SpongeBob dev urges developers to not ‘abandon’ Nintendo Switch

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Spongebob SquarePants: The Patrick Star Game has now launched across seven platforms, stretching across everything from the Nintendo Switch to the most powerful PC rigs. As a quirky physics sandbox game, developer PHL Collective had a huge challenge to get the game running perfectly on its lowest-powered platform.

In an interview with VideoGamer, The Patrick Star Game’s production director Chris Rose urged developers to not “abandon” the Nintendo Switch in the face of more powerful hardware. With a massive install base and surprisingly powerful tech, the director sees new games coming until 2030.

Keep supporting Switch

While the Nintendo Switch 2 is seemingly on the way in the near future, Outright Games is still aiming to bring as many titles as possible to Nintendo’s 2017 handheld. Despite its hardware being trounced by smartphones, the huge user base means publishers will continue supporting the hardware as long as possible.

“Don’t be so quick to abandon Switch or Xbox One.”

Outright games production director chris rose

“My free advice to anyone who wants to make a kid’s game is young kids, especially if they have older siblings, will get hand-me-downs off the last generation of console,” Rose said. “There are going to be 143 million hand-me-downs out there in about a year, two years’ time… That is 143 million potential customers for you. Yeah, don’t be so quick to abandon Switch or Xbox One.”

With over 100 million PS4s, 60 million Xbox Ones and the huge install base of the Switch, there’s countless gamers that won’t be upgrading to expensive new devices. As younger gamers, or less fortunate players, pick up the cheaper, lower-power hardware, a new audience emerges that also want to buy new games.

“You know, the day will come where PS6 is the next thing and Xbox Five, whatever they call that, will be and those become the hand-me-downs,” Rose explained. “They’re still mega powerful pieces of equipment, but they’ll be the hand-me-downs for the next audience, for the next generation of children.

“So make sure you support the ones that are out there and still actively engaged with, because not everyone wants to go out and buy the brand new [console] for a younger child. But we know that there are loads of kids gonna be playing their switches for at least another four or five years, if not longer. So that’s why you have to support these consoles.”

“I would be amazed if we’re still not supporting Switch come like 2028″

Chris ROSE

Switch in 2030

Rose revealed that the team at Outright Games isn’t planning to give up on Switch development anytime soon. After years of working on LEGO games across PS2, Nintendo DS and more, Rose explained explained that the current Switch hardware could realistically stretch into the 2030s.

“I would be amazed if we’re still not supporting Switch come like 2028, for example, maybe even longer than that,” the director explained. “If someone said to me in 2030, we need this to come out and switch, it wouldn’t shock me. Again, there’s 140 plus million of them out there.”

In the eyes of studios like Outirght Games, the Nintendo Switch is the new PlayStation 2 or original Game Boy. With so many units out there, continued support for the device is not just ideal, but necessary for smaller studios.

“It’s a bit like PS2, right?” he said. “The PS2 support went on for a very long time. they would just keep porting football games onto PS2 ’cause there were just so many of them there, and they would keep selling them. So it’s one of those things where if someone said to me in 2030, ‘by the way, this needs to support Switch’, I wouldn’t be surprised… it’s such a juggernaut of a machine and I wouldn’t even be surprised if it ends up breaking 200 million units by then.”

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Patrick Star Game is out now on Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PS5 and PC.

About the Author

Lewis White

Lewis White is a veteran games journalist with a decade of experience writing news, reviews, features and investigative pieces about game development with a focus on Halo and Xbox.