Yeah, I have noticed that myself. Certain publishers, especially Japanese pubs, use "Winter xxxx" to describe the January-March quarter on the following calendar year, so even though it says Winter 2023 is when DLC 2 will release, it doesn't necessarily mean a December 2023 release, DLC 2 could actually release in January-March 2024, and Switch 2 could also release Q1 2024, and this Pokemon leaker would be right in that scenario.

The leaker claims they're working on patches to make the game run better on the "new model" which would rule out a simple cosmetic change.

I have been burned too many times by devs saying the game is coming Winter xxxx expecting it to come around November, only for it to come a few months later next year or get delayed to summer.

March 2024 isn't bad launch timing, gives more time for a big Mario game.

Here we go again. Remember how the switch pro turned out? This thread is filled with personal wishes or expectations. When we put those aside and look at the amount of software that switch is selling now vs at the beginning its a lot higher. Sure hardware sales are slowing down some but was still beating xbox and ps up until the last two months.

Is launching an entirely new system this year really that much more profitable for Nintendo as opposed to waiting a year or two and sell potentially alot more switch software before the inevitable plummet at the announcement of a new system?

The DS sold over 20m units in 2010, the 3DS launched Feb 2011. The whole "sales are still high" isn't as convincing an argument as people think it is.

Still on team Holiday 2024 personally though.

I'm always shocked at how quickly people beleive leaks... it wasn't that long ago we were definitely for sure getting WWHD and TPHD ports on the switch and new hardware with BotW2 launch......  Prime Trilogy HD and a pro.

And back then, Nintendo was still reacting to its competitors. Since the PS4/5 aren’t really affecting the Switch and they have the handheld market for themselves, they can take their time and release the successor at the right without rushing it (3DS). 

I think you're right though I think it could be something like summer 2024 to early fall 2024, depends on software probably more than anything. 

It really just depends on when the hardware is ready, when launch games are ready, and when Switch sales slowdown, as well as when they finish up the last round of Switch games to get them on the market.

I'm guessing the hardware could be ready at any point as they are probably gonna be using chipsets from 2022 and I would certainly think they have the design done now and have late stage prototypes and everything.
They could be very far along in development of MK9 and a new 3D Mario which presumably would be the launch games.
Switch sales are slowing but still should be pretty solid this year, though next year they could drop to levels Nintendo doesn't like.
And presumably they have a few more AAA and AA games coming out on Switch that haven't been announced yet and I would think that would take them through at least another 12 months.

If they don't plan on doing much of anything to lengthen the Switch's lifecycle (price cuts, new models) then I could see a late Spring 2024 successor launch. That way they don't announce it until after the holidays, so as to not hurt Switch sales over the holidays, while still giving consumers a few months to get ready. So perhaps 12 months after Zelda we get the next-gen system.

It’s not like Nintendo HAS to launch Switch 2 with Zelda. After the massive decline from DS/Wii to 3DS/Wii U and all the unknown variables around Switch, Nintendo had to make sure it had a killer app at launch.

Before launch people were arguing that it was too expensive, too weak, too big, short battery life, not enough storage, no 3rd party support, poor online, Joy-Cons were too small and expensive, etc. As long as the successor isn’t a wild departure from the current concept than we know none of those things are a factor.

I don’t think Switch 2 will launch this holiday but if it did than Metroid Prime 4 and a casual game that shows off any new features would be fine for 1st party launch titles.