Nintendo recently issued an update (21.0.0) for its Switch 2 console that, in addition to some small changes, has caused some third-party docks to stop working as intended. In the early weeks and months of the console’s availability this summer, companies raced to figure out the right commands, the right power draw, and the right chips to use in order to trick the Switch 2 into thinking it had connected to the real thing — Nintendo’s dock, which is included with every console. Now, some of them will have to figure out how to do it again.
You’re not alone if you think Nintendo did this on purpose. But did it? According to Nintendo, not exactly. Gaming site Kotaku published a new statement from the company that says it “does not have any intention to hinder or invalidate legal third-party dock compatibility.” Read in one way, it seems like Nintendo didn’t intend to cause these issues with its latest update. Read another way, Nintendo has apparently established that there’s a legal and an illegal way to create a third-party Switch 2 dock, and a lot of the ones out there were made illegally, apparently.
The fact that some third-party Switch 2 docks still work makes this more confusing. I tried out Viture’s Pro mobile dock (one of the early third-party docks to provide Switch 2 support), for use with its Pro XR glasses, and it just works fine with the same firmware that’s been on it since I started testing it months ago.
Without more details from Nintendo, it’s tough to know what this spells for the future. Are more docks on the dock chopping block? Is it reconfiguring its proprietary Switch 2 dock handshake to leave third-party dock makers in a constant scramble? Will it develop (or has it already developed) something similar to the Apple MFi certification program to let companies pay a fee to promise support out of the box with its locked-down port?
Whatever the answers are, Nintendo will naturally want to push consumers towards using its pricey dock, and push third-party companies away from trying to engineer duplicative gadgets at a fraction of the cost. That spells an interesting next couple of months for third-party makers, including the likes of Genki and JSAUX, which are both launching compact, power adapter-size docks later this year. Switch 2 support is on each of their feature lists, but we’ll see if it remains a selling point closer to their launches.
