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Soundwave on 30 September 2021
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Zero_Revolution said:
hinch said:

Look at how carefully worded that response from Nintendo is. Its hard to imagine all 11 sources being wrong.

There's years of planning for hardware releases, you don't simply cancel them.

Fyi Takashi Mochizuki was the same person who reported dev kits going out for the NX (Nintendo Switch) in 2015.

"The exact shape of the NX hardware isn't yet clear. People familiar with the development plans said Nintendo would likely include both a console and at least one mobile unit that could either be used in conjunction with the console or taken on the road for separate use. They also said Nintendo would aim to put industry-leading chips in the NX devices, after criticism that the Wii U's capabilities didn't match those of competitors. "

https://www.wsj.com/articles/nintendo-begins-distributing-software-kit-for-new-nx-platform-1444996588

I mean, yes and no. They're certainly planned years in advance, but plans do still change, and sometimes things are cancelled outright. Even going by Nintendo's history, this could be a similar story to the Game Boy, where a full successor was planned for release around 1998 (which was officially shown by Nintendo over a decade later) but due to Pokémon reinvigorating the system, they opted to just release a modest upgrade instead with the Game Boy Color. Could be the same with Switch 4K and OLED, with the factors leading to it being that Switch is still performing very well, and the chip shortage making them want to elongate the standard Switch's lifespan.

Other cancelled Nintendo handhelds include the GBA 2, and a 3DS successor separate from the Switch, both of which Nintendo confirmed were in the works, yet never happened. (I guess we technically have no idea if the 3DS successor was cancelled but I mean, it's pretty obvious) 

It's doubtful this would happen today. 

Modern chip designs are not cheap, especially Nvidia ones. The 90s/even early 2000s was a totally different time. If Nintendo invested in a 4K capable chip design to the point where dozens (?) of developers were given actual development kits, I doubt it would be cancelled. 

I mean for what even? The Switch itself is a few months shy of 5 years old, which is getting onto the older side for any game system, its no longer a spring chicken, so a successor chip has to be in development by this point in time anyway. 

From what I understand as well Project: Atlantis (cancelled Game Boy successor) and the GBA2 never got out of prototype stage either, they never had dev kits given to broad 3rd parties. When you are sending dev kits out to developers to begin software development you've basically committed to the system becoming a consumer product. You don't waste developers' time by giving them a dev kit to work on for months and then not having hardware release, even Sega never did that. 

Not to mention if that ever happened anonymous devs would blab about it immediately to the gaming press "I worked for 3 months on a Nintendo prototype game and they cancelled it!!", that story would be everywhere. 

Last edited by Soundwave - on 30 September 2021