It looks like the next generation of Pokémon games could price out millions of players.
Pokémon Legends: Z-A is the last farewell of Gen 9, with the next generation expected to launch sometime in 2026.
Despite the popularity of recent Pokémon titles though, it appears as though the next generation of games could be set to leave behind a large number of players.
According to Nintendo’s second quarter financial results report, which was published earlier today, the Switch 2 has been selling well.
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As Nintendo reports, the Switch 2 has seen strong sales, “with cumulative sell-in surpassing 10 million units worldwide as of September 30. This marks the highest global sales figure for any dedicated video game platform from Nintendo in the first four months following its launch”.
Meanwhile, Nintendo later claims that 84 percent of Switch 2 players transitioned from the original Switch, indicating a strong conversion rate between platforms.
“This high percentage shows that many consumers who enjoyed Nintendo Switch are smoothly transitioning to Nintendo Switch 2, allowing us to maintain our relationships with them across platform generations [...] Consumers who purchased Nintendo Switch between its launch in 2017 and the launch of Nintendo Switch 2 have been uniformly migrating to Nintendo Switch 2”.
What will this mean for Nintendo Switch owners?
With this in mind, however, the company will be shifting development focus away from games on the original Switch console, and focusing solely on Switch 2 in the future.
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As Nintendo reports, “While our business focus will shift to Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch has maintained a steady sales pace even after the June launch of its successor. While taking consumer demand and the business environment into consideration, we will continue sales of Nintendo Switch hardware.”
What this essentially means is that all of Nintendo’s future major games will be designed and released for Nintendo Switch 2, with the original Switch being slowly discontinued. The last major game released for the Switch appears to be Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream.
However, the statement also shows that the company will continue to sell Nintendo Switch consoles if the demand is there, which there clearly still is for the time being.
This would still mean that the next Pokémon game will only release for the Nintendo Switch 2, with Gen 10 leaving a lot of players who haven’t yet switched over to the next generation unable to play it.
Topics: Pokemon, Nintendo, Nintendo Switch 2, Nintendo Switch