Nintendo has reportedly postponed the Switch 2 in China, with stringent government restrictions and a continuing analysis of demand in the country being the main reasons for said delay.
According to Nikkei (via VGC), Nintendo is looking into how much demand there would be among Chinese gamers for the Nintendo Switch 2 before deciding to release the console in the country.
Nikkei says that games and consoles in China are subject to exhaustive government inspections, with the Chinese government often imposing restrictions on said software and hardware based on what VGC calls its “intentions”. As such, Nintendo may decide the headache of going through said inspections isn’t worth the returns it would get by selling the Switch 2 in China.
As VGC points out, Nikkei’s report points to the fact that Tencent is a co-distributor of the original Nintendo Switch in China, and when asked for comment, the tech giant declined to say whether it would also be involved with distributing the Switch 2.
It’s possible, then, that the Switch 2 won’t see an official release in China; it’s a market largely dominated by mobile and PC games, so it may be that Nintendo decides the potential customer gain isn’t worth the hoops it would have to jump through.
Additionally, Nintendo is in the process of closing down the Switch’s online services and eShop in China, with the shutdown scheduled for the end of March next year. Evidently, the company doesn’t see a benefit to keeping the services online any longer than that, which is another indication that there’s not a large audience for the Switch 2 in China.
In case you missed it, the Switch 2 was revealed in full during a Nintendo Direct show last week.
Elsewhere in the world, the console is set for a June 5th release, a date Nintendo insists hasn’t changed despite delays to pre-orders in both the US and Canada. Whether or not it sees a release in China remains to be seen.
