Nintendo "very, very, upset" by Switch 2 leaks, former staff suggest
"This really does have a disruptive impact."
The recent deluge of Switch 2 details will have left Nintendo "really mad" and prompted time-consuming investigations into where information has leaked from.
That's according to former Nintendo employees Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang, who worked at Nintendo of America for more than a decade and experienced the company's processes when leaks erupted previously.
"This really does have a disruptive impact in what the company's trying to do now, which is to announce and launch a new console - which is hard enough as it is," Yang said on the latest episode of the Kit & Krysta podcast.
"[Nintendo]'s been disrupted daily, for months, with these leaks, and I'm 100 percent sure they are really mad, to the most severe level. We joke around but... they are very, very, very upset by this."
While leaks of information from Nintendo's manufacturing supply chain - such as the Switch 2 motherboard - may be dealt with overseas, the duo discussed information they felt may have trickled out from within Nintendo itself, from the team working on the Switch 2 launch. And when this sort of leak happens, Nintendo always investigates internally.
"They do have very good people that investigate these things," Ellis said. "They will eventually get to the bottom of it, but it takes time and it takes a lot of just talking to everybody involved.
"This is hard work, this is a lot of work and the people working on this - and it's not the whole company, it's a small group of people, at this point, who are allowed to know this information - need to focus all of their efforts onto [Switch 2].
"But now... half of their day is going to be eaten up by [questions like] 'I have to talk to you about every step you have taken at this point, who have you talked to, where do you think this could have happened?' And, quite frankly, that's time they don't have."
Yang said the pair had been through similar processes during their time at the company, and that teams "basically have another full-time job of being part of the investigation into these leaks".
"It's extremely disruptive, it's a high-stress situation as well because you really feel like you're in the hot seat," Yang concluded.
Leaks also limit Nintendo's desire to grow the teams working on under-wraps products, Ellis added, so as to avoid leaks spreading further. This then meant more work, as product launches neared, on a smaller circle of people.
Switch 2 has been widely-tipped for an imminent reveal, with reports the console could be unveiled later today.
The expectation is that Nintendo will first show off its long-awaited Switch 2 successor via a brief introductory video focused on the console hardware itself, before a longer look at a later date showcasing Switch 2 games.