But now, the internet has gotten its hands on an apparent development build of a modern Nintendo game running on the Switch.

This latest release, which first started percolating on web forum 4chan, contains a version of Pokémon Sword and Shield that dates back to March 2018.

One of the first notable things about the build, which hackers got in a playable working state in mid-October, is that it contains several Pokémon who are not in the final game.

Previously, there was a lot of controversy over which creatures in the compendium made it into the game, though Game Freak has worked to fill out the roster with expansions.

Notably, many of these cut monsters don’t display correctly in this build of the game, sometimes showing up with technical hitches like garbled animations and sound effects.

A Twitch streamer briefly running the beta build had their game crash more than once?

All of this has led modders to believe that Game Freak may have cut some pocket monsters from Sword and Shield for the purposes of optimization.

On a more philosophical level, a couple of hackers and modders I spoke to about this say that the community feels slightly uncomfortable that the leak revolves around a modern game that people are still playing

To wit, Sword and Shield will get a new expansion at the end of October, so the release cycle of the game isn’t even done yet