Fans have been asking for Overwatch on the Nintendo Switch ever since the console was released. With every announcement and BlizzCon that passed, players hoped for positive news but it never came until recently. Overwatch is finally coming out on Switch - and apparently, it was a long time coming.
Overwatch’s game director Jeff Kaplan, in an interview with The Verge, said that he considered a Switch port for a long while. “Literally the day the Switch came out, we were thinking about it,” Kaplan noted. “I remember immediately talking to people around the office saying, ‘What would it take for us to be here?’”
Apparently, Blizzard focused on porting Diablo III first. That came out in November of last year and was pretty successful. However, Overwatch proved to be harder to port. “It was much easier to get Diablo on the device than it was to get Overwatch,” said Kaplan. “And, like everything we do here, we wanted to make sure to do it right. It was just a long process of figuring out how to handle the development in a way that we felt like we would be very proud of the end product.”
There is a concern that the graphics on the Switch might not be on par with other consoles. Overwatch producer Wes Yanagi, however, said that the only difference is that it will run on the Switch at 30 frames per second (both docked and undocked), compared to 60 fps on PS4 and Xbox One.
It’s also important to consider how updates and added features will adapt to the Switch. Kaplan addressed this and said that any heroes, events, and more should be out on all consoles at the same time. They plan to give every platform the same level of care and attention to detail.
There’s still hope that the game will have cross saves to compete with Fortnite. The battle royale has a leg up on Overwatch with that feature as well as the price tag. Time will tell if Overwatch will try and compete with those aspects.
The game is set to be released Oct 15, 2019
