There were several high-profile announcements at Game Awards 2023, from the announcement of new DLC for "God of War Ragnarök" to the first look at the latest installment in the "Monster Hunter" series. However, one of the "world premieres," the reveal trailer for "Visions of Mana," received a little less attention, but this title may actually be the first Nintendo Switch 2 game to be shown.

The trailer for "Visions of Mana," which was shown at The Game Awards, ends with a splash screen confirming that the game will be released in 2024 on PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, and PC. Surprisingly, there is no sign of a Nintendo Switch version. This is because the franchise has never skipped Nintendo platforms in the past. Collection of Mana was released for Switch in 2019, Trail of Mana in 2020, and Legend of Mana in 2021. Thus, the franchise as a whole has a long history with Nintendo.

Perhaps the rapidly aging Nintendo Switch hardware is not powerful enough to handle this new installment of the "Mana" series. However, since "Visions of Mana" will be released on the PS4, a console more than a decade old, it is clear that the developers are not taking full advantage of the latest gaming hardware with this project.

According to regular Nintendo leaker Zippo, the reason why the Switch version of "Visions of Mana" has not yet been confirmed is that the RPG will actually be one of publisher Square Enix's very first Nintendo Switch 2 games This is because.

"'Visions of Mana' is pretty exciting for Square Enix because it will be one of the first games released for the new system. And this is just the tip of the iceberg. Square is planning extensive support for the next system with franchises large and small," Zippo wrote in his latest blog post.

This certainly makes a lot of sense. Because given the history of the series (the first Mana game was released on the SNES in 1993), it would seem puzzling that Visions of Mana would skip Nintendo's platform altogether. But while Zippo is a reputable insider, it is important to take this information as speculation for now. Until we hear from Nintendo or Square Enix, this report should not be considered definitive fact.

Zippo previously claimed that the Nintendo Switch 2 would be released in late 2024, with a new Mario Kart game in the second year of its release. Again, these are just rumors for now, but it is exciting to think that we may only be a few months away from specific details about the currently unannounced Nintendo Switch 2.