The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom Nintendo Switch 2 upgrades bring a slew of improvements that vastly enhance the experience, but the latter's upgrade also misses an important opportunity.
In a new in-depth analysis by Digital Foundry of the Nintendo Switch 2 upgrades for the two open-world entries in the series, it's confirmed that Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom still uses AMD FSR 1 in the upgraded version. AMD's upscaler is mentioned in the game's Intellectual Properties page, and a deep look at the game's image quality confirms that it is still being used, leaving a lot of distracting flicker in view during gameplay. This is most definitely a missed opportunity, considering the Nintendo Switch 2 supports the superior NVIDIA DLSS upscaling solution that has already delivered impressive results in several launch titles.
Despite the above and a few other issues, such as issues with shadows not being completely fixed on Nintendo Switch 2, and a draw distance that's mostly identical to that of the original system, both Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are very solid upgrades. The higher dynamic resolution range in both docked and handheld mode returns a sharper image, which improves gameplay by making it easier to spot items on the ground from a distance, for example, and the new higher-quality environmental textures make both games more pleasing as a whole. The rock solid 60 FPS in both games, the faster load times and the implementation of the Zelda Notes round up two upgrades that are among the best we have seen to date.
Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom are hardly the only games to have received significant improvements on Nintendo Switch 2. Splatoon 3, for example, sees an enormous resolution boost on the system, while unpatched games running at unlocked framerates often hit 60 FPS with no trouble.
About the author: Francesco De Meo has been covering video games and technology since 2012, starting his career at small outlets like Gamersyndrome and GeekSnack. After joining Wccftech gaming section in 2015, he quickly expanded his video gaming coverage with in-depth reporting, interviews with iconic industry figures such as Grasshopper Manufacture founder and No More Heroes creator Goichi "Suda51" Suda, Resident Evil series creator Shinji Mikami, Team NINJA's president and Nioh series director Fumihiko Yasuda, and Silent Hill creator Keiichiro Toyama, reviews and on-the-ground coverage of major industry events such as Gamescom and E3. When he's not reporting or reviewing, Francesco can be found playing the genres he loves most, spending time with his six cats, reading, writing music, playing guitar and drumming for his progressive rock band.
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