What will Switch 2’s gimmick be?

polygon.com:

Nintendo has a unique philosophy when it comes to video game hardware, defined by the late designer Gunpei Yokoi as “lateral thinking with withered technology.” The idea is that, instead of aiming for state-of-the-art tech, Nintendo’s engineers use cheaper, mass-produced, less powerful parts, and then produce something unexpected and innovative. The philosophy has led to most, if not quite all, of the company’s biggest successes, including Yokoi’s original Game Boy: the twin-screen, touch-enabled DS; the motion-controlled Wii; and the Switch, a hybrid portable game console born of Nintendo’s realization that low-power mobile chipsets were catching up fast with mainstream gaming tech.

To put it another way: Nintendo loves a gimmick. As we await the reveal of the successor to Switch — the Switch 2, as we’re calling it — it’s natural to wonder what this console’s gimmick will be, and indeed whether it will even have one. It would be out-of-character for Nintendo to release a straight, “same but better” sequel to one of its consoles. Even the 3DS, which was otherwise just an updated DS, had a glasses-free 3D screen. On the other hand, Nintendo was badly burned by the failure of Wii U, its first attempt at a hybrid console. Seven years later, though, the Switch’s sales pitch remains unique enough that it still stands out, even against a new wave of powerful handhelds like the Steam Deck.

Reporting so far suggests that Switch 2 will indeed be a fairly straightforward follow-up, a power-efficient handheld that can be hooked up to a TV. Here, we’ve collected a few of the more interesting theories about what other features Nintendo might be tempted to jazz it up with.

From the DS to Wii U, Nintendo has a longstanding love of a dual-screen setup, and a patent recently unearthed by Game Rant suggests that it might consider going back to a DS-style twin-screen handheld device.

There are a couple of new twists here. The first is that, even when closed, the device still has a