Hacked Nintendo Switch may be able to run native PlayStation Vita games

Developer Sergi Granelli claims he has found a way to run PlayStation Vita games natively on the Nintendo Switch. While he hasn’t run any PS Vita games on the Switch yet, he thinks he may be able to in the future, without emulation.

An early version of the tool has been posted online by Granelli on his GitHub. Granelli tells Liliputing that it is a ‘proof of concept’, with which little is possible. He has not yet been able to play any official PS Vita games on the Switch through his tool. At the moment he has only been able to test some light homebrew games.

The tool is especially notable, as it doesn’t emulate games, but runs them natively. The tool translates software written for the PS Vita’s ARMv7 processor into the Nintendo Switch’s ARMv8 processor. This makes it more like a compatibility layer, with which software can be run on another operating system, according to Granelli.

However, there are still some hurdles to overcome before real PS Vita games can be played on a hacked Nintendo Switch. For example, according to Granelli, shaders can’t yet be translated from the PS Vita’s graphics processor to that of the Nintendo Switch.