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StarTopic Nintendo Direct Speculation |ST|

When will the next general Direct (full or mini) be?

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Hey everyone! My first Direct thread after years of lurking on other sites that shall not be named.

Looks like the party moved over here lol. Glad to be home!

#TeamFebruary
 
Even after the gameplay trailer, I'm still not really feeling Legends Arceus. And that's okay.

Ready for that February Direct, though.
 
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Gamer_G said:
Style saavy has been on these era/boards lists for the past two years, idk if it’s gonna happen man
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Yeah I know, its rare that +5 year has passes since last style savvy 3DS was released and nothing about a new entry for switch. The only thing that can be happening is that Nintendo wanted to wait until there is a bigger female audience on the console.

But I think that they want to take advantage of switch success and release as many of their IPs as possible. Famicom Detective Club, Brain Training/Academy or Advance Wars are proof of that. So I have faith that a new style savvy one will be released.
 
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So, we all have expectations for which rumoured things we expect to be shown in the next Direct, but what's something unexpected you'd like to see?

For me, it'd be something completely out of the blue like an update for Pikmin 3 adding higher difficulty and online bingo battle.
 
So... just a couple of thoughts.

I don't get all those "calendar is full, BOTW2 2023 for sure" takes. Like, Nintendo revealed the date like six months ago? They knew for sure what their next calendar year releases would be. It's not like they weren't sure if Splatoon or Metroid or Fire Emblem would be ready and they said "you know... let's make an official announcement for our most expected game, the same game is sorrounded by secrecy and which we haven't talked about in two years... yes, that game, let's make an announcement and if next week IS emails us telling FE will be ready we will publicly delay the game". Like, not in a million years Nintendo would make it. If it gets delayed, it'll be because real issues within development or because they decide to push it farther to tie with a new hardware that should have been get much more seriously impacted than forecasted because even delays are taken in to account when dating products. So, yeah, the whole "Nintendo doesn't need it" it's an objective true that doesn't impact at all the release date of BOTW 2.

Besides that... it's time for 3D Mario, for sure, but it's even more time for 2D Mario. We haven't had a brand new, full 2D Mario in like, what, nine years? Sure, we had SMM2, but we also had Bowser's Fury. I think that, even though Nintendo can totally release a 3D Mario to side with the movie, they can, for sure, decide to launch a 2D Mario instead. The effect (1-2 punch) would be the same, 2D Mario tend to sell even better than 3D counterparts, and EPD 10 is one of the teams that manage to pull an anual release (and their last two games, Pikmin 3 Deluxe and Brain Age, has been mostly co-developed externally). So, if that's the case, I'd say there's even less overlapping with other releases (XC3 and 2D Mario on November/December? That can totally be it).

Lastly... Ring Fit Adventure 2 this year? EPD 4 is the other team with a yearly output and given the massive hit RFA was it'd be a crime to not continue with another game that uses the Ring-Con.
 
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Subrosian Link said:
So... just a couple of thoughts.

I don't get all those "calendar is full, BOTW2 2023 for sure" takes. Like, Nintendo revealed the date like six months ago? They knew for sure what their next calendar year releases would be. It's not like they weren't sure if Splatoon or Metroid or Fire Emblem would be ready and they said "you know... let's make an official announcement for our most expected game, the same game is sorrounded by secrets and which we haven't talked about in two years... yes, that game, let's make an announcement and if next week IS emails us telling FE will be ready we will publicly delay the game". Like, not in a million years Nintendo would make it. If it gets delayed, it'll be because real issues within development or because they decide to push it farther to tie it with a new hardware that should have been get much more seriously impacted than forecasted because even delays are taken in to account when dating products. So, yeah, the whole "Nintendo doesn't need it" it's an objective true that doesn't impact at all the release date of BOTW 2.

Besides that... it's time for 3D Mario, for sure, but it's even more time for 2D Mario. We haven't had a bran new, full 2D Mario in like, what, nine years? Sure, we had SMM2, but we also had Bowser's Fury. I think that, even though Nintendo can totally release a 3D Mario to side with the movie, they can, for sure, decide to launch a 2D Mario instead. The effect (1-2 punch) would be the same, 2D Mario tend to sell even better than 3D counterparts, and EPD 10 is one of the teams that manage to pull an anual release (and their last two games, Pikmin 3 Deluxe and Brain Age, has been mostly co-developed externally). So, if that's the case, I'd say there's even less overlapping with other releases (XC3 and 2D Mario on November/December? That can totally be it).

