Retro remake dev calls Switch 2 game-key cards "disheartening," says you'd hope a company as big as Nintendo "would take preservation a little more seriously"

The CEO behind retro remake specialists Nightdive Studios has called the Nintendo Switch 2's game-key cards "a little disheartening."

Revealed alongside all else Switch 2 in and around Nintendo's big showcase at the start of April, game-key cards give developers the option to provide players with a physical cartridge that doesn't come with full game data, but rather the ability to download the game they purchased.

While that might be ideal regarding the rising sizes of games, it's proven controversial to many, partly because it's not the best for preservation efforts. One such person among that chorus would be Nightdive Studios CEO Stephen Kick, who tells GamesIndustry.Biz that you'd hope for better given Nintendo's history.

"Seeing Nintendo do this is a little disheartening," he says. "You would hope that a company that big, that has such a storied history, would take preservation a little more seriously."

Thankfully, the broader picture is a little bit brighter. While Nintendo's move is a "step back" for preservation efforts, Kick points to the recent news of Square Enix, Capcom, Sega, and Taito's commitment to archiving past development materials as a step in the right direction.

"While that's really nice, it would have also been nice if they did this 20 years ago, right?" Kick says, laughing. "But that could be said for everybody. I think everybody is definitely putting in way more effort these days to back up their stuff, which is great. It'll make our jobs easier as a studio that primarily focuses on remasters.

"There won't be that struggle, hopefully, to find source code and assets to create collections and that kind of stuff in the future."

Keeping up with all the latest Nintendo Switch 2 news? Be sure to check out our roundup of upcoming Switch 2 games, too.