Nintendo Hints the Switch 2 Will Keep Getting Classic Remakes

Published Nov 5, 2026, 5:00 PM EST

Giovanni Colantonio is a video game journalist who has covered the industry for two decades. He was formerly a senior editor at Digital Trends and has contributed to publications like Inverse, Fanbyte, and Hard Drive. His specialty is criticism, as he’s focused on a modern approach to video game reviews that’s focused on the nuances of how interactivity communicates to players. He is currently a member of the New York Video Game Critics Circle.

“I often have the best time anticipating which games are going to send the fandom into as big of a fervor as possible, and certainly the first time we heard about Ocarina of Time, we expected that to be the case,” Bihldorff told Polygon at the game’s launch event at Nintendo’s flagship New York store.

During our conversation about Ocarina of Time, Bihldorff explained how the critically acclaimed Zelda game fits into the Switch 2’s growing software lineup. The Switch 2’s first year of games was especially eclectic, giving players left-field swings like Kirby Air Riders and Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream. While the lineup was strong, some Nintendo players wondered when the publisher would roll out its biggest guns. But Nintendo was confident about holding on to a system-selling announcement for a little while, because it had plenty of faith in the Switch 2’s initial software lineup.

“We always have confidence in our developers coming out with great games,” Bihldorff said. “There’s one constant that has been consistent through my entire career at Nintendo, and that’s that you can pretty much set your watch by the idea that we’re going to be coming out with stuff. And the beauty of having so many different IPs that appeal to different people is that you can have a cycle of different games that come out. It doesn’t matter how excited I am about Donkey Kong Bananza at launch; there’s always going to be more games that are coming down the pipeline. This felt no different than that.”

While Ocarina of Time was likely to be a slam dunk, it’s a creatively risky project on paper. Players have strong feelings about the original game, which has long been hailed as the greatest video game of all time. According to Bihldorff, the developers were aware of the stakes, but they were more excited than nervous about working on the remake.

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo

“They knew the challenge that was before them when they decided to take on this project, but you can also read the enthusiasm in all of their comments about how excited they got, once they actually got in the mix, to bring this to a new generation of people,” Bihldorff said. “I think that outweighs any concern about ‘I hope we don’t screw this up!’ No, they have passion about this. Let’s get this out. The final product really speaks for itself.”

Part of that excitement comes from the hardware the game was built on. In an interview with Polygon earlier in the day, Zelda producer Hidemaro Fujibayashi stressed that the Switch 2 granted developers the opportunity to realize Ocarina of Time in a way that mid-’90s gaming technology simply wouldn’t allow.

“Now with the new hardware, Nintendo Switch 2, we're able to leverage all of the capabilities and try to do things that we weren't able to do with Ocarina of Time,” Fujibayashi told Polygon. “So I think this gave us an opportunity to really explore thoroughly what that kind of gameplay and game design is."

Image: Nintendo EPD/Nintendo

Ocarina of Time would have been an eye-catching move for Nintendo in its own right, but it’s even more interesting in context of the Switch 2’s 2026. It’s the second major remake of the year for the company, following June’s Star Fox. (Though not a literal remake, 2025’s Kirby Air Riders was also, in many ways, a revisiting of the GameCube’s Kirby Air Ride.) Was it a coincidence of timing, or a signal of a strategic shift for Nintendo as it looks to bring back its most beloved games? Bihldorff emphasized that while original games are still as important as ever for Nintendo, remakes are a big part of Nintendo’s software plans right now.

“I do think that new games and remakes both have a place in the Nintendo stable, of equal importance to be honest,” Bihldorff said. “There are fans of every single IP that we have out there. Of course, having new games in those series is wonderful, and I look forward to them as much as anyone else does, but there’s also a deep satisfaction in revisiting games that were very, very special, like Ocarina of Time… But it’s also important to think about how many people had never played the original, and for them, the remake of Ocarina of Time is going to be an absolutely brand-new, 2026 experience, and one that I just cannot wait for them to get their hands on.”

Bihldorff’s comments paint a picture of Nintendo's strategy in the second year of the Switch 2. The publisher is living in an interesting creative space, where it’s balancing niche games in smaller IP with high-profile remakes that feel like safer bets. That tightrope act seems to be working, especially considering that left-field releases like Tomodachi Life: Living the Dream are turning out to be financial winners for Switch 2. If any move — whether it be reviving a critically panned GameCube game or giving Ocarina of Time a radical facelift — seems surprisingly risky, you can chalk it up to the kind of bravado you’re bound to earn when those risks keep paying off.