Is The Nintendo NX's Secret Feature A Return To Game Cartridges?

By Luke Smith / June 28, 2016

Speaking to the Associated Press (by way of The Express), legendary Nintendo figurehead Shigeru Miyamoto has stated the upcoming NX console is taking time to develop, a key quote being that “If it was just a matter of following advancements in technology, things would be coming out a lot quicker."

This lines up with a copy of some Nintendo trademark filings that recently hit the web, pointing to the idea of Nintendo going back to cartridges. A Neogaf thread has analysed said filings and concluded that whilst upcoming Wii U games like Captain Toad and Tokyo Mirage Sessions are listed as being on discs, Pokemon Sun & Moon is listed as a cartridges - all above board, as it'll be dropping on 3DS.

Interestingly though, the upcoming Legend Of Zelda - which is as far as we know, only in development for the Wii U and NX - lists both discs and cartridges as its physical media.

Perhaps it's all just speculation, and the new Zelda game will just also be available on... the 3DS? But the question remains: What if?

If Nintendo returned to cartridges, not only would the nostalgia factor be off the chain, but with today's technology, said cartridges wouldn't be grounded with the same technological limits that eventually ended the N64.

An Extremetech article argues that nowadays, cartridges could in fact compete with the Blu-Ray readers of Microsoft and Sony's consoles, stating:

"The Blu-ray disks in the current Xbox One and PS4 top out at roughly 27MB/s of performance. Microsoft and Sony could theoretically boost that by adapting faster drives, but NOR flash can hit performance levels that leave even the fastest Blu-ray hardware in the dust." NOR flash is a product from Macronix, a memory manufacturer who announced they expected to provide chips for the NX."

Like I said, it's all down to speculation, but can you imagine?

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Do you want to see the return of cartridges? Let us know in the comments below!