Bringing Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 to Nintendo Switch 2 has been a major technical challenge for developer Digital Legends, but the developer believes the results have made the effort worthwhile.
Modern Warfare 4 marks the first time since 2013’s Call of Duty: Ghosts that the mainline Call of Duty entry is returning to a Nintendo platform. With the Switch 2 hardware presenting different technical specs compared to PlayStation, Xbox and PC, questions have naturally surrounded how much of the full Call of Duty experience could make its way onto Nintendo’s system.
During an interview with Insider Gaming at Gamescom, Digital Legends Associate Production Director Beatriz Gonzalez acknowledged that bringing Modern Warfare 4 to Switch required the team to approach the project carefully.
“Every time that you approach something new, you have to do it in a cautious way,” Gonzalez said.
Digital Legends has been working on games for unique platforms for 25 years, according to Gonzalez, and that experience helped the team take on the challenge of bringing Modern Warfare 4 to Switch 2.
“And again, we are very happy with the results because we have 60 FPS running for multiplayer,” she said.
The team has also taken advantage of features specific to Nintendo’s hardware. Modern Warfare 4 will support gyro controls through the Joy-Cons and Pro Controller, while the Joy-Con can even be placed on a table and used like a mouse.
Gonzalez described seeing that functionality work for the first time as a genuine “wow moment.”
“The first time that I saw the mouse—that somebody in the team say, ‘Look, it works’, and then you start controlling with it. That for me, that was a wow moment,” Gonzalez said. “It just blew my mind that you can just do that.”
Beyond the controls, performance has been one of the biggest areas of focus throughout development.
Gonzalez said the team spent significant time optimizing Modern Warfare 4 across the game to ensure the core gameplay experience could run properly on Switch 2. While the team is targeting 60 FPS for multiplayer in docked mode, handheld mode currently reaches around 44 FPS, with additional optimization work continuing ahead of launch.
“There has been a ton of optimizations in all areas of the game,” she said. “We have worked heavily on technology to be able to reach those 60 FPSs on multiplayer on docked mode.”
The Switch 2 version will also be designed around the different ways players can use the console. Digital Legends has optimized the game for both docked and handheld play, while adding Nintendo-specific settings and control options. For Gonzalez, that combination of technical optimization and platform-specific features has made the project particularly rewarding despite the difficulties involved.
“It was a challenge, but a very exciting challenge,” she said. “And we are very, very happy with how it’s turning out.”
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 is scheduled to release October 23 for Nintendo Switch 2, PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.
Are you going to play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 4 on the Switch 2 when it launches? Leave your thoughts down in the comments and in the official Insider Gaming Discord.
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Mike has been covering the gaming industry since 2012, and has reported on some of the largest events in the industry while also working as an investigative reporter. Outside of…
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