Doom Eternal for the Nintendo Switch is considered by many to be one of the best looking games on that console. However, the team responsible for the Switch port had to put some limitations on how the game ran on Nintendo's console.
The development team at Panic Button understands that fans of Doom Eternal had to wait longer than expected for the port. There were even some who believed the port was entirely canceled. After the wait, they finally got the game on December 8, 2020, but noticed one aspect appeared to have been toned down a bit. Not long after some users pointed it out, Panic Button admitted it had limited cutscene frame rates to 20 FPS.
RELATED: 5 Great Shooter Games on Xbox Game Pass
Panic Button Lead Engineer Travis Archer recently talked to Digital Foundry about his team's reasons for the frame rate cap. Archer said he wanted to make sure the level of detail for Doom Eternal on the Switch was still quite high. He added most games' cutscenes are the most "graphically intensive." He added there was quite a bit of importance in not losing the level of detail in Doom Eternal. Archer added Panic Button decided it was better for the cut scenes to run at a higher resolution, in part because it didn't affect the performance.
That doesn't mean Doom Eternal's cutscenes are always going to be capped at such a low frame rate. The developers are looking at finding ways to improve it in the near future. However, at the moment, Panic Button hasn't figured out how to make sure the game looks better, without harming the performance. Still, the team is constantly looking to find a way to ramp up the frame rate on those cutscenes.
It's safe to say the frame rate cap isn't the only allowance Panic Button had to make in porting the game to the Nintendo Switch. Chief among those adjustments was Doom Eternal's file size. While it was shrunk down to just 17GB, that is still a decent-sized game for the Switch, considering the most popular memory card size is just 32GB.
The game's arrival on the Nintendo Switch means that the title is available on almost every gaming platform, excluding iOS or Android. Additionally, those Game Pass Ultimate users who hadn't tried the game out yet, were able to play Doom Eternal on PC for free once it joined the subscription service in December.
Doom Eternal is available now for PC, PS4, Switch, and Xbox One.