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StarTopic Nintendo First Party Software Development |ST| Nintendo Party Superstars

Did we have any indication that Nintendo was hiring for Pikmin 4 before the announcement?

Also given the hirings, it may be that EPD10 is doing Pikmin 4 and 2D Mario simultaneously?...
We don't. It was in development from god knows when, and yep they are doing it simultaneously, nothing new for them.
 
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Did we have any indication that Nintendo was hiring for Pikmin 4 before the announcement?

Also given the hirings, it may be that EPD10 is doing Pikmin 4 and 2D Mario simultaneously?...
Despite being the same group pikmin and 2d mario dont share almost any staff,Pikmin 3 and NSMBU/NSLBU both released within 6 months, most of Pikmin 3 staff went to Zelda and Splatoon what kind explains why the game took so long and why its coming back now
 
Monolith are also obviously working on Pikmin 4 as they worked on 3. My assumption is anything Monolith helped with, they're going to do the same for the follow-up until shown otherwise.
To be frank,theres an difference between regular outsourcing and what nintendo support studios do, on Odyssey and Botw Monolith/1-Up artists are credited for Landscape Art, where the outsourcing companies got credits for Landscape Modeling, one is a creative position,the other not, those outsourcing firms strict follow nintendo orders,they finish assets based on concept art and art direction, Monolith and 1-UP are actively involved since the beggining phase and have creative input on the project,theres entire Splatoon stages comceptualized and made by Monolith alone, 1-UP designed a lot of Odyssey characters and worlds, heck, the chief concept artist of the game was from 1-UP,if you look the artbook most of the art presented was drawn by Asami Inoue from 1-Up,all the art bellow is by her

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Monolith also had their own ideas for furtinure and clothes for animal crossing
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This is legit amazing to know. Nice to see some tangible things certain devs worked on rather than just "we did this and this broad term, trust us" sort of thing we only see in gameography descriptions.
 
Monolith are also obviously working on Pikmin 4 as they worked on 3. My assumption is anything Monolith helped with, they're going to do the same for the follow-up until shown otherwise.

This is legit amazing to know. Nice to see some tangible things certain devs worked on rather than just "we did this and this broad term, trust us" sort of thing we only see in gameography descriptions.
more stuff they made for odyssey

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Bowser Castle is one the best looking ares and 1-Up did both the concept art and the modeling of the area
 
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For real. I love Monolith, but man, some of the laurels for games should definitely go to other contract companies.
Monolith has an active brand, a lot of those other (excellent) support studios don’t. Retro is similar, despite not having released a game in 8 years
 
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Is Monolith's Action Game still a possibility? Or that was confirmed to be Zelda?
Probably,TLDR but Xenoblade 3 staff size is rather small for a studio that more than doubled it size since 2017,theres a lot of new hires on positions where monolith wasnt involved in BOTW missing from Xenoblade 3 and a game designer who got promoted to Game Director said in a interview he wants to direct a new action game and was missing from 3 together with honne and others
 
As far as we know, Zelda is the only series where Monolith Soft have a significant development assistance role. Fair dos there - but teams like NST, iQue, 1-UP, [NDCUBE], NERD, [NTD] (not to mention external contractors) continually provide support on a number of first-party titles without the same kind of fuss.

One subsidiary that has become a part of core game development is Mario Club. Besides the obvious testing and debugging, they now have consistent credits for level design and script design across several EPD releases (Big Brain Academy, WarioWare, New Super Mario Bros., Animal Crossing, etc.)

Looking at the numbers, most of the mega sellers come from within the EPD groups. Some of the focus testing and experimentation the developers do behind the scenes - really set them apart from how other contemporaries make games. At the end of the day, in order to keep everyone active around that hit making core, we see more and more help and assist teams work around the EPD creations.

So what does Pikmin 4 mean for new 2D Mario by EPD10? We know from rumors that development of Pikmin 4 was rebooted in 2019 which happens to be the same year when Maker 2 shipped but there was hiring for 2D game for Kyoto in 2019 and in 2020 with mention of both Kyoto and Tokyo offices (that was probably also for that DK game by Tokyo). So then, is EPD10 working on 2 projects at the same time? Could also new 2D Mario ship in 2023?

