If you plug the world’s best-reviewed webcams into the Nintendo Switch 2 today, they won’t work, while many comparatively ancient webcams do. Why? That’s been a mystery for the nearly three weeks since the handheld launched. Now, two companies say they’ve figured it out and are pledging to update the firmware on their cameras.
Here’s a possibly oversimplified answer: today’s more-powerful webcams advertise many different modes that they support to any device you connect via USB – but that’s a problem because the Nintendo Switch 2 appears to be choosing modes it can’t properly play.
In the case of Elgato, which will update its non-working Facecam MK.2 and Facecam Neo, the solve was adding an additional low-resolution 480p mode, with Elgato general manager Julian Fest speculating that the Switch can only reliably support “very low resolution” cameras in order to put multiple facecams on screen.
But low resolution by itself isn’t the answer – as you’d probably expect, given that Nintendo’s own official Switch 2 camera is a 1080p camera which genuinely broadcasts a 1080p mode (we checked), and given it’s far from the only 1080p or higher camera that works with Nintendo’s new Switch …
