This is Furukawa, President of Nintendo. We will make an announcement about the successor to Nintendo Switch within this fiscal year. It will have been over nine years since we announced the existence of Nintendo Switch back in March 2015. We will be holding a Nintendo Direct this June regarding the Nintendo Switch software lineup for the latter half of 2024, but please be aware that there will be no mention of the Nintendo Switch successor during that presentation.
So what are we expecting to see in June?
This seems like the last chance to announce a Switch release for Metroid Prime 4. If we don’t see it, I’ll assume it was pushed to the next console.
I thought the rumors of a remake for Fire Emblem: Genealogy of the Holy War sounded likely. FE 4 and 5 have both never been remade and never officially been made available in English, but 4 is popular in Japan and Sigurd had a relatively prominent role in Engage compared to most of the other Emblems. However, we haven’t heard anything about it, so if we don’t hear about it in June I’ll assume they aren’t doing it.
Star Fox tends to launch at the end of a console’s life… so there’s that maybe.
Sakurai has been up to something… probably the next Smash, but I can always dream it’s a new or even remade Kid Icarus.
And probably some last minute WiiU ports.
Metroid Prime 4 is probably too high profile to leave to the switch… (and Mario hasn’t had a launch title since the N64, maybe GCN at a stretch) but they could always pull a Twilight Princess I suppose.
Assuming BC is confirmed on the new platform I would be willing to buy a Wind Waker / Twilight Princess double pack.
Really hoping one of those is Xenoblade X. The end of 3 made it look like they’re merging all the Xeno games, and X is the only one from Blade that’s not on the Switch.
Great point about Sakurai. He’s doing regular youtube videos, but there’s a good chance he has some smaller pet project. Something like Kid Icarus that he’s wantes to work on but was too busy with Smash.
More news on Pokemon Legends AZ, assuming it is far enough along in development? I would expect it to be one of the last Switch games, especially if the Switch 2 is backwards compatible. Pokemon Company is known for releasing games for previous generation systems.
I think they might wait for an FE4 remake until the next console. Engage had a middling reception and just released last year. FE games generally come out around 3-4 years apart unless they are companion games in the same setting (such as FE4 - 5 (Jugdral), FE6 - 7 (Elibe), and the Wii games (Tellius)), and a 3-year gap from last year will align with FE4’s 30th anniversary, which will likely help it sell in Japan (the novelty of another classic title finally releasing in the West will probably be enough to sell well here). If the Switch 2 releases early next year, 2026 will also be great timing to get enough of a handle on its capabilities to optimize for it well and really give it some good presentational polish.
Good point. It’d be awesome to see what they’ve come up with for MP4, but if they don’t show anything, I’ll assume the same.