Nintendo ended Tuesday’s Pokémon Presents with new footage for Pokémon Legends: Z-A on Nintendo Swap 2, exhibiting the participant wandering the streets of Lumiose Metropolis, having fun with a break within the park with a full staff of Pokémon, and having fast-moving, sharply animated battles with a number of Pokémon on-screen on the similar time. There’s a slight drawback with all this, although:. The footage was solely for Nintendo Swap 2.
I get it. Nintendo naturally needs to point out off the perfect model of a serious fall recreation that’s poised to promote tens of millions of copies. And I don’t suppose anybody who’s up-to-date with video video games thinks Pokémon Legends: Z-A will run as easily on the unique Swap as it can on the brand new console. However of us nonetheless have the suitable to know what to anticipate from their buy.
On the finish of March, Nintendo reported it had offered over 152 million Swap items world wide. 4 days after the Swap 2 launched, the corporate introduced it offered greater than 3 million items. It’s unimaginable to know what number of Swap homeowners may improve or what number of even care about Pokémon, however the level is, that’s lots of people who don’t have a Swap 2 but. Which suggests there are lots of people more likely to decide up A New Pokémon, belief it’ll be fantastic as a result of Nintendo, after which doubtlessly not have a technique to get their a refund in the event that they bought it digitally (to economize through Digital Recreation Card sharing, for instance).
Legends: Z-A may carry out fantastic on the unique Swap, however a number of the early footage Nintendo confirmed raises quite a lot of questions. The trailer from the March 2025 Nintendo Direct — the final time Nintendo revealed footage of the sport on the unique Swap — is usually a sequence of cinematics exhibiting off Lumiose Metropolis. The gameplay segments which are proven are much less demanding; you’re by no means seeing quite a lot of Pokémon and characters on display screen on the similar time. It seems to be fantastic, certain, however decision isn’t the necessary factor right here.
Throughout one scene roughly 1:33 minutes into the March trailer, the participant encounters a Dedenne and a Spewpa on a rooftop, each of whom are simply staring into the space. Perhaps they’re simply dissociating a bit as a deal with, but it surely’s extra seemingly that the system’s restricted processing energy is stopping them from behaving in a Pokémon-like manner. Given how Pokémon Scarlet and Violet on the unique Swap struggled to render sufficient Pokémon and have them behave appropriately within the open world, it makes me doubt the console’s capability to deal with issues like a number of Pokémon following you, residents procuring, strolling, and dwelling in a manner that makes the should-be-bustling metropolis really feel alive, and the way clean battle animations can be.
This lack of transparency will not be a brand new subject. In notes for Swap 2 editions of previous video games, Nintendo already established a precedent of not being notably candid about what Swap 2 upgrades truly enhance. Pokémon Scarlet and Violet’s Swap 2 description, for instance, solely mentions that the video games are “optimized for… high-resolution TVs” and have a body charge “improved for smoother motion.” That translated to assist for 4K decision and 60 fps. Nintendo did the identical for the Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom upgrades and refused to stipulate particularly what modifications different free and paid Swap 2 upgrades included.
The observe makes Nintendo an outlier, as higher openness about efficiency variations between console generations is, maybe not fairly a rule, however actually not the exception. Sony didn’t present official side-by-side comparisons of Horizon Forbidden West on PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 5, for instance, however did not less than publish footage of the sport working on older {hardware}. Publishers corresponding to Deep Silver often publish detailed spec sheets explaining what you’ll get from the lower- and higher-end consoles, because it did for Kingdom Come Deliverance 2, and it’s normal process with PC video games and their minimal and most spec. Even when official footage solely exhibits the sport working on highly effective {hardware}, you continue to get an thought of what it’ll seem like in your rig.
Perhaps Nintendo plans to do one thing comparable earlier than Pokémon Legends: Z-A’s launch date, with an in depth model comparability or maybe some further footage of the sport working on the unique Swap. (We’ve reached out to Nintendo asking simply that and can replace if we hear again.) If it doesn’t, and also you don’t personal a Swap 2, simply keep in mind that what you see from Z-A’s promotional supplies won’t be what you find yourself getting.