Rumors anticipate an announcement from Nintendo this Thursday (January 16) about the Nintendo Switch 2. This week's announcement may be just a teaser ahead of a bigger launch later this year, but whatever Nintendo plans to say, it's being preceded more leaks on what to expect from the highly anticipated Switch sequel.
In fact, a pair of new leaks surfaced revealing a more powerful GPU and possibly an explanation for the mysterious new 'C' button that has shown up on alleged dummy units of the follow-up console.
The bigger rumor comes from the Famiboards forums (as spotted by The Game Post), which tends to feature a ton of gaming leaks. There, leaker and dataminer ZachyCatGames has posted that the Switch 2's GPU clock speeds could hit or surpass 560 MHz when the handheld is in portable mode
What does that number mean? In comparison, the GPU on the Valve Steam Deck clocks in around 1.6 Ghz with about 1.6 TFLOPs of performance. Assuming the rumor is true, the Switch 2 is supposedly going to hit 1.72 TFLOPs in portable mode.
ZachyCatGames also claimed that a Switch 2 in docked mode will nearly double the speed of portable mode, hitting 1,007.3 MHz or about 3.09 TFLOPs.
It's not quite at PS4 or PS4 Pro levels but it's still significantly more powerful than the original Nintendo Switch.
Still, as with most things Nintendo Switch 2, do take this and the next rumor with a grain of salt. It's not entirely clear where these numbers are coming from. In fact, reading through the excruciatingly long forum thread, the claim seems more tongue in cheek.
The mysterious 'C' button
The other rumor comes to us via a Discord server that is dedicated to the Switch 2 (as spotted by GameRant). Datamining done by users in that server seem to indicate how Nintendo plans to use the new 'C' button that has been spotted on leaked images of the Switch 2.
Allegedly, the latest firmware from Nintendo mentions a feature named "Campus." A poster in the server alleged that this feature is related to group and voice chat support for Nintendo Switch Online subscribers.
They also claimed that "Campus" will allow screensharing and chat groups that can host up to 12 people. Presumably the C actually refers to chat and not Campus.
If true, it knocks down previous rumors suggesting that the C button was meant for screen captures.
Where we run into skepticism is with the idea of a chat function at all. In general, Nintendo has skewed very kid-friendly with the social functions of the Switch, which has meant keeping voice and chat off of the device. There are some games, like Mario Kart, where you can send pre-written messages after online races, but that's about it.
Nintendo seemed to learn its lesson with the Miiverse where people could send doodles and some messages in games like Splatoon, which quickly became filled with more perverse images that Nintendo clearly didn't want in its games. The service was discontinued in 2017.
A dedicated screen capture button still makes the most sense but we'll potentially know more of which direction Nintendo is leaning on January 16, assuming rumors of some sort of Switch revelation are true.
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