Summary
- A Nxnative fork has reportedly gotten Switch 2 game Mario Kart World running on the iPhone.
- The Mario Kart World port seems playable but stutters and loads slowly (though the shaders have improved).
- The Switch 2 game Splatoon Raiders is running on a private Eden build, but it lags and lacks several features.
The Switch and Switch 2 port scene is heating up, with Mario Kart World making its way to iPhone with improved performance and Splatoon Raiders running through a private build of the Switch emulator Eden.
Earlier this week, I covered Nxnative, a Wine-like compatibility layer that lets software written for another platform run on the host operating system — in this case, Switch games running on Mac, iPhone, and iPad (roughly 85 Switch games are already compatible with the tool). The tool also uses high-level emulation (HLE) to recreate Horizon system services and translate Switch graphics operations into Metal (Horizon is the Switch’s operating system).
Then, Nxnative was forked to work with the Switch 2 and Mario Kart World. While Nxnative laid most of the groundwork, Will Faust, the developer behind the Mario Kart World port, says the hardest part of the project was getting NVN2 support running (NVN2 is Nintendo’s proprietary graphics API for the Switch 2).
While the initial video Faust posted showed off the kart racer title in a messy-looking but still playable state on a Mac, the latest clip shows off the game running with improved shader rendering and a smoother frame rate. This time, the game is also being played on an iPhone, not a Mac. There are still occasional stutters, and Mario Kart World still takes quite some time to load, but it seems even more playable than before and includes on-screen touch controls.
Faust has made it very clear that he has no plans to release the code for this project anywhere, but I wouldn’t be surprised if this proof-of-concept inspires other developers to create a public tool similar to Nxnative, but for the Switch 2. Faust has also said the port was created with AI assistance.
Switch 2 game Splatoon Raiders is reportedly running on PC through an emulator
The game isn’t exactly playable, though
Along with Faust’s follow-up clip, another developer, Sheepish, showed off Splatoon Raiders running on a private build of Eden, an emulator designed for the original Switch. Sheepish says the build was created by compiling source code that was provided to them by another developer.
A brief clip posted to X shows the third-person, ink-filled shooter running and then offers a look at its opening cinematic, which seems to run smoothly. As soon as they reach the character select screen, Splatoon Raiders starts to lag pretty badly, and we don’t get to see the title in action. Sheepish says there are “missing implementations” and that the game has no VSync in its current state.
It’s also worth noting that, like many similar port projects, Sheepish says they used AI to help develop this build of Eden. Unlike Faust, they mention that the Switch 2-focused build of Eden could be released publicly at some point. A screenshot of Donkey Kong Bananza “recomp” was also recently posted online, though we don’t actually see the game running, and the Twitter account behind the post seems relatively shady.
On that note, none of these ports have been verified since there aren’t public releases available yet (and there may never be).
Related
Nintendo Switch games can now run on Mac thanks to a Wine-like tool, and 85 titles are already compatible
Nxnative allows Switch games to run on Apple silicon.