I've been wondering if I think Pikmin 4 is an in-house creation. I mean obviously it is going to have additional companies (subsidiary and agencies) help out with the art, but the question is if lead development is taking place internally. I know the director / lead programmer Yuji Kando has been a one-man army on the game (he worked on an unreleased DS Pikmin, and I'm almost positive he ported a vanilla version of the game for Eighting to play with), but I don't know if it is a game Nintendo would devote many of its prized resources too.

One sure fire way to know is if any recruit ads for PIkmin 4 start posting. Which is also a reason why Nintendo may have needed to reveal the game now (a la Splatoon 3 announcement).
 
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Devs can emulate other devs style to a certain degree but when you compare Luigis Mansion 2 with the original or Halo 4 with 3 you can feel its another developer,but Pikmin 4 for me really looks like 3,it feels like and EPD game from the lighting to the texturing style

Its also probably the best looking switch game,i dont know which partner studio could make a game this good looking on switch,maybe only capcom or square enix but theres no way either working on it,eighting couldnt even get Pikmin 3 running at 900p
 
Devs can emulate other devs style to a certain degree but when you compare Luigis Mansion 2 with the original or Halo 4 with 3 you can feel its another developer,but Pikmin 4 for me really looks like 3,it feels like and EPD game from the lighting to the texturing style

Its also probably the best looking switch game,i dont know which partner studio could make a game this good looking on switch,maybe only capcom or square enix but theres no way either working on it,eighting couldnt even get Pikmin 3 running at 900p
Nlg is making pikmin 4 imagine lmao
 
they the only studio who could reach this graphical level, but they even have expericence with realistic graphics ??,their style is more cartoony,TBF nintendo also didnt have and they made pikmin 3
Nlg worked on realistic shit before being nintendo exclusive. A captain america gsme, sportd games, and a new realistic ip
 
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EPD 10 doubling up on Pikmin and 2D Mario in a short period is nothing new. Both of the expected projects from EPD 8 overlap with 2D Mario in some form though (3D Mario and what is likely 2D Donkey Kong) so I couldn’t even possibly guess which will emerge first. Would they reveal and release two EPD 2D platformers in the same year? Or even both a 2D and 3D Mario in the same year?

I've talked about it before but there's reason to believe, from files mistakingly left behind in 3D All-Stars' launcher, that EPD 8 are also making the transition to using the Lunch Pack engine most other EPD projects (sans Zelda) have been using this generation. It's a posible explaination for what appears to be an abnormally long development cycle for a 3D Mario, at least.
 
3D Mario and 2D DK in the same year is the combination that makes the most sense,two 2d platformers or two mario platformers would be weird (both happened before in 2002,2010,2012 and 2018,but Sunshine and Advance 2 were in different platforms and one was a port and DKCR/DKCTF and Kirby Epic Yarn/Kirby Star Allies were very different games and NSMB2 and NSMBU were in diferent platforms too)
 
EPD 10 doubling up on Pikmin and 2D Mario in a short period is nothing new. Both of the expected projects from EPD 8 overlap with 2D Mario in some form though (3D Mario and what is likely 2D Donkey Kong) so I couldn’t even possibly guess which will emerge first. Would they reveal and release two EPD 2D platformers in the same year? Or even both a 2D and 3D Mario in the same year?

I've talked about it before but there's reason to believe, from files mistakingly left behind in 3D All-Stars' launcher, that EPD 8 are also making the transition to using the Lunch Pack engine most other EPD projects (sans Zelda) have been using this generation. It's a posible explaination for what appears to be an abnormally long development cycle for a 3D Mario, at least.
I remember that post, it was really good read. But still, I can't get off my head the feeling that something from 2017-2019 was cancelled and put to rest, even with the offices move in 2020 and whole Covid situation in mind. Anyway, I expect the 3D Mario to drop in late 2023 that is pretty much given at this point (even if the development begun as late as 2019). It will be great to see Tokyo back in full force again, they will blow our minds completely. Whole another level up, even as great as Odyssey was.
 
The pikmin 4 team will absolutely do one of the most gorgeous switch games and then literally do another new super mario bros next lmao
 
3D Mario and 2D DK in the same year is the combination that makes the most sense,two 2d platformers or two mario platformers would be weird (both happened before in 2002,2010,2012 and 2018,but Sunshine and Advance 2 were in different platforms and one was a port and DKCR/DKCTF and Kirby Epic Yarn/Kirby Star Allies were very different games and NSMB2 and NSMBU were in diferent platforms too)
3D Mario and 2D DK definitely makes the most sense. In 2009 Miyamoto said Galaxy 2 was being held back for 2010 because NSMB Wii was going to be released that year. Also keep in mind that the release dates for 3D World and Tropical Freeze were super close before Tropical Freeze got delayed a bit.
 
