NX will be compatible with Nintendo smartphone games, report claims

Nintendo’s smartphone aspirations will in future be tied into its new console ecosystem.

That’s according to The Wall Street Journal, which concurs with prior reports that NX will be a hybrid handheld/console system but adds that a person familiar with the matter” has stated that Nintendo’s new machine will be compatible with its own smartphone games”.

That could mean any number of things. It may mean that NX will outright be able to play Nintendo’s smartphone games, either on the move or possibly also on the TV. It could, however, mean that additional apps will be released that interact with Nintendo’s smartphone games.

A Eurogamer report earlier this week blew the lid off Nintendo’s NX plans. The console will be designed to be portable for play on the move, but will also dock with a base station at home to allow for traditional TV play. The unit will have two controllers that can be attached to either side of the device, which houses a screen. These can also be removed and the screen propped up for multiplayer gaming when out and about.

MCV has corroborated all of these facts from its own sources, as revealed yesterday.

Eurogamer also claims that the machine is built using Nvidia’s mobile-focused Tegra tech. Current units use a version of the existing Tegra 1 chipset. The site speculated about the possibility that the final version may use a different version of this chipset, or perhaps even the Tegra 2, although it felt the latter option was unlikely.

MCV has not been able to confirm what chipset will be used, although we do understand that Nintendo is prioritising price when it comes to NX development, which leans toward a version of Tegra 1. Our source claimed that the games they had played, to their eyes, visually seemed perhaps ahead of PS3, but not approaching PS4 standards.

A price point was also speculated, although this was based on assumptions from presentation statements and not on firm numbers from Nintendo. The figure, however, was far cheaper than any recent console launch price.