[lastgeniusua]

I'm not sure the Mig Switch will allow you to play homebrew, it is designed to replicate the (apparently reverse-engineered) security protocol of game cards signed by Nintendo. The Github repos you've seen previously are probably your best bet, they're designed for homebrew development, but to launch these you'd need to mod your Switch: with an unpatched original model (could easily be verified on https://ismyswitchpatched.com/) it's as easy as connecting two pins with a paperclip and injecting a USB payload with your PC, with patched later models this requires a modchip soldered onto the board.

[gjsman-1000]

Even with that though, home-brew games are almost nonexistent on the Switch, or extremely minimal. Having the ability to launch a game with a modded Switch, doesn't mean you have access to the SDK, or the documentation. Without those things, you really can't write any useful programs. It's like gaining access to the cockpit of a plane, and having no manual or labels on what all the buttons do.

If you truly want to develop a Switch game, you need the SDK, and dev hardware is basically necessary as well. That's only coming from a deal with Nintendo.

[derefr]

> Having the ability to launch a game with a modded Switch, doesn't mean you have access to the SDK, or the documentation.

The very same websites and forums and Discord servers where the people who come up with jailbreaks for the Switch hang out, can also point you to leaked copies of SDKs, and ways to use these with a jailbroken switch and/or an emulator like Yuzu. (After all, while most published console homebrew — including jailbreaks — use ground-up rewrites of support libraries, it's a lot easier to tinker on Proof-of-Concepts for exploit chains using the official SDK.)

> and dev hardware is basically necessary as well. That's only coming from a deal with Nintendo.

Funny enough, you can find all sorts of dev hardware for old consoles on eBay... and yes, that's despite all such kits being closed-lifecycle systems that are supposed to be returned to the OEM when no longer used. (I think the main way these make it out into the market, is through the company that owns them going bankrupt and getting its assets liquidated.)

[seba_dos1]

devkitPro (libnx) has a complete OpenGL implementation with solid SDL2 port. I have ported my game engine to it with ease. There are even homebrew Godot ports for Switch that have been going on for years now. There's absolutely no trouble with writing proper homebrew for the Switch, no deals with Nintendo necessary.

[JoshTriplett]

> Even with that though, home-brew games are almost nonexistent on the Switch, or extremely minimal.

One major reason for that is that Nintendo aggressively permabans Switch devices that appear to be modded, preventing them from ever being used online.

[traverseda]

You can run full ubuntu on it, so I guess people don't see much need for "homebrew". You can just run any game that compiles for arm linux on it.