Nintendo Ships Every Switch With a Hidden NES Emulator

When the Switch launched, it did not have access to the Virtual Console, but Nintendo does intend to launch a Switch Virtual Console at some point in the future. Access to retro games is also linked to subscribing to next year's Nintendo Online Service, which will include access to collections of classic games.

It looks as though Nintendo has been preparing to support retro games on the Switch since day one, though, and in particular NES titles. As Engadget explains, hackers dissecting the Switch's system files discovered a title called "flog," which is golf written backwards, and turns out to be a NES emulator and a copy of NES title Golf from 1984.

The discovery of the emulator comes via Twitter user yellows8 and details posted on SwitchBrew. Apparently the game has been updated to support use of the Joy-Cons, but also motion control while the Z{L/R} button is pressed.

As to how the Golf screenshots were captured, yellows8 confirmed that the emulator had been run "unofficially" and not by using a development kit. That's ominous for Nintendo if hackers have figured out how to access the system and run software on it unofficially.

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For now, the existence of this emulator and NES game is yet to be officially confirmed. However, if true, it does point to the Switch eventually gaining access to a healthy selection of NES games. However, with the NES Classic being re-released next Summer, I suspect we'll be waiting a long time for NES games to appear for Switch.