A second rumour claims the Switch 2 will be out this year and it seems to have some plausible evidence: Nintendo has banned the source.
If you were to guess what Nintendo’s plans might be for their next console, which may or may not be called the Switch 2, you’d probably think that a 2024 release date seemed most likely; given there’s been no official hint of new hardware for this year and Nintendo would probably be tempted to go for another May release, the same as the first Nintendo Switch.
That does seem plausible, with the only real circumstantial evidence being the lack of new games confirmed for the second half of this year. And yet two recent rumours have suggested the Switch 2 will actually launch in 2023.
The first was from a leaker that had already been proven accurate when it comes to Pokémon DLC news, while the second is well known by fans and yet has allegedly been muzzled by Nintendo themselves.
The leaker known as Uncle Nintendo frequented the Famiboards forum and has previously proven to have inside knowledge about hardware before it’s announced, such as the new stand for the Switch OLED model and the Splatoon 3 hardware bundle.
Neither were very exciting revelations, but they did confirm that the leaker has accurate sources, close to Nintendo’s hardware production, with one of their last rumours being that they knew of a new, more powerful system that could still be announced this year.
Their very last communication was that they were involved in testing new components, ahead of an order to start mass production on unspecified new hardware.
Shortly after that though Uncle Nintendo was permabanned from the forum and all their threads deleted… supposedly at the request of Nintendo.
Companies having information taken down is always the best indication that something is true and while the leak never confirmed that a 2023 launch was happening, it seems Nintendo recognised that they were an accurate source and closed them down before they said anything else.
The Famiboards posts on the matter can be difficult to understand with all their peculiar lingo and references (the ‘ninja’ they keep talking about is, they imagine, Nintendo itself) but the news has also spread to Reddit and beyond and is fairly compelling.
Whoever Uncle Nintendo is they clearly did use to work on a production line but as they themselves said, even if Nintendo would prefer to launch their new console this year there’s no guarantee that will actually happen.
Even if that’s the plan at the moment it depends on a whole range of other factors, including component availability, production line capacity, and the progress of launch games.
