Nintendo’s new Switch 2 has been out for only a couple of days as of writing, but modders have wasted no time poking around under the hood. On June 5, developer and security researcher David Buchanan (@retr0_id on Bluesky) shared footage of a successful framebuffer graphics demo running on the console through a userland Return-Oriented Programming (ROP) exploit. For reference, it’s a technique that doesn’t involve native code execution, but still manages to draw graphics directly to the screen. In this context, “userland” (or “user space”) refers to code that runs outside the kernel, meaning it doesn’t have full system privileges or direct hardware access.

“This has no practical purpose and I can’t prove I’m not just like, playing a YouTube video or something,” Buchanan joked. However, fellow devs and modders were also quick to confirm its legitimacy - and to express concern that Nintendo will likely patch this quickly, making it viable only on early production units.

https://bsky.app/profile/retr0.id/post/3lqtwrndzf22w

Obviously this doesn’t mean much for now. But it’s cool to see that people are already beginning to tinker with the system.