Lastly... Ring Fit Adventure 2 this year? EPD 4 is the other team with a yearly output and given the massive hit RFA was it'd be a crime to not continue with another game that uses the Ring-Con.
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It's more likely that "we don't need it, let's save it for 2023" applies to whatever people think would replace BOTW 2 as the Big Holiday Game (3D Mario I assume for most)
 
Subrosian Link said:
So... just a couple of thoughts.

I don't get all those "calendar is full, BOTW2 2023 for sure" takes. Like, Nintendo revealed the date like six months ago? They knew for sure what their next calendar year releases would be.
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I agree. As late as TGA a month ago, Nintendo reiterated their plan for BotW2 to release this year through their 2022 trailer/commercial. All of those other games didn’t just pop up on their radar recently, they surely have been planning ahead for some time with all of their cards in hand, so I don’t think BotW2 will be delayed because of too many other titles this year.

It could still get delayed because it’s not up to their standard of polish, though, in which case the abundance of great games this year will make up for it.
 
zelda getting reiterated as 2022 all last year only to be bumped in favor of something not announced yet would be the biggest leapfrog of all time
 
Missed the Intelligent Systems talk in the general thread yesterday and I mentioned this on Era a while back, but a surprisingly high amount of the Get it Together staff also worked on Origami King, especially on the programming side. A lot of those who didn't have the former as their only IS credit, which makes me think that they were probably from one of the several outsourcing companies listed.

While pre-production likely started with Goro Abe and the other leads sometime in 2018 before Gold released, I wouldn't be surprised if Get it Together didn't begin full production until 2019 or even early 2020 as Origami King was wrapping up.
 
Skittzo said:
Who says it would need to be delayed for that to happen?
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fS0sK1r.gif
 
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Subrosian Link said:
I don't get all those "calendar is full, BOTW2 2023 for sure" takes.
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Perhaps people aren't making this argument exactly, but the idea that Nintendo is now planning a bunch of unannounced games and suddenly finds the calendar too crowded for 2 Wild 2 Breathe* is totally backwards. Zelda is the tent pole. If it's ready this year and a lot of other games are too, they'll sit on the ones they haven't announced yet. If it's not ready, it'll come later.

* official title, take it to the bank
 
Skittzo said:
Who says it would need to be delayed for that to happen?
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I did notice that there was a conspicuous lack of any new hardware talk in Nate’s podcast… then again they’re probably tired of talking about it so much with very little new info
 
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Breath of the Wild
2 Wild 2 Breathe
Breath of the Wild: Hila Rao Drift
Breathe Wild
Breath Five
Breathe Wild 6
Wild 7
Bait of the Wild (that one kinda fell apart, shit)
B9: The Breath Saga (also a vitamin)
And if we assume Chris Morgan wasn't joking about F&F10 having Vin Diesel go to the moon:
Breath of the Wild: Majora's Mask
 
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Raccoon said:
zelda getting reiterated as 2022 all last year only to be bumped in favor of something not announced yet would be the biggest leapfrog of all time
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Agreed. With all due respect to MVG and Nate (I've got endless amounts of respect for Nate's patience in online discourse), but listening to the podcast I'm once again having trouble seeing the logic behind their reasoning.

Last month Nintendo reiterated Zelda for 2022. Why would they then delay it for games that haven't been announced at all yet - hypothetical Mario, Fire Emblem and Xenoblade games that have been completely invisible up until now? I don't see the logic. If anything, Zelda still being planned in 2022 during the Geoffs - at a point where 2022 was probably completely clear for Nintendo from a release schedule point of view - would rather imply that the year is planned around Zelda.
 
manfromthedam said:
Agreed. With all due respect to MVG and Nate (I've got endless amounts of respect for Nate's patience in online discourse), but listening to the podcast I'm once again having trouble seeing the logic behind their reasoning.

Last month Nintendo reiterated Zelda for 2022. Why would they then delay it for games that haven't been announced at all yet - hypothetical Mario, Fire Emblem and Xenoblade games that have been completely invisible up until now? I don't see the logic. If anything, Zelda still being planned in 2022 during the Geoffs - at a point where 2022 was probably completely clear for Nintendo from a release schedule point of view - would rather imply that the year is planned around Zelda.
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Raccoon said:
* Hidden text: cannot be quoted. *
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Maybe. Still it doesn't make sense for anyone to know about a Zelda delay when it was still actively announced for 2022 as of last month :p . A more logical way of thinking would be that, because the year seems to be ridiculously stacked, unannounced stuff will stay unannounced for a while longer.
 
