Fact Check: Will Dead Space remake come to Nintendo Switch in the future?

The Dead Space remake brought the engrossing survival-horror experience that terrified gamers back in 2008 to modern consoles and PCs. With the entire game built from the ground up in the latest iteration of the Frostbite engine, the setting of the USG Ishimura has never looked better.

This focus on visual fidelity and attention to detail means that the title has skipped last-gen consioles, as well as the Nintendo Switch.

The latter is one of the most popular gaming consoles on the market right now. Despite being a far less powerful platform than even the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, the little hybrid handheld continues to punch above its weight. So, is there a chance that Nintendo players could enjoy his acclaimed horror title on the go in the future?

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As it stands now, the Dead Space remake will not come to the Nintendo Switch any time soon

For one, the Dead Space remake's target platforms were penned down from the start, ensuring the studio can squeeze as much as it can out of the current-gen technology. In other words, the game is not geared towards Nintendo's portable device. On an interesting note, the Frostbite engine has already been ported to the platform.

For those unaware, PopCap's 2021 port of Plants vs Zombies: Battle for Neighborville was the very first Switch game to run on Battlefield developer DICE's popular graphics technology. To top it off, for a debut showcase of the engine on the system, this rendition looks and even runs better than many Unreal Engine 4 offerings on the handheld device.

But this latest Dead Space iteration is a different beast entirely. Given the game's CPU-heavy nature, it is quite likely that the Switch's paltry processor will face problems. Then there are the streaming issues as well. Further, we know that the remake recommends SSDs as a minimum requirement on PC.

Unlike the original Dead Space, the USG Ishimura is an interconnected map instead of a linear model. This allows for easy backtracking - in fact, as per YouTube channel Digital Foundry, Frostbite was retooled by the team at EA Motive to allow for a seamless transition between large areas for this project.

So, given that the Nintendo Switch is a memory bandwidth-starved device, the results do not sound promising as it would be far more prone to stutters and frustratingly long load times.

Some readers will be quick to point out that the upcoming action-RPG Hogwarts Legacy is also coming to Nintendo Switch. It is certainly an ambitious showcase, with a vast and detailed open-world to explore.

However, the game has been built with the Switch in mind from the beginning, just like ID Software's DOOM Eternal. This prioritization has a benefit as seen by DOOM Eternal's performance and visual quality being on par, if not better, than the 2016 entry on Switch. This is despite the newer 2020 shooter being a more graphically intense game.

Of course, there is always the possibility that some top-of-the-line studios out there like Saber Interactive or Panic Button will prove everyone wrong yet again by making the impossible happen.

That would be a neat surprise for sure, but realistically, that will not happen for the foreseeable future. This means Nintendo players will have to enjoy the Dead Space remake on other systems or even the Steam Deck for portability.

The Dead Space remake is available on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X/S.