Yeah I think you're right.

I mean obviously the timing wouldn't make sense to launch a successor early in the year as that would cut off holiday 2023 sales for Switch. No reason whatsoever for Nintendo to do that to themselves. That's a no brainer. As you said it was fine when Switch did it because WiiU sales were already long since dead.

Q1 2024 announcement and Q2 2024 launch is the earliest we'll see. I expect Switch sales will indeed be slowing down a good bit in 2024 so a holiday Switch 2 launch would lead to low HW numbers for Nintendo in 2024. They could always do HW price cuts, SW price cuts, plus launch GB and GBA on NSO, and have a last small round of fan-desired games in 2024 to keep interest in Switch fairly strong until a holiday Switch 2 launch.

Essentially, if Nintendo doesn't want one fairly bad year of HW sales, they'll launch probably in late Spring '24, if they are fine just gobbling up insane SW profits while letting HW sales become lackluster and perhaps actually taking some steps to increase sales, they should have no problem launching Holiday '24. 

There is certainly no rush for a successor to launch. Plenty of big games people are still waiting/hoping for (Zelda, Prime remake, DK, Prime 4, Pikmin, 2D Mario, and hopefully more), and I doubt there's anyone that doesn't have a big backlog of Switch games to play through. Honestly I might put off getting the successor for a couple years just to give me time to get through my Switch games. For gamers Holiday '24 is just fine.

I think Q1 2025. Switch will sell probably between 17-18 mil. this year. I expect a 2D Mario for the holidays season, so together with Zelda: TotK these numbers are achievable. Then 2024 they probably will sell 11-12 mil., in my opinion good enough numbers for a transitional year. Then come with Switch 2 in March 2025. I think, not releasing in the holidays season is an advantage as the Nintendo fans and gaming enthusiasts will buy it anyway at launch, so they will have less shortage problems for the holidays season for all the others who want to buy one.

I'm thinking the same, Switch had supply problems the whole year it was released.

I'm just curious how much that would affect Switch Holiday and even other consoles too.

I think not even Nintendo could have guessed how many Switches they would need in 2017. I don’t believe that will be a problem this go around. I don’t know what components they’ll be using, but I don’t think there will be as many problems getting them as has been true for Sony and Microsoft’s more powerful systems.

I could see the Q1 2025 result, but only because of software pipeline issues.

I agree that not launching during the holidays is definitely beneficial because then they get the big launch sales along with big holiday sales. I think the Switch proved this. BUT, launching Switch 2 in March 2025 would require them to announce it probably in Summer or early Fall 2024, and it would effectively kill off Switch sales for the 2024 holiday season as people will mostly be waiting for the new system.

So it would just make more sense to launch it holiday 2024 rather than suffer a very weak holiday season. The last thing Nintendo is going to want to have during any year is have a really weak holiday season.

If they want the double spike in sales the first year from launch as well as holiday they would probably launch Spring/Summer 2024. But I wouldn't be surprised if they give Switch software more time to sell (considering TotK is coming out this year and presumably 2D Mario will be coming as well and those will both be mega selling games with legs) and launch during the 2024 holidays rather than get that double sales spike.

If they launch holiday 2024, I just hope they have several million systems on shelves. It would suck to go through the Switch drought again where they were impossible to find for the first year or so.

I really don't know how they gonna insure the transition.

At this point, the Switch is one of the best consoles ever made, with a huge library, it scored everything a console needs to score throughout its lifecycle. Unless there is a clear separation between the two generations, the transition will be hard.

1. Full backward compatibility.

2. Make it a Switch 2, same hybrid concept and everything, just perfecting the design and obviously a large spec boost. Also at least 128gb of storage so people don't have to go get an SD card within the first couple months of owning the system.

3. NSO operational on the system from day 1 so the online service can make a seamless transition. Maybe even announce before launch that GC will be added to the service within 12 months of the launch.

4. Probably stop manufacturing the Switch as soon as the Switch 2 launches because presumably the next-gen system will be no more than the OLED price point so it wouldn't make sense to confuse consumers with Switch and Switch 2 at similar/same price points. Maybe just keep the Lite around since its a different price point so people very late to the game can still buy a new last-gen Switch. Other option is to do like $100 price cuts on OG and OLED but that doesn't seem likely.

5. MK9 and 3D Mario on launch. With a healthy lineup of first party and big third party games announced for the first 12 months.

6. Manufacture plenty of systems for launch and the period after so there aren't millions of eager gamers unable to buy it.

7. Make online communication better so you can actually message friends directly from the system to set up play sessions and whatnot.

8. Keep the same eshop from Switch (maybe with some improvements) and if someone has a Switch 2 just move the Switch stuff to its own tab. So that Swith and Switch 2 games are all integrated into a single eshop system, helping with the ease of backwards compatibility for users.

9. Include Super Mario Galaxy 2 on every system since they totally bizarrely left it out of 3D Mario All-Stars despite including the first Galaxy (okay this is more wishful thinking lol)

Basically just do everything they can do make the transition seamless for current Switch owners, and make the system feel like the same great hybrid concept but perfected and brought up to the graphical standards of the 2020s.

The problem with all of what you said is that this is exactly what they did with the Wii U and 3DS

Not even close. The WiiU was most definitely not a Wii2. It’s about as far removed from that experience as you can imagine. 4 folks playing motion gaming in a living room becomes one gamer staring down at a gamepad and looking up at the tv, often going back and forth between the two. I love the WiiU, but it definitely doesn’t have that same open, inclusive feeling of the Wii. 

The 3DS was a transition searching for a gimmick and most folks were already nonplussed by 3D graphics. The AR stuff was definitely interesting, but not WiiSports or Nintendogs interesting. 

Both the DS and the Wii were built on casual audiences. Folks that didn’t necessarily buy a lot of games or play a lot of games. They were also folks who could easily transition into mobile experiences. And I do think a lot of the Wii audience, folks that had just come into gaming, “graduated” to the more typical gaming experience with the PS4. 

The Switch avoids these pitfalls. Its audience is core by and large. They buy plenty of games in a variety of genres and the Switch provides a standard gaming experience when docked with a Pro Controller. Nintendo has iterated on many of their most beloved franchises, creating some of the best reviewed and best selling titles in their history. At this point the transition is Nintendo’s to lose. If they do what the previous poster recommends they will find success. It will be contingent on the software and the newness of each experience. 

All that being said, this is Nintendo and they could do what you are claiming the previous poster said: they could burn the Switch to the ground, replace it with a newfangled concept that while fun and interesting alienates or confuses the established audience and fails to truly communicate this new experience or deliver software that underwhelms in its execution. 

I see no problem with a Switch successor being basically the Switch with more power. Isn't that basically what PS5 & XSX are compared to PS4 & XBO? Despite that, XSX is outpacing XBO and while PS5 has lagged behind PS4, that is due to stiffer competition and shortages. Both systems could end up outselling their predecessors in the long run despite being seemingly more of the same.

If Nintendo wants to do gimmicks, they should do them as optional peripherals, like what they did with Ring Fit & Labo. I think it's pretty clear that people are willing to pay for more expensive hardware so long as it packs more power and has a standard experience. They could also innovate within the games themselves, which Nintendo has done with the Switch generation anyways.

In short, I am saying let the games themselves and external, optional peripherals do the innovating while the system itself retains a standard (hybrid) function.