When Nintendo revealed the Switch 2, there was a tinge of disappointment in some corners of the internet over the fact that the console wasn’t a major departure from the original Switch. It is still a hybrid console that you slide in and out of a dock to play games on the go or via your TV, only with prettier graphics, a bigger screen, and new Joy-cons. However, Nintendo still has a gimmick up its sleeve, only it isn’t as in-your-face as it was with something like the Wii’s motion controls.
The Switch 2’s new Joy-cons aren’t just bigger and magnetic but also appear to have new mouse-like functionality. This opens up the doors for a ton of new games we want to see on the Switch 2 that could take advantage of that unique control scheme.
What I want most, though, is to see the return of a forgotten Wii U feature that never got the chance to show off its full potential: Miiverse.
A whole new Miiverse
The Wii U had a lot of issues that contributed to its failure, most of which stemmed from its gamepad and name. Nintendo couldn’t quite communicate that this was a new system and not just a tablet accessory for the Wii, but also struggled to sell why gaming while looking between the screen in your hands and the TV would be fun.
Despite that, the system had just as strong a first-party support as any other Nintendo system. It was so good that almost every notable game from it eventually got ported to the Switch for a second chance on a popular platform. But one feature that the Wii U pioneered didn’t survive the transition to the original Switch.
Miiverse was a short-lived social network launched with the Wii U that allowed players to send messages, leave comments, and even post gameplay videos. That all was fairly standard even at the time, but it had one brilliant inclusion that took full advantage of the Wii U gamepad. Instead of just typing messages or comments, players could use their tablets to leave messages in the form of hand-drawn sketches.
As small as the Wii U community was, seeing these hand-drawn messages appear in the Splatoon 2 hub or at the end of a Super Mario Maker 2 level gave the impression that we were all connecting in a more personal way. It wasn’t just an outlet for creativity, but sharing joy and communicating in a way that wasn’t as cold as text can be. A nice text comment on a Mario Maker level is great but seeing someone take the time to draw a funny moment from your level, regardless of artistic skill, is a more direct connection between two people. It’s like how handwriting a holiday card means just a little bit more than picking up a pre-written one from the store.
Miiverse was discontinued in 2017 and was never integrated into the original Switch. Without a way to replicate the tablet’s drawing feature, it made sense to leave it behind. The Switch 2 has no gamepad but gets around that limitation with one potentially brilliant feature added to its Joy-cons. The mouse functionality has the community’s imagination running wild with the different genres the Switch 2 will be able to support, new ways we might control familiar games, and what special new experiences Nintendo has in store utilizing the feature we won’t see coming. My first thought was how perfect it would be for a new version of the Miiverse to finally show off the potential of such a clever community tool.
A mouse may not be the ideal tool for professional artists, but the point of Miiverse was to include everybody. It was about giving players the freedom to engage with one another in a new way that breaks through the language barrier. On the Wii U, everyone had the tablet and the opportunity to communicate in a fun and low-commitment way. The same will hopefully be true for the Switch 2s’s Joy-cons. So long as you have the system, a flat surface to place the Joy-con on and some inspiration, almost everyone should be able to intuitively participate. And with the Switch 2 almost guaranteed to outperform the Wii U, the community will only be bigger.
Even if Nintendo doesn’t want to revive Miiverse, it could still implement the core of it within individual games in ways that make sense. Let us draw pictures to send to friends in a new Animal Crossing game and hang them on our walls, or have a handful of drawings pop up from other players who also recently completed a Mario stage as we slide down the flagpole. It could help players still feel like they’re part of the community even when playing single-player games.
In an era where so much communication is one-sided and asymmetrical, it is all too easy to disassociate and forget that there’s another person behind a comment. The human touch of seeing a drawing pop up could be a breath of fresh air that would set the Switch 2 apart without alienating or confusing players like the Wii U gamepad did.
