The Nintendo Direct focused on the Switch 2 is set for Wednesday, Nov. 2 at 10:00 a.m. Brasília time. Nintendo will stream the roughly one-hour presentation on its YouTube channel and Twitch, and it will also be available through the company’s news app, Nintendo Today.
The company officially revealed the Switch successor in January via a short video that highlighted features such as magnetized Joy‑Cons and offered a preview of a new Mario Kart title, but it left many details undisclosed. The upcoming Direct is expected to expand on hardware and software information.
What is known about the Switch 2
According to Nintendo’s prior disclosures, the Switch 2 will be larger than the original Switch and will include redesigned Joy‑Cons. The new console will be compatible with physical Switch cartridges, and digital purchases should be easy to transfer between consoles.
Virtual Game Card: lending digital cartridges
In a recent Nintendo Direct, the company introduced the Virtual Game Card, a feature that represents physical game cartridges in a digital form on the console.
How Virtual Game Card works:
- Purchases made on the Nintendo eShop are registered on the console as a “virtual cartridge.”
- Users can manage these virtual cartridges similarly to physical ones, “inserting” and “ejecting” games from the console interface.
- A game loaded as a Virtual Game Card on one console cannot be played simultaneously on another console, matching the behavior of physical cartridges; to play on a second console you must “eject” it from the first and “load” it on the second.
- To transfer a Virtual Game Card between consoles, both devices must connect to the same local network at least once; after that, an internet connection is required to perform the load and eject operations.
Benefits for households and families
Virtual Game Card aims to simplify sharing and lending of digital titles:
- For households with multiple Switch consoles, it should make transferring digital games between devices more convenient without the previous need to manage primary and secondary account settings.
- Users will be able to lend digital games to other members of their Nintendo Family Group (which can include up to eight users); borrowed titles will automatically return to the original account after 14 days.
- There is an expectation that Virtual Game Card will be compatible with the upcoming Switch 2, which would ease transition and access to digital libraries on the new hardware.
