Nintendo Switch is celebrating its third birthday with a new system update, but it might not be worth busting out the confetti cake and noisemakers.
Nintendo Switch update 9.2.0 went live on March 2, 2020, the day before the third anniversary of the Nintendo Switch release date in 2017. It would be a great time to put out a big update that adds fan-requested features, right? Well, this is the extent of the patch notes:
"General system stability improvements to enhance the user's experience."
Don't get me wrong, stability is great! But Switch players have been spent years hoping for features like folders to more efficiently sort their games, or decorative themes to beautify their dashboards. Both of those features were available back on 3DS, which makes it all the more mystifying that Switch still doesn't have any equivalent (besides choosing from light or dark mode) three years into its lifecycle.
Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa recently explained that Nintendo Switch is now "entering the middle of its life cycle" as it heads into its fourth year on the market. The company has also confirmed that it has "no plans" to release a new model of Switch this year, leaving the lineup at classic Switch and Switch Lite - though it is adding a lovely new coral colorway for the latter.
Lack of fan-requested features aside, I still think Switch is the best console Nintendo's ever made. But as PS5 and Xbox Series X loom on the horizon, it's hard not to pine for at least a few fresh updates to match the shiny new appeal of the next generation.
Even if the system itself isn't changing much, we have a lot to look forward to from our Animal Crossing: New Horizons hands-on preview.
