The Switch has been the hottest device on the planet for the past year. After becoming the fastest selling console in year-one ever, its now become a device that will be harder and harder for companies to ignore.
Recently, we were able to speak with Bethesda Softworks’ Senior Vice President of Marketing Pete Hines at an event during PAX East to gain further insight into how a third party publisher has begun to view Nintendo’s new console. As they are nearing the release of their third game on the Switch — Wolfenstein II: The New Colossus — we were curious to hear how Bethesda is now viewing the console.
We began by asking Hines whether or not they’d be looking to bring any other currently released Bethesda games to Switch in the future, in the same way that they ported over both The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim and DOOM last year. Hines told us the following:
“It’ll just depend. It’ll depend on whether or not we think the game is a good fit for the platform technically and whether we think it’s something that audience wants on Switch. In that way, it’s literally no different than any other platform that we look at or any other game that we do. Hopefully, it’ll be a mix of both. If there’s stuff that folks want us to release on Switch and it’s a good fit and it works – great. If it’s new stuff going forward that we think is a good fit and will work on Switch, then we’ll do that too.”
We then asked Hines if he would ever consider bringing a single title to only the Switch in a similar manner to how Ubisoft brought Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle to the console last year. Hines said:
“I don’t know, we’ll have to see. All of that stuff always comes down to the devs’ idea and what we think is a good fit idea wise and platform wise.”
Lastly, I touched on the way that Bethesda has released Switch games thus far and asked if in the future they’d like to release the Switch version of games at the same time as other versions of the same title. Hines told us that of course, that would be their goal if it’s achievable.
“That’s always our preference but in the case of Skyrim and DOOM, well, that wasn’t possible. In the case of Wolfenstein II, we needed the extra time and there was no way we were going to hold the other platforms to wait for Switch. From my perspective, any time we can bring it out on the Switch at the exact same time as the other platforms for new releases, I don’t know why we wouldn’t.”
At this point, it seems like Bethesda is committed to putting their games on Switch when they can make it happen. Hines spoke to us more about his own personal love of the Nintendo console further as well as his preparation for E3 during our discussion, the entirety of which you should be able to read in the near future.
For now, be sure to check out Hines’ other comments on the likelihood of bringing The Elder Scrolls: Legends to consoles.