PokemoN S/V, understandably they might want to focus on the upcoming game for now but I hope that receives a patch as well. It sorely needs it.

 

[Scarlet]

There's been no mention of a patch for PokemoN S/V, understandably they might want to focus on the upcoming game for now but I hope that receives a patch as well. It sorely needs it.

Read the main post, there has very much been a mention of Pokemon Scarlet and Violet lol.

They’re getting a free performance update.

 

[Exnor]

It's good but what I wanted was a new Zelda to go along with NS2, not Zelda games we had on NS1.

Yep. Same here.

But Nintendo wants to milk those 2 games until they are dry.
BoTW was a Wii U game ffs Nintendo! This s##t is why people get fed up and start "pirating" games. I'm surprised that aren't more people using migswitch (or its clones).

 

[MurraySkull]

Yeah, I really can't imagine why anyone who has been gaming for more than 5 years would buy into this $10 upgrade nonsense. The games are 7 years old, they were made for an aging chipset even back then, so I'm not gonna cash in my IRA to put the map on my phone, which is ironically the biggest feature they cut from the Wii U version to prevent the Switch one from looking bad.

It's all part of modern Nintendo's cycle of theorizing, withholding, and then paywalling creative features as "bonuses" instead of just deploying them in the base products like they used to.

It's really important for people not to buy these upgrade packs, not just because of the low use case but ESPECIALLY if they have a high use case. Because if they sell, there will be no limit to the number of fun features they will cut from new releases, only to sell them to us later as "additional content."

After all, PS4-to-PS5 upgrades are free, at least for as long I have had a PS5, no reason Nintendo can't do the same.

And with the possible exception of Kirby and the Forgotten Land, I can't see any justification for it.

 

[Captain_N]

New Super mario Bros U? wtf thats a wii U game. It should be running its full potential on the switch already

 

[Scarlet]

New Super mario Bros U? wtf thats a wii U game. It should be running its full potential on the switch already

It’s already running at 1080/60 on the Switch. They might get 4K/60 out of it on the Switch 2, but I imagine the main reason it’s on the free update list is for the GameShare feature?

Edit:
Seems not actually. It really might just be a 4K/60 kinda deal. Thinking back I suppose that does make sense, since it never supported anything but same-screen multiplayer. I think the GameShare thing just gives people another copy of the game temporarily to play local/online. Having said that though, Mario Odyssey was the same deal. It's tough to call, maybe it'll get added, even if it's not on the list lol

With some luck they'll bump the framerate in the game too though. 1080/120 in handheld mode would actually be pretty nice.