I was looking at all the games that have desserts/food areas/levels that came out on the switch (MP, Kirby, Odyssey I might be missing a couple) but I think NDcube has the best looking desserts. Could be because its smaller than lets say Dream Buffet or Luncheon.
 
Yeah, I can't figure out the release timing for the Mario and DK games. They could all wrap up development around the same time but be held back for scheduling purposes.
 
I feel like it barely got discussed. How will they approach 2D Mario and 2D DK. Both in the same year one being early and one being later. Or they’re in separate years. I know people want to think a Mario game will come near the movie. I’m April you’re not getting a 3D Mario so 2D Mario could possibly come.
 
I could see the mario movie + a new Mario game in march, or at least the game in march (far enough from ToTK), and the movie a few weeks later, considering there isn't any major game in march and april. It would make it a top 3 H1 of the Switch since its release, I think.
 
The thing with the “2D Mario in March for the movie” thing is that we already know Nintendo’s releasing a 2D platformer in February. Would they release two in two consecutive months? I kind of doubt it, in the same way I doubt they’d release, like, a mainline FE and Xenoblade in two consecutive months (I know Three Hopes and Xenoblade 3 just came out in June and July, but even that only seems to be because Splatoon and Xenoblade pretty clearly switched spots at the eleventh hour).
 
3D Mario and 2D DK in the same year is the combination that makes the most sense,two 2d platformers or two mario platformers would be weird (both happened before in 2002,2010,2012 and 2018,but Sunshine and Advance 2 were in different platforms and one was a port and DKCR/DKCTF and Kirby Epic Yarn/Kirby Star Allies were very different games and NSMB2 and NSMBU were in diferent platforms too)

Agreed, especially with M&R releasing this holiday. That + 2D Mario + 3D Mario all in the span of 12 months is too much Mario.
 
"what will release alongside the Mario movie" nothing

or not necessarily a Mario title in April anyway
I think a re-marketing campaign to increase sales of existing Mario titles makes a lot more sense then trying to time the release of a Mario game to the movie.

Re-release a half dozen of them in special red packages for $39.99 and arrange to have special displays in stores. Boom, there’s your tie-in.
 
There's a 3 month gap between Kirby RTDL and TotK, so something will probably get slotted in late March. Could be a case of they're just waiting to see what wraps up development soon before committing to a date. Probably like a remaster or something since those have short marketing cycles.
 
There's a 3 month gap between Kirby RTDL and TotK, so something will probably get slotted in late March. Could be a case of they're just waiting to see what wraps up development soon before committing to a date. Probably like a remaster or something since those have short marketing cycles.
"Pikmin 4!" I half-heartedly suggest as I pee my pants, tears streaming down my face
 
Remember Corey Bunnell the american programmer that worked on BOTW ?? Dairi Hayakawa,an artist that worked with him on their graduation project at their university joined nintendo too after working on Resident Evil 7 and Devil May Cry 5




Theres also an mexican girl who worked on splatoon 3 as an programmer
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I've got so much respect for people uprooting their lives and moving to a foreign country to chase their dream. Lots of risk and anxiety involved of course, which is why I never had the courage to do anything of the sort (which in turn explains why I'll never amount to more than a smalltime musician doing YouTube and sometimes composing xD).

Green is staff returning from splatoon 2,black is those who worked at nintendo at 2017 but didnt work on splatoon 2, red is the new hires,purple is people hired after 2018 but credited in others games before

Takuro Shimizu
Atsuki Miyagi
Takahisa Ikejiri
Hito Matsudaira
Koji Sonoyama
Tsumugi Harunari
Kazumi Yamaguchi
Mari Shibata
Hiroshi Ueda

Kazuki Okamoto
Mayu Furukawa
Jun Tanaka
Maasa Sugimoto
Takeshi Koike
Aoi Aso
Kaori Mitsuzawa
Reiya Nagae

Yui Takaki
Akane Kamiya
Takeru Fukada

Kaho Sawada
Momoka Yamamoto
Shogo Shimada
Shohei Imamura
Tomoki Hirayama
Yusuke Suzuki
Taigo Hamaguchi
Nanaka Kumazawa

