Nvidia GeForce Now could come to more devices in the future if there’s enough interest from gamers, including Nintendo Switch.
In an upcoming interview with TechRadar Gaming, GeForce Now’s vice president and general manager Phil Eisler didn’t rule out the possibility that the game streaming service could come to other platforms in the future, but it all depends on demand.
“Based on member requests, we started supporting smart TVs beginning with the latest LG TV models in December 2021,” said Eisler. “At CES in January, we announced that we’re collaborating with Samsung to bring GeForce Now to its Smart TVs by adding the service to the Samsung Gaming Hub. We continue to evaluate other devices that our members are interested in.”
We’ve seen Nintendo rely more on cloud gaming recently to bring more graphically intensive titles like A Plague Tale: Innocence, Hitman 3, and Kingdom Hearts to the console. With a Nintendo Switch 2 or Switch Pro model still nothing but a rumor, cloud gaming can bring titles that might not be able to run on Switch’s hardware to the platform.
However, the current cloud streaming solution Nintendo has in place isn’t the best. As analyzed by Digital Foundry, it’s often prone to pixelation, tops out at a resolution of 720p, and is capped to 30fps.
The highest tier of Nvidia GeForce Now uses an RTX 3080, which is far more powerful than the Nintendo Switch and could provide a far more appealing alternative than the current solution Nintendo has opted for.
We’d love to see it, but don’t get too excited
However, because Nvidia GeForce Now lets you play your Steam library, it won’t be the easiest sell for Nintendo. The way cloud gaming works on Switch still requires a user to pay the usual purchase price for a game, so unless there’s a way Nintendo can take a slice of revenue, we wouldn’t be surprised if GeForce Now doesn’t arrive at all.
Still, Nvidia and Nintendo do have an existing relationship that should at least keep the door open. The Switch is powered by a custom Nvidia Tegra X1 processor and is the only console on the market that hasn’t opted for Nvidia’s rival, AMD. It’s likely that should we see a more powerful Switch in the future, Nintendo will choose to partner with Nvidia again, particularly if it plans on making the console’s successor backward compatible.