Nintendo Space World looks a bit different these days...
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tournote is an edutainment Minigame Game developed by Nintendo EPD and Nintendo Cube for the Nintendo Switch 2. It was released on June 5, 2025.
The game sees the player as an attendee at a technology expo held by Nintendo, where the topic is how video game consoles work. And naturally, the best way to explain the intricacies of hardware design is to let guests walk around a 1000:1 scale replica of the company's newest piece of hardware. As you explore this exhibition hall in the shape of the Nintendo Switch 2 and its various accessories, you'll interact with information kiosks and partake in a collection of over 30 minigames and tech demos that not only demonstrate the various features of the system, but also explain how everything from the HD rumble to magnetic connectors to even the game cards function. Much emphasis is also placed on the system in context, juxtaposed most heavily against its direct predecessor to emphasize its changes and improvements, while also relating the Switch 2 to earlier Nintendo consoles and their pioneering of certain features.
Pre-Release Material: April 2025 Nintendo Treehouse Footage
, Overview Trailer
Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour contains examples of:
- Achievement System: You receive medals from engaging in minigames and tech demos around the exhibition hall, with every minigame having a medal requirement before it can be played. Tech demos grant a single medal just for participating, while minigames can grant up to three depending on your performance.
- Anti-Frustration Features:
- If a minigame is giving you a hard time or you don't have the required equipment to play them (such as the camera or a 4K TV/monitor), you can skip them by inputting an SOS morse code via the Y button near the attendant and they will give you Skip Medals. Skip Medals will count towards your overall total medals and you can go back and play the minigames you skipped so you can still earn the medals you skipped over.
- The tech demo showing VRR can have its frame rate set as low as 1, which will make the controls very laggy. Pressing A resets the frame rate to 60 so that you aren't stuck.
- Chekhov's Gunman: A certain NPC with white curls shows up often after playing quizzes and offers bonus insights on the tipic at hand. This NPC turns out to be the cutator of the expo and administers the final exam in the final area of the game.
- Collection Sidequest: Every area in the game has a lost item that you must return to the information desk on Joy-Con 2 (L), though there is no actual reward for doing this other than the game simply marking the sidequest as complete. Each item must be collected and returned one at a time, though the ability to instantly warp to the desk and back to the exhibit you were near makes this a trivial limitation.
- Double Unlock: Most minigames have several levels/variants of rising difficulty, and require both getting at least one medal in an earlier version of the game and having enough total medals.
- Edutainment Game: The game is dedicated to explaining how video game hardware works - as well as some technology concepts in general - through its minigames and quizzes, though all of this information is naturally centered around how it relates to the development and design of the Nintendo Switch 2 in particular.
- Frictionless Ice: Downplayed. Walking around on the Nintendo Switch 2 screen is treated like ice and you'll accelerate if you keep moving in one direction. You can still turn around, but the reduced friction makes it very difficult to change direction. Running straight for a few seconds will cause your avatar to fall on their ass and keep sliding until they get back up.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: One NPC expresses surprise that "they're showing us this much", referring to the fact that Nintendo has never had such a candid in-depth technical showcase and discussion of one of their consoles for public viewing, down to showing views of internals and assembly of the Switch 2 parts.
- Mercy Mode: If one of the minigames is too difficult to beat, or you don't have the needed accessories, you can tap out "S.O.S." in morse code using the Y button to the staff member at the booth to receive "skip medals", so you are less likely to be gated out of playing later minigames, though you'll still need to go back and get at least two medals from that minigame in order to get 100% Completion.
- No Ending: What do you get for passing the final quiz and finishing the game? Well, the curator congratulates you... and that's it. No credits, no ending cutscene, nothing.
- Pixel Hunt: Exaggerated. There's an entire minigame centered around finding white pixels so small you would need a jumbotron to see them clearly, all in order to showcase the console's 4K resolution.
- Pop Quiz: The game gives you one of these after you've read all the "insights" for a given topic.
- Rank Inflation: Each minigame gives an upfront reward of two medals, but each one also has third medal that is rewarded if you manage to achieve an even more strict target time or score. Only the first two medals count for 100% Completion, and the third one's requirement is only shown on revisits.
- Some Dexterity Required: One game, Dodge the Spiked Balls, has you using one of the Joy-Con 2 controllers as a mouse to control a UFO and dodge an avalanche of spiky balls. Later rounds, however, make you control two UFOs at the same time using both Joy-Con, which can be too much to keep track of especially in "Nightmare Mode". It can be made more manageable if you pass the second Joy-Con to a friend and treat it like a two-player game like the game suggests if you're struggling.
- Tech-Demo Game: The various minigames and tech demos are intended to explain the system's features and capabilities. The given label denotes how much of an actual game the given activity is: minigames include activities like using the mouse controls to play speed golf or do target shooting, while tech demos are more simple experiences such as having the HD rumble 2 create different sounds or shooting fireworks to show off the system's HDR capabilities.