Shigeki Yoshida
Syo Murata
Akari Mine
Miu Morita
Haruka Tatsuta
Dairi Hayakawa
Mari Miki

Miryan Paku
Boku Kondo
Riku Takamatsu
Mei Minagawa
Kanoko Kobayashi
Yoshiki Takada

Miki Aoki
Ryoko Yamazaki
Daichi Nonaka
Ayane Fujitani
Kureha Ura
Yuri Takai
Akito Osanai


Splatoon 2 Returning Staff
Takuro Shimizu
Takahisa Ikejiri
Kazumi Yamaguchi EPD Tokyo
Mari Shibata
Hiroshi Ueda
Akane Kamiya
Takeru Fukada
Miki Aoki
Akito Osanai
9


Old Nintendo Staff
Atsushi Miyagi
Koji Sonoyama
Tsumugi Harunari
Mayu Furukawa
Jun Tanaka EPD Tokyo
Maasa Sugimoto
Takeshi Koike
Shigeki Yoshida
Sho Murata EPD Tokyo
Haruka Tatsuta
Miryan Paku
Ryoko Yamazaki
Kureha Ura
13


Staff Hired After 2018
Kazuki Okamoto
Kaho Sawada
Akari Mine
Riku Takamatsu
Kanoko Kobayashi
Yoshiki Takada
Ayane Fujitani
7

New Staff
Hito Matsudaira
Aoi Aso
Kaori Mitsuzawa
Reiya Nagae
Yui Takaki
Momoka Yamamoto
Shogo Shimada
Shohei Imamura
Tomoki Hirayama
Yusuke Suzuki
Taigo Hamaguchi
Nanaka Kumazawa
Miu Morita
Dairi Hayakawa
Mari Miki
Boku Kondo
Mei Minagawa
Daichi Nonaka
Yuri Takai
19

19% of the art team worked on splatoon 2


Old Staff 21 - New Staff 26
55.32% New
44.68% Old


Art Team Size
Splatoon 2 - 26 Nintendo Artists
Splatoon 3 - 47 Nintendo Artists


Overall Art Staff
Splatoon 2 - 59 Artists
Splatoon 3 - 130 Artists



Splatoon 2 Partners
MONOLITH SOFTWARE INC.
TOSE INC.

Splatoon 3 Partners
Bandai Namco Studios Singapore & Malaysia
LEMONSKY Studios
DIGITAL MEDIA LAB., INC.
AGNI-FLARE CO.,LTD.
MONOLITH SOFTWARE INC.
Applibot,Inc.
Great breakdown. Heartening to see so much new staff, and already putting out a fantastic game. Exciting for the future of EPD.

I don't know if it is a game Nintendo would devote many of its prized resources too.

One sure fire way to know is if any recruit ads for PIkmin 4 start posting. Which is also a reason why Nintendo may have needed to reveal the game now (a la Splatoon 3 announcement).
On the one hand Pikmin is Miyamoto's pet project, along with Star Fox. For the latter he contracted Platinum, so maybe he's done something similar for Pikmin? On the other hand, looking at the huge amount of new staff on Splatoon 3, maybe Pikmin 4 will have similar amounts of new hires on it's internal team.
 
In ∼ 5 months the new EPD Tokyo 3D Mario will probably get finally revealed. Some might say they will wait for Zelda to drop, so at E3 they will announce the next 3D Mario from Tokyo but I feel like the timing would be right as they tend to reveal some Holiday titles earlier in the year, I know that games from Tokyo are getting revealed closer to release but my feeling is that the timing is right.
 
I feel as though if Nintendo weren't making Pikmin that would've been part of the announcement
Well they were pretty coy about the dev for Prime 4 (have yet to ever officially acknowledge that Bandai Namco were working on it); but obviously Pikmin isn't in the same situation and it will be primarily developed by EPD.
 
In ∼ 5 months the new EPD Tokyo 3D Mario will probably get finally revealed. Some might say they will wait for Zelda to drop, so at E3 they will announce the next 3D Mario from Tokyo but I feel like the timing would be right as they tend to reveal some Holiday titles earlier in the year, I know that games from Tokyo are getting revealed closer to release but my feeling is that the timing is right.
I agree. I don’t think Nintendo cares for TotK to release first.
 