Raccoon said:
* Hidden text: cannot be quoted. *
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Sure! And that can totally be the case. What I was saying was not that it couldn't slip to 2023 - rather, that the idea of 'been packed' couldn't be the reason for that. But they can push it because real development issues or Dane Switch problems or whatever, and Nate may be totally accurate with the prediction (but the logic is what doesn't seem to stand to much).

That said, props to Nate and MVG for the episode, as always!
 
Nate has been wrong in the past about things he has said in his podcast and that's okay, I don't take everything he's saying as absolutely truth, sometimes he's just guessing like us.
 
As of right now, it's probably unlikely that Nintendo is currently planning to delay BOTW2 since they showed, again, a 2022 release only 1 month ago. I'd say Omicron will delay something like Zelda before other games.
 
In Detective Pikachu 2, Pikachu gets murdered at the end of the first act. You then play as Detective Evee for the rest of the game. It's the biggest switcheroo since Metal Gear Solid 2.
 
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manfromthedam said:
Agreed. With all due respect to MVG and Nate (I've got endless amounts of respect for Nate's patience in online discourse), but listening to the podcast I'm once again having trouble seeing the logic behind their reasoning.
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I did listen to Nate’s podcast this week. I interpreted it more as - Zelda games are often delayed and COVID presents even more challenges. So if it slips into next year they’ll still have plenty for this year.
 
What are people's thoughts on Pokemon this Q4?

Personally, I'm not counting on Game Freak having another RPG ready in 2022 after Legends. I thought Legends would have DLC, and that might follow the traditional patterns: 1) announced in a Pokemon Day Presentation 2) launches in 2 stages, first part in summer, second in November.

Without Pokemon, Nintendo are short of a solid 15 to 20 million seller late in the year (apart from Zelda). Mario movie aside, I'd expect a major Mario title late this year to complement Zelda. It's also another reason I expect Nintendo to push to have Zelda out in 2022, and why I think this could be a big year for EPD. There isn't really another studio Nintendo can lean on to produce that kind of hit. I know Next Level had a big late year hit with Luigi's Mansion 3 in 2019, but I wouldn't expect them to have something new just yet. And Mario Party, which has exploded on Switch, has just had a new release.
 
Amadeus said:
Nate has been wrong in the past about things he has said in his podcast and that's okay, I don't take everything he's saying as absolutely truth, sometimes he's just guessing like us.
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True. I think it is clear when he speculates and when he got some info. And even then things can change quite a bit along the way.

But when these things are said there is def smoke.
 
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MisterSpo said:
What are people's thoughts on Pokemon this Q4?

Personally, I'm not counting on Game Freak having another RPG ready in 2022 after Legends. I thought Legends would have DLC, and that might follow the traditional patterns: 1) announced in a Pokemon Day Presentation 2) launches in 2 stages, first part in summer, second in November.

Without Pokemon, Nintendo are short of a solid 15 to 20 million seller late in the year (apart from Zelda). Mario movie aside, I'd expect a major Mario title late this year to complement Zelda. It's also another reason I expect Nintendo to push to have Zelda out in 2022, and why I think this could be a big year for EPD. There isn't really another studio Nintendo can lean on to produce that kind of hit. I know Next Level had a big late year hit with Luigi's Mansion 3 in 2019, but I wouldn't expect them to have something new just yet. And Mario Party, which has exploded on Switch, has just had a new release.
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If you have a Mario, you don’t need Zelda, and vice versa. Whatever we get this year, will push the other to early next year.
 
MisterSpo said:
What are people's thoughts on Pokemon this Q4?

Personally, I'm not counting on Game Freak having another RPG ready in 2022 after Legends. I thought Legends would have DLC, and that might follow the traditional patterns: 1) announced in a Pokemon Day Presentation 2) launches in 2 stages, first part in summer, second in November.

