Tomorrow’s unprecedented Nintendo Direct still won’t have the info fans want most
Monday morning, Nintendo surprised absolutely everyone by announcing not just one presentation, but two. A Nintendo Direct and an Indie World, back to back! And so quickly after last week’s special Nintendo Direct, which focused solely on the Nintendo Museum.
In June, Nintendo aired an all-timer Nintendo Direct. An incredible parade of titles, all the more shocking because of just how late we are into the Switch’s life cycle. That Direct focused solely on first-party titles—meaning, games made by Nintendo and its direct affiliates, like Retro Studios.
Tomorrow’s Nintendo Direct will focus only on games made by “partner” studios. That means third-party games made by, for example, Bandai Namco or Square Enix. The Direct will be immediately followed by an Indie World showcase. Which is technically still third-party, but you get the drift. To this reporter’s knowledge, it’s the first time Nintendo has done a partner showcase and an indie showcase back-to-back.
The full presentation will be 40 minutes total. Nintendo, in its wisdom, knows exactly what people want to hear about the most—and have already issued a statement about it.
No Switch successor, and what else to not expect
Both the Nintendo Direct partner showcase and the Indie World showcase will focus on games made outside of Nintendo. So unless they’ve shopped it out to a third party (possible, but highly unlikely) that means no news on, say, a Twilight Princess or Windwaker port for Legend of Zelda fans. It also means no news on Nintendo hardware. In other words, there will be no announcement regarding the Switch’s successor.
Nintendo has already come out and made this perfectly clear in a statement on Twitter / X. They want to tamper people’s expectations. They’ve been issuing statements like this for the past couple of Directs. I appreciate the honesty.
Nintendo has said we will hear about the Switch’s successor before the start of the next fiscal year, which begins (in Japan) on April 1, 2025. So we will hear about it before then. And when Nintendo doesn’t issue a little disclaimer, we’ll know which Direct will have the Fated Announcement.
The lack of a Switch successor announcement doesn’t mean tomorrow’s presentations won’t be worth watching. Hell, for all we know, we could finally hear about Silksong. I mean, it’s safest not to get your hopes up. But given how incredible June’s Direct was, who knows what Nintendo could have in store for us. Like any good surprise, we have no idea what to expect.
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