Palworld Director: Nintendo Switch 2 Version Worth Considering if 'Beefy Enough'

When Pocketpair's monster capturing survival adventure, Palworld, launched, it quickly drew comparisons to Pokemon, with many dubbing it "Pokemon with guns." Although Pocketpair's communications director, John 'Bucky' Buckley, isn't fond of the comparison, the allure of collecting adorable creatures has led many to wonder if Palworld would ever make its way to the Nintendo Switch, Pokemon's favored platform.

Unfortunately, Buckley has clarified that a Switch release is unlikely due to technical constraints. "If we could make the game work on the Switch, we would, but Palworld is a beefy game," he stated. This was shared during a conversation at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco following Buckley's talk, 'Community Management Summit: A Palworld Roller Coaster: Surviving the Drop.'

The possibility of a release on the rumored Nintendo Switch 2 was also discussed. Buckley expressed interest but noted that Pocketpair hasn't had the opportunity to assess the feasibility of a port yet. "We haven't seen those specs yet," he mentioned. "Like everyone else, we're waiting. I'm walking around GDC hoping someone will tell me them, but everyone I've spoken to says they haven't even seen them. If it's beefy enough, it's 100% worth considering. We did a lot of optimization for Steam Deck, which we were really happy with. Still work to do, but we're really happy with how it turned out. So we would like to get it on more handhelds if possible."

Pocketpair is currently embroiled in a lawsuit from Nintendo over alleged patent infringement related to Pokemon's ball-throwing mechanics. This has led some to speculate that the lawsuit is the true reason Palworld hasn't been released on the Switch. However, Buckley clarified that the lawsuit isn't the primary barrier to releasing on Nintendo's platforms. In his GDC talk, he briefly addressed the lawsuit, mentioning that it caught the team by surprise despite numerous legal checks conducted before the game's release. "Pretty much everyone at Pocketpair is a huge fan [of Pokemon]," Buckley said, "so it was a very depressing day, everyone heads down and walking in the rain."

The question remains whether Nintendo would allow a game it has taken issue with to be released on its next-generation console. We'll be posting our full interview with Buckley from GDC later this week, so keep an eye out for more insights on Palworld. In the meantime, if you've taken a break from the game, now's a great time to jump back in, as Palworld recently introduced cross-platform play with its latest update.