Nintendo absolutely could go off into left field and do something completely different next gen, but people assume Switch 2 because we all want just a next-gen version of the Switch in a few years and the hybrid concept has been insanely successful with the Switch very possible becoming the best selling system ever so why would Nintendo run away from that success. Also after doing a hybird it's not like they are going to go back to an ordinary console or handheld-only, so regardless of what they do it seems obvious they'll stick with the hybrid concept which means very likely it'll be a direct successor. Of course knowing Nintendo they might add in some other thing like maybe it'll also somehow be VR or something I can't even think of.

What would Switch U even look like? Bulkier, bloated interface full of loading, and one big joy-con with a screen on it, (Codenamed Project Bastard sword, because it’ll be big enough for players to use two hands on one of them for complex games) and EA will be really keen on unprecedented development on it so we can get great EA hits……. like Madden :D

It will feature the next level of asymmetric gameplay: obtuse multiplayer - slower, more annoying, and more difficult to understand than ever before.

You can play Switch games on it, but it takes an extra 4 minutes to load “Switch Mode” and you’ll have to somehow figure out how to sync classic joy cons to the beast of a console, Switch U will weigh a whopping 6.5 kilograms (that’s right, in the UK it’ll be called The Stone).

Probably won’t happen.
Oh well… we can always dream.

I am 100% sure its not gonna be called Switch 2. I can bet any money on it.

Nintendo has never ever named a console with a number, its always been super or U or something like that.

I in no way was suggesting in my post that Nintendo invented the technology, just was proving that when they add a new technology they tend to keep using it in future generations lately.

Nintendo should just concentrate on making games for a couple more years. The existing hardware is just fine for running the sort of games their customers crave... People who want a powerful console will just go and buy a PS5 anyway (oh wait a second - no they can't)

At that point maybe the chip shortage will be over and technology will have moved on, allowing Nintendo's next hardware to leapfrog PS5/XBox. In the meantime, battery upgrades, cosmetic upgrades and maybe a price cut will do everything necessary to keep the Switch fresh.

Nintendo should never pursue innovation purely for innovation's sake again.

If they had released a 'Wii 2' that kept or slightly upgraded the Wiimote instead of trying to reinvent the wheel again with the gamepad then the system would have sold multiple times what the Wii U did. The original Wii was outselling the Wii U for much of 2013 despite being abandoned and replaced by Nintendo, so it wasn't the Wii brand that was the problem. The Wii U was so unappealing that Nintendo would have been better off just continuing to make Wii games and selling Wiis instead of making the Wii U. They'd have sold more Wiis from 2012-2017 than they did Wii U's in that period if they kept supporting and producing the Wii. I doubt a true Wii 2 would have sold 100 million like the Wii, but I could see it selling anywhere from SNES numbers to 3DS numbers.

Nintendo is in a similar situation now to where it was in the Wii era, and if they try to reinvent the wheel again they will be making the same mistake all over again. The Switch as a concept and brand could be as stable and popular as Playstation is and the Gameboy brand used to be before the DS prematurely killed off the GBA. It could be a line of systems that sells 100 million consoles every generation as long as Nintendo doesn't screw it up. The end of the motion control boom meant that the Wii brand didn't have that kind of potential even if its successors could still have outsold the NES, but the Switch can do it if Nintendo doesn't muck it up like they did with the Wii U. They could lose many tens of millions of console sales by introducing a bad innovation like they did with the gamepad.

I wish Nintendo would adopt a two step model: one gen innovating, one gen refining. Meaning they innovated with the Switch concept and follow up with a refined Switch 2. But the reality of Nintendo is, that they tried to innovate each gen for the past two decades. They got lucky with the 3DS, the 3D stuff wasn't a hit, but they kept the DS features so that the 3DS still worked well and fixed pricing and lackluster initial library to steer the initial bad response in a different direction. Still, I assume a true DS2 would probably have done better than 3DS. They dropped the ball hard with WiiU. Despite the name the WiiU did everything to be different from the Wii, and the result was a devastating failure.

So I wish Nintendo would us just give a Switch 2 and after that tries something new, but I fully expect them to give us a Switch U. Because that is what Nintendo does.