Even with the current success of Nintendo Co Ltd’s most recent family-friendly title, Splatoon, the Japanese game company still has its eyes on the next console generation, especially after the mediocre sales performance of the Wii U. Aside from the codename “NX” and the chance that it may be region-free, little is known about the next Nintendo game console, but now new rumors have surfaced that suggest Nintendo could be working on an Android-based system.

According to a report by Nikkei, one of Japan’s largest newspapers, a Nintendo insider stated that NX’s “operating system is loaded with Android.”

The insider added, “This would be able to speed up getting all game developers on board.”

Currently, the Wii U suffers from a significant lack of third-party titles because the system requires a greater investment of development time, and with the Wii U’s poor adoption rates, many studios have a hard time justifying the cost. An Android-based OS would reduce that cost and improve the risk versus reward for developers who might have otherwise skipped a Nintendo release.

Aside from making it easier for third-party developers to create games for the console, an Android OS would also make it easier for Nintendo to produce cross-platform games as part of its new tablet and smartphone game initiative with DeNA.

Switching to Android would be a big change for Nintendo, who has a long history of developing its own systems in-house. While Nintendo often innovates and takes risks with hardware, such as with the Wii’s motion controls or the ill-fated Virtual Boy, the game maker has been slow to adapt to some of the current big trends in gaming, such as online multiplayer support, digital distribution, and mobile games.

Nintendo has yet to comment on Nikkei’s report, but the studio is notoriously tightlipped about future developments and will often respond diplomatically by calling reports “inaccurate,” as it did with the rumors about a Legend of Zelda series for Netflix.

Nikkei has previously reported on rumors about mobile Nintendo games and a jumbo sized 3DS, both of which Nintendo denied and both of which later turned out to be true.

Photo by MattGrommes