Back in 2015, before Nintendo was ready to fully unveil the Nintendo Switch, the console was teased as the codename NX. Nintendo kept up the secrecy for a while, continually hyping the NX console for well over a year until they debuted the finalized system as the Switch in late 2016. After that, the NX joined the list of in-development Nintendo monikers such as Revolution and Cafe, never to be used again.

Now, years later, we get to refamiliarize ourselves with the NX, thanks to the leak of a prototype game. An early development build of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe was dumped, with a build date two days prior to the reveal of the Switch's final name, which occurred on October 20, 2016. This supposed beta came from what is claimed to be an early EMMC ODIN board, with footage already uploaded to YouTube.

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In addition to the Mario Kart 8 prototype, which has a debug menu and numerous in-development options, was a short boot animation. Many are familiar with the snap of Joy-Cons heard when you boot a Switch, but before that was the final design, Nintendo had a working NX logo and animation, which haven't been seen before. The MK8D prototype is already running on emulators via a patch, and is currently being datamined.

The Nintendo Switches Codename was the NX and this was an early Logo / Boot Up animation used during development of the Console ( It was found in the Mario Kart 8 Deluxe Prototype ) This was never seen outside Nintendo pic.twitter.com/B1bS5zCKOu

— @pfkelly.bsky.social 🇵🇸 🇺🇦📯 (@PaulFelixKelly) November 20, 2022

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[Marc_LFD]

Wii u gamepad went basically unused even in first party titles

I took the Wii U GamePad for granted when I was playing Mario Kart 8 back then because I could have checked what other items the others had, and I didn't do that. I do that on Mario Kart 7 strategically.

It makes me chuckle when everyone stops or goes backwards to not be hit with the blue shell.

 

[Plazorn]

Calling all Nintendo Ninjas! They are probably going to DMCA the video any minute...

 

[Ryab]

View attachment 339095
Oh yeah I remember why I don't look at twitter anymore. AyugaWind had a good response though.

I finally deactivated my account yesterday after 7 years.

 

[Marc_LFD]

I finally deactivated my account yesterday after 7 years.

BuT wE fInAlLy HaVe FrEe SpEeCh!

 

[SylverReZ]

Hope Nintendo doesn't take this down like what happened with Steam.
I think the Switch boot logo is more better though.

 

[diggeloid]

playing pokemon like never before

at 60 FPS?

 

[SylverReZ]

at 60 FPS?

That's typical with Scarlet and Violet, let's just hope that an update fixes this.

 

[torrent_get]

The logo animation reminds me of a rotary dial.

original reddit source.

We might have to wait for another Nintendo mega leak to answer the questions.

 

[x65943]

The logo animation reminds me of a rotary dial.

original reddit source.

View attachment 339175
We might have to wait for another Nintendo mega leak to answer the questions.

Rotary dial controller still more practical than the power glove

 

[Ryab]

BuT wE fInAlLy HaVe FrEe SpEeCh!

Free speech until a certain someone disagrees with it.

 

[MikaDubbz]

They should hold on to the Nintendo X name until their 10th console. Or they could call that the NinTENdo lol.

Post automatically merged: Nov 21, 2022

Sadly it went the way of all Nintendo gimmicks. Every console they push some gimmick that becomes useless almost immediately, and every time I still think it will be used for something

Tell that to the Switch and it's main hybrid gimmick.

 

[orangy57]

The fact that they just decided to stick in a rough sketch before they got the renders of the Local Multiplayer toads is cute

It's rare that we get to see any modern prototype stuff from Nintendo since usually betas and debug builds are found like 20+ years after the fact this is really cool

 

[andeers]

They teased JoyCon Drift before it was cool

Nintendo foreshadowing is sick

 

[Bladexdsl]

i'm just going to quote myself here

yep they will call it mario kart 8 double deluxe charge you full price and add 5 more DLC. they aren't doing a mk 9 eva

NAILED IT!!

 

[Reploid]

WU = Wii U (bad, should've been named Wii Pro or something)

So instead of being confused for wii accessory, it'll be confused as wii revision.

 

[banjojohn]

Imagine holding 2 of these bad boys in each hand playing pokemon like never before

HACKERMAN: IM IN

Two in each hand might be a bit excessive.

 

[SPAC3W4IFU]

That’s actually a pretty rad looking logo, crazy how they even made the effort of animating it too.

Makes me wonder if they were initially deadset on calling it the NX before going with the Switch, if they went that far. Never saw Nintendo do this with their other prototype names before.

 

[jeffyTheHomebrewer]

Nintendo's prototype names are so much cooler than the final ones, imo.

Dolphin = GCN (I actually love they named it GameCube)
Revolution = Wii (Revolution would've been awesome)
WU = Wii U (bad, should've been named Wii Pro or something)
NX = Switch (not a bad name, it's catchy and memorable)

Tbh I would've given the Wii U a better dev name, like maybe Brewster or Beanbag (due to the general theme of coffee in the hardware names)

 

[Hiccup]

Can you even still buy them? They were widely available on AliExpress for a year and then I never saw them again. I tried hard to find one before the OLED model came out but they were all either reballed retail boards or sellers lying about what they had passing off 32gb boards as 64gb boards.

Would be a good idea in case some turn up again (maybe second hand)

 

[lattechan]

Two in each hand might be a bit excessive.

If Nintendo taught me anything it's that more buttons = more power