Nintendo Switch Menu Mockups Found On Prototype Console

Image: Damien McFerran / Nintendo LifeDo you ever look at the home screen of your Nintendo Switch and wish there was a bit more colour? A bit more chaos? Or that it was a bit less monochromatic? Well, thanks to German translator PaulFelixKelly, we’ve had a glimpse at some of the ideas and mockups Nintendo had for the menu.

Kelly managed to get hold of a prototype Nintendo Switch unit which was used for early production and development. The Prototype Switch NAND comes with 64GB of storage, but it’s also home to some development secrets, which include these menu mockups.

Now, it’s worth noting, as Kelly does on Twitter, that these are all just mockups — essentially, placeholders for whenever Nintendo settled on the final design. But you can see from Kelly’s screenshots below that many of the placeholder menus look very similar to the Wii U’s own menu.

These mockups are dated from 2015, although these dates are often provided for app display purposes. You can see many of the game icons have been pulled from the Wii U and 3DS, with titles such as Super Mario Maker, Nintendo Badge Arcade, Triforce Heroes, and the original Splatoon present.

But you can see from these screenshots that there’s a greater variety of icons, including pixel art Yoshi and Donkey Kong. Two folders full of these — titled ‘Friends’ and ‘Avatars’ — give a few lesser-loved Nintendo characters some time in the limelight. Who thought we’d see a Nikki icon, hey?

We’ve linked both of these threads above, but you can also have a look at the icons below:

If menu mockups aren’t doing it for you, then Kelly also found design concepts for the Nintendo NX — which we all know eventually became the Switch. Looking at these pictures, the design of the console was nailed down pretty early on, and there are very few differences from the final product.

Sharing the designs and photos of a retail unit, Kelly outlines the key difference, that being the black Joy-Con with unique joysticks. The dock also lacks the Nintendo Switch branding, being just a regular black dock which houses the Switch itself.

There’s some fascinating stuff on show here which gives a little bit of insight into what developers were working with before the Switch hit the markets. We kind of love the more colourful menus that are shown above, but we understand Nintendo’s decision to go with something a bit more clean and concise with the current model. The burning question we have, though? Was there menu music? We miss menu music!

What are your thoughts on the menu mockups for the Switch? Do you like them more than what we got? Head on down to the comments and share your thoughts.

[source twitter.com]