Without Pokemon, Nintendo are short of a solid 15 to 20 million seller late in the year (apart from Zelda). Mario movie aside, I'd expect a major Mario title late this year to complement Zelda. It's also another reason I expect Nintendo to push to have Zelda out in 2022, and why I think this could be a big year for EPD. There isn't really another studio Nintendo can lean on to produce that kind of hit. I know Next Level had a big late year hit with Luigi's Mansion 3 in 2019, but I wouldn't expect them to have something new just yet. And Mario Party, which has exploded on Switch, has just had a new release.
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Something I've speculated on before is that EPD 10 is working on a new (non-NSMB) 2d Mario for later this year to complement the movie. Makes sense to me given it has been nearly 3 years since Mario Maker 2. This way they can keep the next big 3d Mario for Switch 2 since they clearly won't have a new 3d Zelda ready in time lol

I think Pokemon Gen 9 is Holiday 2023
 
MisterSpo said:
What are people's thoughts on Pokemon this Q4?

Personally, I'm not counting on Game Freak having another RPG ready in 2022 after Legends. I thought Legends would have DLC, and that might follow the traditional patterns: 1) announced in a Pokemon Day Presentation 2) launches in 2 stages, first part in summer, second in November.

Without Pokemon, Nintendo are short of a solid 15 to 20 million seller late in the year (apart from Zelda). Mario movie aside, I'd expect a major Mario title late this year to complement Zelda. It's also another reason I expect Nintendo to push to have Zelda out in 2022, and why I think this could be a big year for EPD. There isn't really another studio Nintendo can lean on to produce that kind of hit. I know Next Level had a big late year hit with Luigi's Mansion 3 in 2019, but I wouldn't expect them to have something new just yet. And Mario Party, which has exploded on Switch, has just had a new release.
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Difficult to say without knowing how big Arceus really is but I also don't expect them to have the resources for a completely new one this holiday and I don't see them release remakes two years in a row (watch someone pull up receipts about how they've already done that or something).
 
Trevelyan said:
If you have a Mario, you don’t need Zelda, and vice versa. Whatever we get this year, will push the other to early next year.
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With that logic you could easily argue that, if you have Pokemon, you don't need Smash Bros, and yet 2018 had them both plus Mario Party in successive months. 2019 had Pokemon, Luigi's Mansion 3, Ring Fit Adventure in Q4, and a Zelda remake just before the final quarter. Nintendo aren't shy of packing multiple big games into the same holiday period.

I think the deciding factor would be how many small and medium scale games they have. Crucially, that mix allows them to hit multiple target markets with a mix of genres and franchises - we've just seen that in the final 4 months of 2021, which while good, wasn't exactly a banner year for Nintendo software (not like say, 2017 and 2019 are perceived to be). But they still had a mix of games in the final 4 months of the year, in terms of genre and franchise; and two of those were big commercially.

Regardless of which major EPD game makes it out this year, it won't be there alone. And I wouldn't ever rule out Nintendo being willing to have a couple of major EPD titles out in close proximity.
LuckyNumber69 said:
Something I've speculated on before is that EPD 10 is working on a new (non-NSMB) 2d Mario for later this year to complement the movie. Makes sense to me given it has been nearly 3 years since Mario Maker 2. This way they can keep the next big 3d Mario for Switch 2 since they clearly won't have a new 3d Zelda ready in time lol

I think Pokemon Gen 9 is Holiday 2023
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My issue with 2D Mario is that Nintendo have had less time to prep a new 2D Mario than they've had for 3D Mario. It's absolutely possible, but support for Mario Maker 2 only wrapped up in early 2020 and there is the pandemic to factor into things. We're in the unusual position whereby the 3 biggest Mario games - Kart, 2D, and 3D - are all sort of due new entries. Obviously, they're not all going to appear at the same time, but it wouldn't surprise me if we see all three over the next 2 years.

My personal assumption with hardware is we get an iterative successor with lots of cross-gen software, and so the big 2022 games become evergreens for the new hardware (assuming things go well for Nintendo).
Dardan Sandiego said:
Difficult to say without knowing how big Arceus really is but I also don't expect them to have the resources for a completely new one this holiday and I don't see them release remakes two years in a row (watch someone pull up receipts about how they've already done that or something).
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Right. My assumption is Legends has been a big effort, given it's a notable change of direction for the series. But it's absolutely true we really still don't know enough yet to know how this alters Pokemon going forward.
 
MisterSpo said:
What are people's thoughts on Pokemon this Q4?

