Making the Switch 2 Less Portable

From Milton Bradley’s Microvision of the late 1970s to Tiger Electronics’ Game.com from the height of the dot-com boom, a lot of weird portable game consoles have been developed over the years. But the weirdest of all is a DIY “portable” game system powered by a Nintendo Switch 2. Undoubtedly to the delight of Nintendo, with its famous tolerance for hardware mods, YouTuber Joel Creates chose to hack its latest and greatest hardware to make a retro-themed handheld that nobody asked for, but that everyone will want.

Joel Creates drew inspiration for the console from the Nintendo 64, which the Switch 2 can conveniently emulate. Having been released in the mid-1990s, the Nintendo 64 was meant for use with a CRT TV, so that is what Joel Creates decided to pack into his console. Aside from that, the system would need the essential components of a Switch 2 dock, a built-in controller, and some speakers to be complete.

Again to the delight of Nintendo, a Switch 2 dock was disassembled. The “extra” components, like unneeded ports, were cast aside to save space. Through a series of converters — to get from HDMI to composite, while maintaining the ability to adjust the screen aspect ratio — the video output was fed into the guts of a Sony Watchman color TV. For the controller, a USB gamepad was disassembled so that the buttons and pads could be positioned where needed. Joel Creates wanted to be sure that audio quality wasn’t taken for granted, as is often the case with portables, so iMac G3 speakers were included in the design.

With great difficulty, all of this hardware was stuffed into a slick, if not excessively large, 3D-printed case. The TV screen sits prominently on top, and one half of the controller sits on each side of it. Grips built into the side of the case allow the massive contraption to be called handheld, which may be one of the worst abuses of the term in the history of gaming. The Switch 2 itself cleverly slides into the console like a VHS tape.

Things were really starting to come together, so as everyone who has ever worked on a complex project like this knows, that meant it was time for something to break. In this case, it was about the worst possible thing that could happen — the picture tube got fried. The only fix was a transplant, but with color Watchman TVs in short supply these days, Joel Creates instead had to use a portable Magnavox set. Everything was different, of course, and substantial redesigning ensued.

You have to give credit where credit is due, and Joel Creates definitely deserves credit for hanging in there and completing this project in spite of all of this trouble. The result is nothing less than magical, and after seeing it, the stock Switch 2 dock just looks sad by comparison. This video is one that you won’t want to miss!