The TV dock barely adds anything to the cost of the Switch I'd bet. 

Switch is basically the evolution of the Nintendo portable line hardware wise

GBA = portable SNES+ 

Nintendo DS = portable N64/PSOne

3DS = portable PS2/GCN

Switch = portable 360/Wii U+

It's where the Nintendo portable line was going anyway, the only thing is once you get to 360/PS3 tier graphics, those graphics look good enough on a TV, so you might as well have a TV output option. That doesn't make the system cost 2x more or something. 

Nintendo console enhusiasts are really the ones getting the shaft here, if you only play at home, you are being given a "console" that is hugely compromised for portable play and paying for a bunch of stuff (LCD display, built-in battery) that you don't need. 

Nintendo portable fans don't have much/anything to complain about, this is the 3DS successor. What would a "HDS" even be? A dual screen PS3/360. Well that's basically what Switch is, it just gives you one large screen insead of dividing things up into two smaller displays, which I'm going to guess once a lot of you guys get used to playing on, you won't want to go back to two smaller screens. 

HDS should be that... 3DS X TABLET Keeping common library as it has more advantages than disadvantages* , needless to mention them since you have covered me in previous comments of yours.

* ( the only is if mario kart 9 on hybrid would sell as much mario kart 9 on home console and Mario kart 10 on handheld consoles would sell combined )

Perfect for those who love dual screens and for those who find clamshell design embarassing!

Personlly, I'm fearing of many 3DS ownrs who don't care about home consoles won't be buying switch which may seem to them  pricey and not very portable! There is huge risk, Nintendo handheld console unlike home console are always commercially successful business for Nintendo... ;)

"Switch Mini" around the size of a Vita/PSP is probably what you'll get at some point, but I'll say now I don't think that model will sell that great. People like larger screens, especially kids. They love the larger screen of tablets, it's part of why they are choosing tablets over traditional portables. When you get to a graphical range of like PS3/360/Wii U ... you want a decen sized screen to enjoy those games on, even 6.2 inches is probably a bit too small. 

A Switch XL (which will also probably happen) with a screen size more comparable to an iPad Mini (8-inches+) will likely also happen. 

@OP Sorry, but that very likely isn't going to happen. The reason Switch is happening, is two-fold.

1. Wii U, while it didn't lose them money, was a sales failure for them.

2. They have been talking as if they want to consolidate their development studios more, and I think having them be able to all focus on making games for one platform, instead of having to support two very different platforms, plays into that.



IF they can actually prove they learned something from the Wii U, and their mishandling of it, and thus IF Switch can actually be a success, I am not certainly we'll ever see another completely dedicated handheld from Nintendo again. Don't quote me on that. But don't be surprised if they stick with this Hybrid direction in the future, if it works.

Deintegration of Nintendo hardware I don't think is ever going to happen again.

Think about it.

Even if Switch is only a moderate success/lukewarm performer, even in 4 years, mobile chips that are 3x more powerful than the Switch (so 400 GFLOPS portable; 1 TFLOP "docked") will be cheap (10nm Tegra X4 lets say w/12GB RAM). 

There's no reason to not allow a portable to have a video output going forward especially when it can display relatively complex 3D visuals.

Graphically just about any mobile chip is going to allow Nintendo to make a very complex 3D game with a high level of visual effects or realism (which ever they chose).

There's no reason to have two separate hardware lines technically ... in the past, sure it was necessary because Nintendo portables were not suitable to provide the hardware for all the games Nintendo wanted to make. For example, of course there's no way in hell Super Mario 64 was running on a Game Boy Color.

But on mobile chips now, you can realistically make any Nintendo IP ... 3D Zelda, 3D Mario, Splatoon, etc. and it'll look decent, and it'll only look better and better as mobile chips continue to improve.

As such there's no reason to have two hardware lines ever again, what you might see are legacy system releases like NES Mini, SNES Mini, maybe some type of Game Boy Retro, etc. etc.

what you are describing is nothing more than a redesign which would still make Switch the 3DS successor.

If the switch is successfull in the future I can see Nintendo releasing 2 iterations one to emphatize handheld capabilities and one to emphatize home console capanilities. Still shared architecture and shared library.

I doubt that tbh, I can see them just sticking to the one design with maybe a redisgn model after 2-3 years before preparing a successor to release after 5-6 years.

Here is the thing, I think the smartest thing would be for Nintendo to allow for lower budget games (like truly the sequel games to the 3ds) to still develop for the Switch that cost less money ($40?) while also having the home console quality games on the same device ($60). That would be absolutely AMAZING if they did that and then it wouldn't feel like they are abandoning their handheld users that are used to a cheaper, less battery consuming, experience.

i think its highly likely, i remember a couple years ago during an investor meeting Iwata spoke about releasing a unified platform but the number of form factors could increase. Also Nintendo loves to release redesigns

2001-Gameboy Advance, 2003-Gameboy Advance SP, 2004-Nintendo DS, 2005-Gameboy Micro, 2006-Nintendo DS Lite, 2008-Nintendo DSi, 2009-Nintendo DSi XL, 2011-Nintendo 3DS, 2012-Nintendo 3DS XL, 2013-Nintendo 2DS, 2014-New Nintendo 3DS/XL