 This is a big week for Nintendo Switch ports. Bioshock, the collection, Borderlands the collection, and XCOM 2 Collection are all being released for the hybrid console, bringing new meaning to the word portable. Publisher 2K Games has released plenty of games on the Switch up to this point, but these three new collections are among the most beloved games of the past decade and a half. While some games in these collections, such as the original Bioshock and Borderlands, are pushing 15 years old, others, such as Bioshock Infinite and XCOM 2, are so technically complex that it's impressive anyone managed to squeeze them onto a handheld device. This incredible achievement is all thanks to the unsung heroes of Nintendo Switch ports, the incredible team at Virtuous Games. Founded in 2004, Virtuous focuses primarily on game ports, and thus is often overlooked by the gaming media as a whole. This is a shame as the team has been responsible for some of the best ports in recent years. According to Virtuous CEO Gilles Longroyu, work on the PS3 port of Final Fantasy 10 and 10.2 led the studio to discover a passion for creating impressive, challenging ports. He said, We realised there was a lot of value in bringing AAA titles to new platforms, if done well. Meanwhile, our partners also began to understand that our ability to line up a larger number of artists and engineers than traditional developers allowed us to be more thorough in our adaptations. Indeed, the company's size is one of its greatest strengths. Virtuous has over 1,600 employees across the globe, with its largest studio space located in Shanghai, China. Any company that chooses to work with Virtuous knows that they're getting top quality work from an expansive team of talented developers. This large studio is necessary for some of the company's trickier projects. It's not easy getting an expansive HD game to run effectively on the Switch. What's more, according to Elijah Freeman, Vice President of Games at Virtuous, older games can often be more difficult than newer ones. But with enough effort and resources, anything is possible. Says Elijah, We often have this conversation with partners who develop their original game for PC or HD consoles and think that it won't run on the Switch. Give enough time to a specialised team and they will find enough technical and content optimisations to make it play seamlessly. It's simply a matter of priority. How do you balance the distribution of tasks for the GPU and CPU to achieve the expected results? This can be especially challenging if it were a classic game with an antiquated codebase, but it's totally feasible. This requires creative thinking when it comes to frame rate and memory optimisation, especially for the larger maps with complex environments. We have a strong team of technical artists who are rearranging and streamlining workflow and we've set up a VIP, a very important place in the room, which is basically a table with TV sets where we constantly cross-compare the Switch version with other SKUs. We're excited about our progress because we feel that we are pushing the limits of what is possible on the Switch. In 2018, Virtuos created Switch ports for Dark Souls, Remastered and Starlink Battle for Atlas. The quality of these ports may developers sit up and take notice. It turned out that more could be achieved on the Switch than many had realised. Enter 2K Games, who had released several games on the Switch up to this point, but were looking for something more ambitious. Fans were desperate to see some of the publisher's iconic back catalogue make its way onto the handheld. And so, the company decided to dump a bunch of ports onto the system at the same time. According to the 2K Chief Creative, Sammy Thesman, well, we've had a huge demand for these games on Switch for some time now, so it was actually because we felt bad that we've kept everyone waiting this long. In announcing and releasing all these games at the same time, we were able to pull this necessary partnership together even more effectively and really establish it. We didn't necessarily have some kind of marketing goal or something like that in mind, but I'm sure it wasn't just a happy coincidence either. Virtuos worked their magic on these games, trying to crunch down art assets without compromising quality. Ultimately, if there was one thing even this talented studio couldn't do, it was make three chunky Bioshock games fit on a single Nintendo Switch cartridge. So, while the games are releasing physically, this is mostly for show, as the games require a large update in order to run. Regardless, the work that Virtuos is doing is incredibly impressive. The moral of the story is that even if something seems impossible, if you're willing to get creative and rely on other people where necessary, you can still make it happen.