Nintendo Switch 2: what did we discover about discovery?
Also: a whole knapsack of news, and the latest big Steam releases ranked.
[The GameDiscoverCo game discovery newsletter is written by ‘how people find your game’ expert & company founder Simon Carless, and is a regular look at how people discover and buy video games in the 2020s.]
We hath returned at the end of the week. And since clearly there’s not much else going on in the world (*gestures to flaming international trade mess*), we should probably press on with video game discovery news, huh? We have a console reveal to look at…
Before we start - we know Nvidia powers a lot of PC gaming graphics cards. But did you know that CEO Jensen Huang is powering’ a whole set of knockoff leather jacket makers, thanks to his signature style? You too can “BE THE BOSS OF THE FASHION WORLD”! (We’re setting up our David Helgason ‘popped collar’ clothing biz right now…)
News: Split Fiction tops Steam debuts in March…
Let’s start the end of the week, then, with a whole bunch of game platform and discovery news, as follows:
We at GameDiscoverCo published estimates for top new games on Steam in March 2025 by gross revenue. Co-op darling Split Fiction (#1) grossed over $40m on Steam alone in the month, and is doing great on console too. It bested tiny team drug dealing sim Schedule I (#2), which we're estimating at ~$35m gross.
The other major releases of the month were Assassin's Creed Shadows (#3, a creditable start at $34m gross - and only about a quarter of its LTD sales are on Steam), and recent life sim release inZOI (#4 - $26m in March.) And FragPunk (#5) and late-month release The First Berserker: Khazan (#6) also grossed >$10m.
Interesting Steam news, per SteamDB’s xPaw: “Devs at GDC mentioned to Valve that Chinese players couldn't edit their reviews because the Steam community [which you needed to access to edit reviews, but not post them] is blocked. So now reviews can be edited on the store directly.” Will it improve Chinese review scores? We’ll see!
You don’t see a lot of ‘regular’ press about F2P PC card-based autobattler The Bazaar, since it launched off-Steam. But according to Twitch tracker Sullygnome, it’s in the Top 100 for most-watched Twitch games in the last 30 days. (This shows you can still do decently off-Steam, even if it’s a tricky way to go.)
Bonus: GDCo compiled the other Twitch most-watched games in the Top 100 with a PC SKU not on Steam: #3 League of Legends; #5 Valorant; #6 World of Warcraft; #7 Fortnite; #10 Minecraft; #24 Hearthstone; #26 Teamfight Tactics; #27 Escape from Tarkov; #47 Warcraft III; #57 Roblox; #58 Genshin Impact; #86 Star Citizen; #98 The Bazaar. Fascinating.
Epic announced it acquired “3D content understanding and tagging” company Loci, which it’s going to use to improve search and discovery in the Fab asset store. But also, the tech “will help to identify potential IP violations and enhance moderation capabilities across the Epic ecosystem.” (UEFN map data copying being targeted?)
‘Games as platforms’ news: Max Power Gaming looks into Roblox’s new game discovery prioritization: “The most significant addition to the algorithm is a brand-new signal: 7-Day Intentional Co-Play Days per User”; Naavik did a big overview of the state of UGC in games in 2025, with a deep-dive into Roblox, Fortnite & more.
Fun fact: if you have a semi-hit as an indie, you do have a sort of annuity from catalog revenue. Grace Bruxner (Frog Detective) told The Guardian: “If your game continues to have a tail, and you can budget properly and live within your means, it is possible to have a passive income that isn’t tied to being a horrible landlord.”
The biggest ‘trad media’ stories of March 26th-April 1st, per Footprints.gg, are headed by the Nintendo Direct and Switch 2, which collectively had 5x the coverage of the #3 subject, inZOI. (Also in the mix: Assassin’s Creed Shadows & Monster Hunter Wilds.)
One more tidbit about Netflix Games plans ($) from Game File: boss Alain Tascan teases on possible Q4 2025 (& beyond) releases: “For us… [we’re looking at] games on TV with the phone as a controller - and not just using the phone as a classic controller - and saying, ‘What can we do with it?’” Makes sense, for broad appeal.
Microlinks: Xbox’s Game Pass ‘wave 1’ for April 2025 includes South of Midnight, Blue Prince, Borderlands 3 & more; the top-grossing mobile games for March are headed by LastWar: Survival, Whiteout Survival & Royal Match; Amazon’s free Prime games for April include Minecraft Legends on PC & Xbox.
Switch 2: what did we discover about discovery?
