A Switch 2 Emulator Already Runs Mario Kart World at 60 FPS on PC
The first publicly available Nintendo Switch 2 emulator for PC is out. Developer Takoroka published a pre-release build of Eden-NX2 on October 29, describing it as experimental Switch 2 integration for Eden that still needs many fixes. The build runs only on Windows so far, with unimplemented shaders causing mesh errors and missing models. It can boot Mario Kart World and Donkey Kong Bananza, but both games show major performance and graphical problems at this stage.
Community performance reports collected by the press show full speed is already possible on strong hardware, though not everywhere. One tester with a Ryzen 7 5800X3D and GeForce RTX 5090 reported about 60 FPS in Mario Kart World, with occasional shader-compilation stutter and visual glitches. A higher-end pairing of a Ryzen 7 9800X3D and GeForce RTX 5080 held a stable 60 FPS with rare brief dips to 59 FPS. Weaker setups fall short: a Ryzen 5 5600G with a GeForce RTX 5070 managed 40 to 53 FPS in gameplay and 40 to 45 FPS with two players, while a Ryzen 7 5700X3D with a GeForce RTX 3060 stayed around 38 to 45 FPS.
Takoroka's code has already been forked. Eglantine, started by developer Camille LaVey, describes itself as a free and open-source Switch 2 emulator derived from Eden, Yuzu and Sudachi, written in C++ with portability in mind, with builds for Windows, Linux and macOS. Its authors claim Mario Kart World is playable at full speed depending on PC specifications, while Splatoon Raiders is also playable with a variable frame rate. Footage highlighted by XDA shows Mario Kart World running with some stutters but no major graphical breakdown.
The timing is striking. The emulator arrived roughly a week after security researcher pepsipu demonstrated the first untethered jailbreak of the console, and it reuses a mature first-generation Switch codebase. Observers compare it to the GameCube-to-Wii leap, when Dolphin's maturity made the next machine faster to emulate. The project history underlines that speed: the Eglantine repository was created on October 29, 2026, and reached build 60 by October 31 with stabilization fixes.
Neither emulator ships games: users must supply their own dumped Switch 2 titles. Reported requirements include 64-bit Windows 10 or 11, a Vulkan-capable graphics card with at least 8 GB of VRAM, and 16 GB of RAM. Shader stutter on first compilation, missing geometry on tracks, and unproven stability over longer sessions mean this remains a rough proof of concept rather than a polished way to play. What comes next is a race between shader implementation, stability fixes, and Nintendo's response after its 2024 lawsuit shut down Yuzu.