How The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom cements the need for a next-gen Nintendo Switch

The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom is now on the Nintendo Switch and has already established itself as a Game of the Year contender. Amongst all the accolades and praises for building upon Breath of the Wild's success, one common criticism concerns its performance. While underwhelming performance has been a hot topic since the beginning of this year, Tears of the Kingdom feels more held back by the platform rather than an unoptimized mess.

The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild ushered in the Nintendo Switch generation in 2017, showcasing the brilliance of bringing handheld and home consoles together. Six years later, Tears of the Kingdom follows it up with another fantastic title. However, this time the performance feels disappointing on the device. Is it time Nintendo releases a sequel to the hardware as well?

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The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom performance on Nintendo Switch

The Nintendo Switch is undoubtedly one of the bestselling consoles of all time, punching far above its spec weight class with unique titles. While fans have been compromising on certain shortcomings, it has perhaps reached a point of diminishing return.

The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom provides a 720p 30fps experience in the best-case scenario, with docked mode raising it to 900p. Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom shares the same cell-shaded art style as its predecessor. It isn't hardware-demanding, especially compared to modern AAA titles on other platforms.

While this would have been a very acceptable performance a decade ago, it perhaps isn't anymore. It is unfair to compare what is essentially a handheld console to the current generation of PS5 and Xbox Series X aspiring for 4K 60fps as standard. However, it is undeniable that the Switch isn't cutting it anymore, and Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom is proof of it.

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Nintendo Switch 2 vs. Steam Deck: expected specs and performance

If Nintendo Switch revived the handheld gaming market, Valve's Steam Deck took it to the moon in the post-smartphone era. Priced comparatively, the Steam Deck quickly leaves the Switch behind in performance. But how will it compare to the next generation, i.e., the inevitable Nintendo Switch 2?

The Nintendo Switch is based on the Nvidia Tegra X1 SoC, a 20nm mobile processor from 2015, built on the Maxwell architecture. Since its release, Nvidia has had several generational leaps in Mobile Processor design, from Tegra X2 to Xavier to Orin, released in 2018. Currently, Nvidia is working on the Thor mobile processor based on Ada Lovelace, set for a 2025 launch.

Whether the Switch 2 will be based on Orin or Thor will depend on its expected release window. While it would be ideal to launch the next-gen Switch in 2025 to coincide with Thor's release, Nintendo will likely go with Orin if it aims for as early as next year (2024).

Depending on the version, Orin can go up to 5.32 TFLOPS (FP32) for its GPU, compared to Steam Deck's 1.638 TFLOPS (FP32). The two devices' clock speeds would be comparable, with Steam Deck boosting a 2.4 GHz compared to Orin's 2.2 GHz. Considering the current generation of memory-hungry games, Nintendo will double Switch's RAM to 8GB, if not quadruple to 16 GB.

The next generation of Nintendo Switch is sure to not only hold its own against Steam Deck but exceed it with first-party hardware-level optimizations. Considering The Legend of Zelda Tears of the Kingdom's abysmal performance, the device couldn't get here any faster.