I've got so much respect for people uprooting their lives and moving to a foreign country to chase their dream. Lots of risk and anxiety involved of course, which is why I never had the courage to do anything of the sort (which in turn explains why I'll never amount to more than a smalltime musician doing YouTube and sometimes composing xD).


Great breakdown. Heartening to see so much new staff, and already putting out a fantastic game. Exciting for the future of EPD.


On the one hand Pikmin is Miyamoto's pet project, along with Star Fox. For the latter he contracted Platinum, so maybe he's done something similar for Pikmin? On the other hand, looking at the huge amount of new staff on Splatoon 3, maybe Pikmin 4 will have similar amounts of new hires on it's internal team.
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Since switch released nintendo already hired 506 new graduates (+116 mid-career devs - 622 total a 30% expansion), this year was an all time record,they hired more than double what they used to,this is why Splatoon 3 had so many new staff,its the first nintendo game ever that had more new staff than old,people got excited for the new building news but the expansion already started.
 
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If they wait until E3 to show an EPD Tokyo game I'd just assume it's not releasing until 2024. EPD games have started having longer reveal --> release windows lately and it would be weird that Nintendo is willing to give that long hype cycle for Splatoon, Animal Crossing, and Pikmin, but not a new Mario game.
 
If they wait until E3 to show an EPD Tokyo game I'd just assume it's not releasing until 2024. EPD games have started having longer reveal --> release windows lately and it would be weird that Nintendo is willing to give that long hype cycle for Splatoon, Animal Crossing, and Pikmin, but not a new Mario game.
"Pikmin 4 is coming out in July actually" he said copingly, malding seethefully in the wind
 
"Pikmin 4 is coming out in July actually" he said copingly, malding seethefully in the wind

July or September makes sense, I'm leaning towards September for it. Can't see them positioning Pikmin as the big game of the holiday in October/November, but its also a big EPD game so they'll be sure to give it its moment to shine.
 
Since switch released nintendo already hired 506 new graduates (+116 mid-career devs - 622 total a 30% expansion), this year was an all time record,they hired more than double what they used to,this is why Splatoon 3 had so many new staff,its the first nintendo game ever that had more new staff than old,people got excited for the new building news but the expansion already started.

Did Nintendo officially post their mid-career dev hires or is this your own personal tracking?
 
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If they wait until E3 to show an EPD Tokyo game I'd just assume it's not releasing until 2024. EPD games have started having longer reveal --> release windows lately and it would be weird that Nintendo is willing to give that long hype cycle for Splatoon, Animal Crossing, and Pikmin, but not a new Mario game.
3D World was first shown at E3 2013 and released in October that year. Not even that unusual.
 
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3D Mario and 2D DK definitely makes the most sense. In 2009 Miyamoto said Galaxy 2 was being held back for 2010 because NSMB Wii was going to be released that year. Also keep in mind that the release dates for 3D World and Tropical Freeze were super close before Tropical Freeze got delayed a bit.
I remember this really vividly because we went to the San Diego Zoo in December 2013, when the game was originally supposed to release, and there was an event promoting it. We got to play a couple levels and it made the wait till February really rough.
 
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Didn’t it take a few days for confirmation that NLG we’re the ones developing the strikers game
I mean of course we already knew that, and someone asked nintendo who was behind it, but NLG only revealed it themselves weeks after the game released, which sucks.
 
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finally a more visual comparision

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Yeah, suspicious that Yusuke Amano has moved on from Splatoon 3 after directing the first two entries as well as the Octo Expansion. I'm sure it's been said in this thread, but his first directing credit was for New Super Mario Bros 2. He was last credited in Animal Crossing: New Horizons as a Planning Supervisor, and that came out over two and a half years ago.

We know 2D Mario is in the works, so maybe he pops up there again. Alternatively, and perhaps more excitingly, perhaps he's taking the reins on a new IP.
 
Yeah, suspicious that Yusuke Amano has moved on from Splatoon 3 after directing the first two entries as well as the Octo Expansion. I'm sure it's been said in this thread, but his first directing credit was for New Super Mario Bros 2. He was last credited in Animal Crossing: New Horizons as a Planning Supervisor, and that came out over two and a half years ago.

We know 2D Mario is in the works, so maybe he pops up there again. Alternatively, and perhaps more excitingly, perhaps he's taking the reins on a new IP.
all 3 NSMB directors are missing,either or all could be directing
 


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