Nintendo’s plan to release 64GB Nintendo Switch game cards in 2018 has reportedly been delayed into 2019, according to a new Wall Street Journal report.
The report claims that Nintendo was hoping to roll out higher-capacity cards during the latter half of 2018, but “technical issues” are preventing the company from mass producing them. Currently, Nintendo Switch cartridges can hold up to 32GB of memory. 64GB cards would allow a ton of more storage space for developers to work with, even going above the 50GB limit on Blu-Ray discs on PS4 and Xbox One.
Nintendo chose to go with game cards over discs for the Switch in order to make the system more portable. And while Nintendo’s first-party titles like Super Mario Odyssey and Splatoon 2 are relatively small (anywhere from 2-6GB’s), third-party developers have struggled to keep them the same size. Ports like DOOM and L.A. Noire exceed the console’s built-in 32GB storage and require large microSD cards before downloading. Other games like the Resident Evil Revelations Collection only contain the first game on the cart, while the second game is download-only.
Coming back to the topic at hand, Nintendo was hoping to solve this issue by launching 64GB cards. Now that they are delayed, publishers may be in a tricky situation to release their game on Switch.
According to the Journal, Nintendo “said the notice disappointed some software makers, especially U.S.-based publishers that often produce data-heavy games. Those publishers may wait for the 64-gigabyte card to release those kinds of games for the Switch.”
Despite sales of physical media steadily declining in the industry, Nintendo games tend to hold their value a lot longer than their competition. Will this delay hurt third-party support for the Switch in 2018? It may be too early to tell but the Switch is selling like hotcakes right now so this may not hurt them anytime soon.
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