Lichii emulator compatibility and Switch 2 status
- as of build 75
- November 5, 2026
- no official list
Lichii is not a finished Switch 2 emulator. Some games boot and play with problems, some only reach a black screen, and every result depends on your GPU, driver and settings. This page collects what the release notes and the issue tracker actually say, game by game and subsystem by subsystem.
How to read this page. “Playable with issues” means a release note says the game runs or plays, and known issues remain. We do not test games ourselves and do not round anything up. Issue numbers refer to github.com/zortos293/Lichii/issues.
Game status
| Game | Status | What the release notes say | Known issues / open reports |
|---|---|---|---|
| Star Fox | Playable with issues | Build 70: renders instead of a black screen; controller input works (HID command 300). Build 75: gameplay at 60 fps instead of 30. | RTX 50-series can lose the GPU device after a scene change (try NVIDIA driver 610.88). Open: crash before the training mission (#85), “robot voice” audio (#105). |
| Ocarina of Time remake (“green-hat kid adventure” in the notes) | Boots and plays, heavy issues | Build 75: boots, gets through the intro and plays; about 80 more shaders translate, so the white screen is gone. | Too much fog and glow outdoors; 12–22 fps on Ryzen 5900X + RTX 3080. Open: ~29 fps CPU-bound (#117), black screen without AV1 decoder (#116), green AV1 cutscenes on AMD/RADV (#106), audio desync (#115), infinite launch screen (#99), handheld-mode black screen (#98). |
| Donkey Kong Bananza | Runs well, not locked 60 | Build 70: crash after cutscenes fixed, less stutter; atomic compute shaders and pacing fixes. The notes say it “runs well, though not at a locked 60 fps yet”. | Open: black rectangle on AMD (#78), black DK when finding a banana (#30). |
| Mario Kart World | Runs, speed varies | Build 70: 30 fps mode and dynamic fps options under Graphics → Advanced. On an M4 Pro Mac races went from about 9.5 fps to 30–38 fps. | Open: severe performance regression in build 75 on AMD/Linux (#113), graphics memory leak (#21). |
| Kirby Air Riders | Runs with stalls | Build 70: white world fixed; faster shader translation and shorter race stalls. | Some races still stall while shaders build. Open: crash report (#68). |
| Mario Tennis Fever | Boots | Build 34: boot and rendering fixes. Build 70: device loss when the first court loads fixed. | No detailed status in the notes. |
| Nintendo Switch Sports Resort | Audio fixed | Build 70: system mixer audio in S16 format now plays. | No detailed status in the notes. |
| Yoshi and the Mysterious Book (demo) | Partial | Build 70: shader and video fixes. | Some textures still black; can crash later in play. |
| Fire Emblem: Fortune’s Weave | Not working well | Not mentioned in release notes. | Open issues: black screen with no visuals (#19), screen shaking (#25), FMVs skipped (#83). |
| Pokopia | Does not start | Not mentioned in release notes. | Open: constant black screen (#79). |
| Splatoon Raiders | Reported on macOS | Not mentioned in Lichii release notes; upstream Eglantine’s README says it runs “at variable performances”. | Open (macOS): cannot swim in ink (#29). |
Game names are trademarks of their owners and appear only to describe emulator status. This site does not link to or explain how to obtain any game.
Subsystem status
| Part | Status | Details |
|---|---|---|
| CPU (ARM64 code) | Working | Uses Eden’s dynarmic JIT, extended to decode the ARMv8.1–8.5 instructions Switch 2 games use (atomics, LDAPR, pointer authentication). Developer notes say pointer authentication is treated as identity and memory tags as zero. macOS uses the JIT, not native code execution. |
| Loading Switch 2 executables | Working | Loader and NPDM parser handle the Switch 2 layout (a 0x300-byte ACID signature area instead of 0x200). |
| GPU / shaders | Per-game | Vulkan renderer with Ampere (Switch 2 GPU generation) shader lowering added game by game; build 75 added about 80 shaders for one title. Three rare shaders in that title are still unsupported. |
| GPU threading | Experimental | A split GPU thread; build 70 stopped draining it before every pushbuffer entry and moved buffer flushes to the back thread. |
| Upscaling / DLSS | Partial | Games that run their own DLSS network go through a de-jitter stand-in (Star Fox). Desktop NVIDIA DLSS is only in the Windows MSVC build. |
| Video playback | Partial | H.264 framing and presentation fixes ported from upstream in build 70. Open issues report missing or green AV1 cutscenes. |
| Audio | Partial | System mixer S16 audio added in build 70. Open issue #105 reports distorted Star Fox audio. |
| Input | Working | Controller input through HID command 300 (build 70). |
| macOS (Apple Silicon) | Experimental | Fastmem on 16 KiB pages and MoltenVK work in build 70; release notes still call macOS support experimental. |
| Updater | Working | Checks Lichii’s GitHub releases since build 75. |
Sources: Lichii README, NX2_NOTES.md, release notes for builds 65, 70 and 75.
Known issues listed in build 75
- Ocarina of Time remake: outdoor areas have far too much fog and glow.
- Same game: about 12–22 fps on a Ryzen 5900X with an RTX 3080; three rare shaders still unsupported.
- Star Fox on RTX 50-series GPUs can lose the GPU device after a scene change; try NVIDIA driver 610.88.
- “Failed to allocate 14336 MiB of backing memory”: Windows ran out of RAM plus page file; set the page file to system-managed.
Performance figures in the notes
| Game | Hardware | Result | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ocarina of Time remake | Ryzen 5900X + RTX 3080 | 12–22 fps | build 75 notes |
| Star Fox | not stated | 60 fps gameplay (was 30) | build 75 notes |
| Mario Kart World | Apple M4 Pro | about 9.5 → 30–38 fps in races | build 70 notes |
| Donkey Kong Bananza | not stated | runs well, not a locked 60 fps | build 70 notes |
These are the maintainers’ figures, not a benchmark by this site.
Before you report a problem
- Update to the latest build; most builds fix game-specific crashes.
- On Windows, try the other zip (MSVC vs MinGW PGO); the notes say the MSVC build is the one to use for graphical issues.
- Search the open issues for your game.
- Include build number, game version, CPU, GPU, driver, settings, a screenshot and the log, as the README asks. Do not upload game files, keys or firmware.
FAQ
Is there an official Lichii compatibility list?
No. Neither the Lichii README nor upstream Eglantine publishes one yet; Eglantine’s README says “a list of supported games will be available in future”. This page is built from release notes and open issues and will change with every build.
Which Switch 2 games work on Lichii?
Release notes up to build 75 report Star Fox, Donkey Kong Bananza, Mario Kart World, Kirby Air Riders and the Ocarina of Time remake running, each with known issues; several others boot or partly work. None is described as perfect.
Does Lichii run Switch 1 games?
The README calls it a Nintendo Switch and Switch 2 emulator, and its core is the Eden Switch 1 emulator. Its own release notes, though, focus almost entirely on Switch 2 titles.
Why does a game run at 30 fps or less?
Many reasons: unsupported shaders, CPU-bound sections and GPU driver bugs. Build 75 notes report 12–22 fps for one title on a Ryzen 5900X and RTX 3080. The README says there is no universal frame-rate guarantee.
What does “Failed to allocate 14336 MiB of backing memory” mean?
The release notes say Windows ran out of RAM plus page file. Set the page file to system-managed and close memory-heavy apps.
My game crashes on an RTX 50-series card. What can I do?
The notes list Star Fox losing the GPU device on RTX 50-series cards (5070 Ti, 5090) after a scene change, and suggest trying NVIDIA driver 610.88.