Digital Foundry’s report on the frame-rate of Breath of the Wild compared between the Wii U and the Nintendo Switch versions raised some interesting points. First, it was discovered that the frame-rate ran more smoothly in undocked mode than in docked configuration. We know the game uses dynamic resolution scaling to maintain its 30fps frame-rate, but we didn’t know how this affected performance for the game.
Digital Foundry says that dynamic resolution scaling is present on both the Wii U and the Nintendo Switch, so the fact that it’s there doesn’t explain why the Switch’s undocked performance is so much better. The Wii U GamePad screen runs at 648p resolution, while Switch’s undocked performance is 720p. That’s compared to the Wii U at 810p on the TV and the Switch at 900p when docked.
If you’re interested in all the nitty gritty math behind the pixel-counting that’s involved in figuring out these resolutions, be sure to read the original post.
The interesting part about this post is Digital Foundry has looked into the issue of WiFi performance impacting games on the Switch. They’ve tested a few Switch games in flight mode and found that it has no impact on results in most games they’ve already tested for frame-rate issues and performance.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild – $59.99