You’ve probably read >5 high-level takes on the Switch 2 ‘reveal’ already. So we’re not doing that. But we are going to compile the game discovery takeaways and some less ‘obvious’ elements in one place, for funsies. Starting out - on discovery on Switch 2:
Buried in Nintendo’s Q&As on Switch 2, there’s two key eShop discovery notes. First, Takuhiro Dohta says: “Nintendo eShop on Switch 2 has been improved and runs smoothly even when displaying a large number of games. We believe the act of finding the game you want to play is itself part of the game system experience.” (Good news - OS slowdown on the existing Switch eShop is baaad.)
Secondly, Kouichi Kawamoto reveals: “There's a feature on Nintendo eShop called Game Finds for You, which lets you quickly see screenshots and watch introduction videos for games.” Like Steam’s discovery queue for Switch 2? Neat! Kawamoto adds: “With this feature, I think players will be able to easily find something interesting without having to search every nook and cranny of Nintendo eShop.” (Tom Nook?)
There’s an associated video, as YouTube-analyzed by third parties. Firstly, there’s the Switch 2 eShop sidebar, which reveals a very similar list of options to the first eShop - except Game Finds For You (new) and Wish Lists (upgraded in prominence) - look:
The Game Finds For You feature lets you scroll through multiple full-screen game ‘box shots’. You can press a button to watch the game’s trailer, or select a heart in the top right to wishlist the game. At the end, you get to a final screen that shows you the games you wishlisted, and the next Game Finds date (the game list updates weekly?)
It remains to be seen how Switch 2 and Switch 1 games are mixed into the Switch 2 eShop submenus. (The Game Finds For You examples are all Switch 1 titles, so we are presuming it’ll be fairly liberal, SKU mix-wise. But we’ll know more at launch in June!)
Otherwise, we obviously learned about 40+ third-party games confirmed for Switch 2. The most obvious of these seem to be ‘big console games you couldn’t play on Switch before cos it was too slow’ - Borderlands 4, Cyberpunk 2077, Split Fiction, Yakuza 0, etc. Which leads us to believe that Switch 2’s launch is going to be a mishmash.
Many smaller indies haven’t been able to get Switch 2 devkits yet. So we’re going to see a launch storefront filled with existing Switch games, a handful of big-publisher Switch 2-only ports, and a few key first-party titles. (Mario Kart World is the only launch biggie, and the Mario Odyssey-ish Donkey Kong Bananza isn’t due ‘til July.)
In the short-term, there’s uncertainty, esp. since U.S. pre-orders got delayed thanks to the bananza bananas American tariffs situation. In the long-term, we expect Switch 2 to be a reliable ‘third platform’ to release your console game on, but to lack much of the big ‘early adopter’ sales wins of the OG Switch, due to its backwards compatibility.
Finishing up with Switch 2 console features - or data - you might not have seen yet:
The announcement of the Nintendo Switch 2 Game-Key Card was downplayed, and we get why. Basically, it’s a ‘game code on a cartridge’ that unlocks a download. Sounds like titles like Street Fighter 6 will use a Game-Key Card for Switch 2 physical, although others like Cyberpunk 2077 are boasting of a 64gb physical cart.
This awkward ‘physical → digital’ transition continues with physical carts being more expensive than digital - GAME’s Nick Arran told The Game Business: “To make the move before PlayStation and Xbox that digital games will be cheaper than physical, it’s a bold move and it will be a bit of a challenge for us as a retailer.”
The first-party pre-order Switch 2 hardware priority is fascinating - Nintendo giving top priority to those who “have had any paid Nintendo Switch Online membership for a minimum of 12 months”, and “you must have opted in to share gameplay data and have at least 50 hours total gameplay hours.” (Scalpers beware!)
All that extra power in Switch 2 does come at some battery life cost: “Nintendo‘s specs for the console say the Switch 2’s battery life ranges between 2 and 6.5 hours… Nintendo’s officially stated battery life for the original Switch is 4.5 to 9 hours, while for the Switch Lite it’s 3 to 7 hours.”
Finally: looking Switch’s new hardware/software moves via those ‘Nintendo interviewing themselves’ Q&As, ex-Kotaku EIC Brian Crecente did a nice write-up of what the devs said, with continuity stressed: “We decided it would be best to keep the Switch system’s design and not make any ‘changes for change's sake.”
There’s plenty of other elements to discuss - that Japan-only Switch 2 SKU that’s region-locked to prevent gray market exports, first-party Switch 2 games costing either $70 or $80 in the U.S., up from $60 in the current gen, and more. But we’re out of space. Overall: we’re seeing Switch 2 as good for the game biz, but not a savior?