Studio Behind Final Fantasy, Batman Arkham, Ezio Collection Ports Working on AAA Nintendo Switch Project

Here's some exciting news to tease the imaginations of all the Nintendo Switch lovers out there. [...]

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(Photo: Nintendo)

Here's some exciting news to tease the imaginations of all the Nintendo Switch lovers out there. Virtuos, a company known for its recent ports of hit AAA games like Assassin's Creed: The Ezio Collection, Batman: Return to Arkham, and Final Fantasy XII: The Zodiac Age, is working on something for the Nintendo Switch; something big. The company is currently in the process of porting a AAA game to the system, but we're not sure what it is quite yet. Now then, let's dig into some evidence.

To start, we have word from the studio itself. "In 2017 our Game Division is developing for the new Nintendo upcoming Platform: Switch!" Obvious that tweet is a bit old, dating from January, and it doesn't say anything about a AAA game at all. Recently, though, an update to a Virtuos programmer's LinkedIn profile provided some extra fuel to the fire. You can find Xiaoyu Zhang's profile here, and his most recent project details read as follows:

WIP: Porting a AAA title to Nintendo Switch
- Re-implement the renderer with Nintendo's native graphics API(nvn)
- Design and implement the low level mechanism of graphics resource management and threading
- Exploit the performance advantages of the Vulkan-like API (UMA, explicit management of graphics memory, complete control over CPU/GPU synchronization, etc)

Now what could this be? Speculation is flying, and several sites are claiming that it's "definitely" one thing or definitely another. The truth is that this could be anything! Virtuos is a third-party company that has been used by multiple major publishers to port games. Yes, The Ezio Collection would make a lot of sense on the Nintendo Switch, especially since Ubisoft claimed it has more unannounced titles on the way, but it's not a sure thing. Likewise, Return to Arkham would make sense since previous Arkham games hit the Wii U, but we don't know for sure.

The mention of the "Vulkan-like" API has some people thinking it could be DOOM, while others are certain that it's the L.A. Noire remaster we've been hearing about lately. So what AAA remaster do you want to see the most? Let us know by voting in the poll below.

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