Video: Switch 2’s Mouse Controls Are Nothing New For Nintendo

While Nintendo’s forthcoming Switch 2 doesn’t promise to be particularly innovative, it’s quite unfair to say it lacks progression. It’s an upgrade to a proven concept rather than a complete transformation yet laden with unique touches. To me, the most exciting new feature is the mouse controls which could lead to a wide range of mouse-controlled games in development.

Seasoned gamers might recall that this isn’t Nintendo’s initial experiment with mouse-based controls, with previous attempts including the ill-starred
Nintendo 64DD.

What comes to mind first when you think about the SNES Mouse? If you didn’t mention Mario Paint, you probably didn’t think of anything else. It’s understandable, seeing that the game that came with and defined the accessory is usually the standout.

However, more games supported the peripheral than most would anticipate. Delving into the topic reveals a plethora of information from various sources, but no one seems to know the exact count of supported games. While I don’t claim to have that final tally, I have exhaustively researched all available online data and confirmed which games integrated the SNES Mouse, even if not in the best way possible.

Several of the games listed below were exclusive to Japan due to its fondness for strategic, top-down RPGs at the time. So without further ado, here’s our comprehensive and validated roster of SNES Mouse games:

1. ACME Animation Factory
2. Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Eye of the Beholder
3. Alice no Paint Adventure
4. Arkanoid: Doh It Again
5. Tin Star
6. Tokimeki Memorial: Densetsu no Ki no shita de
7. Troddlers
8. Trump Island
9. Utopia: The Creation of a Nation
10. Vegas Stakes
11. Wolfenstein 3D
12. Wonder Project J: Kikai no Shounen Pino
13. Zico Soccer

Interestingly, some unexpected omissions exist where sequels of mouse-supported games lacked the same control option, the most notable of these is Shanghai II: Dragon’s Eye, which has no mouse support, unlike the first and third titles in the series.

There are also a few games that were announced but nevet released that were purported to utilize the SNES Mouse. Kid Kirby, a DMA Design-developed Kirby game is one such example, with other notable examples including Sound Fantasy (Nintendo R&D1), Warrior of Rome III (Micronet), and Spellcraft: Aspects of Valor (Ascii).

An accessible beta of Spellcraft origins has been unearthed, the incomplete but playable game fully supports the SNES Mouse much like the original DOS game was designed on.

So what’s the final count? If you include the unreleased games, the total rounds up to a staggering 86 titles, or 82 if you exclude them. With 1,757 known releases for SNES, that’s just under 5% of the entire system’s offerings. Quite impressive.

To give you a better perspective, the Switch’s IR camera is known to support less than 20 titles – that’s less than 0.2% of the 12,464 games available for the console at the time of writing, according to Moby Games.

The Joy-Con 2 holds a significant advantage over the SNES Mouse. Its mouse control feature will be a built-in feature for every system sold of this model, and we already have 16 titles set to support this control method, proving that developers are already embracing this readily familiar system.

It may not be the most profound addition to Nintendo’s illustrious history, but if the SNES could succeed with a standalone peripheral in the ’90s, there’s every reason to anticipate that the mouse control of Switch 2 can become a staple in the new system’s library.