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Switch 2 will be backwards compatible with Switch

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288 points ashitlerferad | 5 comments | 06 Nov 24 14:32 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source
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dmonitor ◴[06 Nov 24 15:17 UTC] No.42063608[source]▶
This shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone. Nintendo has had a trend for the past couple decades of releasing "sequel" consoles that are essentially a modernized version of the old one with extra features, compatible with everything that released on the predecessor.

With all three major console manufacturers prioritizing backwards compatibility, and the rise in PC gaming (universally backwards compatible), people are starting to catch on to the fact that old games don't "expire" after 10 years. I wouldn't be surprised if backwards compatibility just becomes the standard for all gaming consoles going forward.

Tangential, but I'm also interested in seeing how games that released on old consoles and are continued to be played, like Fortnite, will support aging hardware. I don't like that Epic can one day announce the game just no longer works on that console, rendering your purchases null and void until you upgrade your hardware, but I can't expect them to update that version of the game forever.

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Taylor_OD ◴[06 Nov 24 16:55 UTC] No.42065199[source]▶
"Nintendo has had a trend for the past couple decades of releasing "sequel" consoles that are essentially a modernized version of the old one with extra features, compatible with everything that released on the predecessor."

Isnt it pretty much just the Wii and Wii U? I guess you could play GameCube disks on a Wii but calling the Wii a modernized version of the GameCube is a real stretch.

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1. aurareturn ◴[06 Nov 24 17:01 UTC] No.42065310[source]▶
Wii, Wii U, GBC, GBA, DS, 3DS all had backwards compatibility.
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2. estebank ◴[06 Nov 24 19:02 UTC] No.42067500[source]▶
Technically, so did the SNES with the NES, it was just never really exposed. SMB all-stars started as SMB3 running directly on SNES. And you had the Super GameBoy, but that was little more than a GameBoy in a cartridge.
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3. simondotau ◴[06 Nov 24 21:03 UTC] No.42069365[source]▶
The Sega Mega Drive (Genesis) had backwards compatibility with the Master System. Unlike the Super Game Boy, the Power Base Converter was barely more than a cartridge pass-through adapter. The Mega Drive’s 68000 is idled and its Z80 sound co-processor takes control as the main CPU.

https://segaretro.org/Power_Base_Converter

4. derefr ◴[06 Nov 24 21:37 UTC] No.42069839[source]▶
> Technically, so did the SNES with the NES, it was just never really exposed.

I've always wondered how true this is — I feel like if it was literally true, we'd see a lot of NES ROMhacks that involve editing the ROM's layout and metadata bits just enough that it's now a SNES ROM, and then taking advantage of SNES capabilities in the mod. But I don't believe I've ever seen something like that.

I do understand that the SNES CPU is basically a "very extended" 6502; and that the SNES PPU's default-on-boot graphics mode is compatible with drawing NES-PPU-formatted CHR-ROM data; and that there's a "legacy compatibility" joypad input MMIO in the right place in address space to allow a game that was programmed for the NES to read the "NES subset" of a SNES controller's buttons.

But is the SNES's (variant) 65C816 ISA a strict superset of the NES's (variant) 6502 ISA? Or would they have had to effectively go through the assembly code of SMB3 with a fine-toothed comb, fixing up little compatibilities in the available instructions here and there, to get it to run on the SNES?

(Though actually, even if they did have to do that, I imagine it would be still be possible to automate that process — i.e. it would be theoretically possible to write a NES-to-SNES static transpiler. In fact, it's so seemingly-tenable, that I'm a bit surprised to have never heard of such a project!)

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5. Uvix ◴[07 Nov 24 00:46 UTC] No.42071933{3}[source]▶
There's at least one such effort, Project Nested: https://github.com/Myself086/Project-Nested