This morning, we got a clearer picture of the Nintendo Switch 2’s third-party future thanks to a new Partner Direct stream. Between announcements of ports, the show brought a few big reveals, from Monster Hunter Stories 3: Twisted Reflection to Octopath Traveler 0. But it was one quick announcement that caught my eye (literally) the most: Goodnight Universe launches on November 11 for Nintendo Switch 2, alongside Windows PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X.
The news was hidden away in the stream’s traditional end montage, where Nintendo rattled off a bunch of release dates in rapid succession. Goodnight Universe kicked off the segment, showing just a few short clips of a baby using telekinetic powers to fold clothing and swat drones. So what the heck is it and why should you be excited about it?
Goodnight Universe is the latest project from the developers of Before Your Eyes, and that detail will mean a lot more to you if you’ve played that game. Released in 2021, Before Your Eyes is a unique indie that uses a webcam as a controller. You control a character who has died and is passing to the afterlife. As part of that process, they are left reliving their memories which you watch unfold in third person. The trick? Every time you blink in real life, the game moves to the next memory. It’s an ingenious way to adapt the old “blink and you miss it” idiom into a real tear-jerker of a game.
While the studio’s latest game sounds a little less emotional, it still uses a similar trick. Goodnight Universe stars a newborn baby who just happens to have psychic powers. Using a camera and eye-tracking tech, you’ll use those powers to wreck some infant havoc on the toddler’s poor parents. When you see the lad folding hovering laundry in the trailer, that’s all controlled by looking at the clothing and using your eyes to manipulate them.
I demoed Goodnight Universe last year at Tribeca Fest (where it won the festival’s Tribeca Games Award in 2024) and found a premise with a lot of potential. Developer Nice Dream has built on the eye-tracking tech that powered Before Your Eyes in clever ways, taking the eye controls far beyond blinking. With a more comedic setup and a little bit of mystery (as teased in a clip where the baby fights off some drones), it’s shaping up to be another indie curiosity that warrants a try.
If nothing else, the news is a reminder that the Nintendo Switch 2 is hospitable to more unique games thanks to its new features. The console’s camera support makes it possible for a game like Goodnight Universe to come to Switch 2 right alongside Windows PC. And if nothing else, it hopefully means that we get Before Your Eyes on Nintendo Switch 2 sometime soon too.
