The popular Yuzu Nintendo Switch emulator reached another important milestone, as the emulator is now available for Android devices, offering decent performance in a variety of titles depending on the device.
The Android launch was confirmed with a new post on the Yuzu official website, which also revealed additional information on this new version of the emulator, such as the team's commitment to improving feature parity, compatibility, and performance of the Android builds and hardware requirements.
At the time, the emulator requires devices powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon SoCs, which have Adreno GPUs, as devices powered by other SoCs like Exynos and Mediatek are expected not to be able to run the emulator due to worse GPU drivers. The emulator also has high RAM requirements, and devices with SD 865 and 8GB of RAM or better are expected to provide the best possible experience. Alongside hardware requirements, the Yuzu development team confirmed that the emulator requires Android 11 or newer and multiple mandatory Vulkan extensions, which the Google Play Store will check for automatically.
While performance will vary greatly, depending on the device, the Yuzu development team provided a quick look at some performance numbers on the Samsung Galaxy S23 and S20 FE 5G (Mesa Turnip). On the former, many games performed surprisingly well, such as Super Mario 3D World + Bowser's Fury, Zelda: Skyward Sword HD and Link's Awakening, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, and Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, which all run at 60 FPS. More demanding games, like Super Mario Odyssey and Zelda: Breath of the Wild, don't fare as well, but it's still impressive that the new version of the emulator can run some games decently enough in its early version.
The Yuzu Nintendo Switch emulator for Android can now be downloaded from the Google Play Store. The PC version can be downloaded from its official website.
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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