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Soul Hackers 2 was not unexpected in this timeline given that publisher Sega had been actively teasing the announcement recently. But it is exciting to think that a brand new Shin Megami Tensei (SMT) game in the Devil Summoner sub-series is coming soon from developer Atlus.
To top it off, it will be released on every major platform: PC, PS4, PS5, XB1, XSX|S. Except one, that is - Nintendo's portable system, the Switch.
Soul Hackers 2 skips Nintendo's popular console for unknown reasons
The original Soul Hackers was originally a Japan-only Sega Saturn title, and was released in 1997. It later got an English release in 2013 on Nintendo 3DS. That, coupled with the fact that the latest mainline MegaTen game, Shin Megami Tensei V, was on the Nintendo Switch makes this an odd omission.
After all, this is the first time in a very long time that a traditional SMT game has been announced for Xbox and PC. The decision has puzzled and disappointed fans across the internet.
As many of these Tweets have pointed out, Nintendo's Switch is a super popular platform for JRPGs, particularly in its home country of Japan. So to see a platform like Xbox - which is not really the first thing that comes to mind when talking about JRPGs - to make the cut is weird.
Speculative reasoning behind Soul Hackers 2 skipping Nintendo Switch
While no official reasoning has been provided as of yet, there following issues could have been a factor in the unexpected decision:
1) Technical setbacks
It's no secret that Switch is less powerful than its home console peers, owing to its portable nature. Perhaps Atlus has run into more fundamental problems during porting? Looking at the trailer, the game does not seem to be pushing technical boundaries - the textures present are fairly mundane-looking, especially in dungeons.
Assuming Soul Hackers 2 is on Atlus' custom Persona 5 Royal engine (as the trailers show no mention of Unreal Engine 4, which was utilized by SMTV), it may not translate over to the Switch's ARM-based Tegra X1 chipset. However, most current generation engines, both general-purpose and proprietary, have successfully made an appearance on the handheld.
2) Not a development focus
This reason isn't unheard of. Many games have been released first on other platforms, only for a Switch port to follow up afterwards due to being added later in the development pipeline. An example is Life Is Strange: True Colors, which was released on Nintendo's machine 3 months after the game's launch on consoles and PC.
So it is possible, perhaps even likely, that Nintendo fans will eventually get to play it on Nintendo's portable machine. But for now, it's a pipe dream.
Soul Hackers 2 is scheduled for a worldwide release on August 26, 2022.