Personally, I'm not counting on Game Freak having another RPG ready in 2022 after Legends. I thought Legends would have DLC, and that might follow the traditional patterns: 1) announced in a Pokemon Day Presentation 2) launches in 2 stages, first part in summer, second in November.

Without Pokemon, Nintendo are short of a solid 15 to 20 million seller late in the year (apart from Zelda). Mario movie aside, I'd expect a major Mario title late this year to complement Zelda. It's also another reason I expect Nintendo to push to have Zelda out in 2022, and why I think this could be a big year for EPD. There isn't really another studio Nintendo can lean on to produce that kind of hit. I know Next Level had a big late year hit with Luigi's Mansion 3 in 2019, but I wouldn't expect them to have something new just yet. And Mario Party, which has exploded on Switch, has just had a new release.
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I think Pokemon this year is Legends, Legends DLC, and spin-offs. Maybe Detective Pikachu 2 + a new Mystery Dungeon?

I'm thinking there could be a 2D Mario title in Q4, but I dunno. I'm bad at speculation.
 
Until Nintendo says otherwise, I'm going to assume BOTW2 and Bayonetta 3 are still scheduled for this year.
 
Estew said:
I think Pokemon this year is Legends, Legends DLC, and spin-offs. Maybe Detective Pikachu 2 + a new Mystery Dungeon?

I'm thinking there could be a 2D Mario title in Q4, but I dunno. I'm bad at speculation.
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I think 2D Mario is definitely possible - as are the Pokemon spin offs.

I just feel that, if 2D Mario is changing direction or concept, away from 'New' and 'Maker', then it would take longer than ~3 years given how EPD works and the pandemic. But I could easily be wrong on that.
Emily said:
Until Nintendo says otherwise, I'm going to assume BOTW2 and Bayonetta 3 are still scheduled for this year.
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Yep. I mean, it's early days in 2022, so lots can change... but it being early in 2022 also means Nintendo (and Platinum) have plenty of time to get that stuff sorted.

I think the thing that gives me reason to pause and ponder late 2022 is that so much of the confirmed and rumoured software skews towards a single player and enthusiast audience - Zelda is wildly popular of course, but Bayonetta, Metroid Prime, Fire Emblem, Xenoblade all skew towards an older, enthusiast, single player audience.

After Kirby and Splatoon 3, what do Nintendo have for families and for multiplayer gaming? Surely there's more of that coming in the second half. That's why I expect Mario to have a presence (though often, but not always, 3D Mario is primarily single player, so perhaps Kart or 2D Mario would ensure greater variety and balance).
 
MisterSpo said:
My issue with 2D Mario is that Nintendo have had less time to prep a new 2D Mario than they've had for 3D Mario. It's absolutely possible, but support for Mario Maker 2 only wrapped up in early 2020 and there is the pandemic to factor into things. We're in the unusual position whereby the 3 biggest Mario games - Kart, 2D, and 3D - are all sort of due new entries. Obviously, they're not all going to appear at the same time, but it wouldn't surprise me if we see all three over the next 2 years.
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That's true, and something I've considered. As a matter of fact though, the unusualness of the long wait between new 3D Mario entries is actually kinda what prompted me to speculate on 2d Mario releasing to have synergy between the film and a huge new Mario release. Given the early adopters of new hardware tend to be more "hardcore" or whatever, and assuming Switch 2 is like, late 2023 or early 2024, and given that Nintendo is already committed to releasing another new 3D Zelda as late as they are on the Switch 1, I figure 3D Mario is the next best "core" crowd-pleaser single-player franchise they could keep for the Switch 2 launch or soon after. Kart is obviously something that seems 99.9% locked as a Switch 2 launch window game given how huge MK8D is and how late we presumably are in the Switch's life.

You're right, though, that Nintendo may have not had enough time/resources (+ COVID) to get out a brand-new 2d Mario this year. I'm just using my own logic as to why Mario Kart and 3D Mario this late don't make much sense as Switch 1 games combined with the common assumption that Nintendo will want some top-level synergy with the film. 2d Mario just makes the most sense to me personally. Although, knowing Nintendo, they could end up not releasing any of the three this year lol. We'll just have to wait and see, I guess. This is probably the most unpredictable the wider Mario IP has been in a very long time haha
 
Arceus feels like the start of a new companion series (similar to Pokemon Ranger on the DS) where they can explore each region's history more.

I suspect if we get a Fall/Winter Pokemon game it'll be a Let's Go title.
 
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