Topic: 2019 concerns

Does anyone feel concerned about the lack of A titles being announced for Switch this year ?

There had been no Direct so far, and Metroid Prime 4 has been delayed.

Nintendo seems to be heavily relying on old titles, and Indy games to see them through.

What are your thoughts ?

Bare in mind we are only In January.
You could argue though, more should of been revealed by this point.

I think a direct will happen soon. And we know that animal crossing, fire emblem, luigi's mansion 3, pokemon, daemon x machina and marvel ultimate alliance are supossed to release this year. I think we stil get some new AAA games. An assassins creed collection has been rumoured for switch.

@Madder128
I don't care with AAA titles.
I just only care with games I have interest about.
Maybe there are some B / A quality titles for Switch during this year, but some of them could be AAA quality for me.

BTW, the games that i consider as AAA quality for me (With my impression more than 90 points from 100) such as The Sims 4 (92 / 100) & Dragon Quest Builders 2 (95 / 100)

@troy258 That is true,

It would be nice to see some more Mature games get released on the system.
Grand Theft Auto would be a great draw.
Not my thing, but it would be great for the system.

I wonder also if Bandai/Namco will repackage their scrapped Metroid 4 under a different name and release it.

@Anti-Matter The Sims would be a good fit for Switch

@Madder128 Sims seems likely, and I would love GTA 5 but it's more likely that we see far cry 3, bortherlands series, Hitman hd collection. Also persona 5 and the witcher 3 have been rumoured. Although I don't know if the witcher 3 would run that great on switch and if sony has exlusive rights to the persona series.

In fairness we didn't know of many of Switch's big 2018 titles (Super Mario Party, Pokemon, Smash) this time last year. Nintendo still have plenty of time to announce things.

We also have Animal Crossing, Yoshi, Fire Emblem, and Pokemon to look forward to this year.

What even is a "triple-A" game? Something like Metroid Prime 4?

We already have a lot of games announced for 2019 anyway. Animal Crossing is actually VERY big, both production (writing and translating a lot of dialogue is not cheap) and sales wise. Fire Emblem is also a pretty meaty game. Luigi's Mansion is also a fan favorite and sold very well. Etc.

We just don't know too much about them. But they're coming this year, AND this is only January. Just be patient and don't count your chickens before they hatch.

Losing Metroid Prime 4 (which would have potentially released this year) is a big blow. To me it would have been almost like losing BOTW from the Switches first year. Hopefully they’ve got some big releases that they haven’t told us about or third party releases start to ramp up a bit.

What they’ve announced plus ports and indies won’t plug a MP4 size hole.

@Madder128 I'm not particularly concerned - 2019 will still be a big year with a lot of exciting things that we don't yet know about.

On a broader level I'm slightly concerned about Nintendo's capacity to produce big new games. Mario Odyssey, XC2 and BoTW were games on that level but looking back over the past few years there isn't much with that scale of ambition and scope. Yes there are other big sellers and games lavished with development budgets like Smash, Mario Kart, Splatoon etc. but there is a difference in terms of impact and influence over the development of videogames as a medium.

By contrast, this year we're looking at sequels to 3DS games, games with a 3DS level scope.

It raises a bigger question - can Nintendo even handle an average of more than one such game every year? Are their teams big enough? Does being confined to a single platform (and the lower sales ceiling that this brings) reduce their budgets out of the realm necessary to create more than 2 or 3 true exclusive AAA games per generation?

@StuTwo A well wrote point.

That’s exactly how I feel about the current state of Nintendo.

I Don't know why most people on here doesn't think Animal Crossing is a huge franchise and could help Nintendo Switch sales move forward.
Animal Crossing: New Leaf - #7 on 3DS Best Selling, #1 Best Selling Animal Crossing Series - 11.94 million sales
Animal Crossing: Wild World - #9 on DS Best Selling , #2 Best Selling Animal Crossing Series - 11.75 million sales
Animal Crossing: City Folk - #18 on Wii Best Selling, #3 Best Selling Animal Crossing Series - 4.32 million sales
Animal Crossing (Gamecube) - #5 on Gamecube Best Selling, #4 Best Selling Animal Crossing Series - 3.15 million sales

is Animal Crossing as big as Pokemon and Mario? no. but it's still a key franchise to Nintendo that sales great and unless somehow Nintendo screws up this switch entry. it will sell well enough on the switch.
as for spinoffs. HHD only sold 3.04 million on 3DS. and Amiibo Festival... well consider Nintendo has not post official sales for that game, it probably bombed hard.

Animal Crossing also appeals to a much different demographic aside from maybe Pokemon. That's a whole different market AC appeals to for some diversity in their lineup and in the games industry in general.

It doesn't and probably never will appeal to me, but don't dismiss it because it doesn't have combat or any "deep gameplay system".

I also wouldn't exactly want to sleep on niche games like Daemon X Machina as well.

I'm not sure I understand this point. Wouldn't a single platform mean that their player base is less divided, and as such they can put more of a budget on any particular game?

@Buizel I think the point being made is.
Hypothetically, if Mario Odysee was on all 3 formats, in theory it should sell better.

Personally I am not concerned about 2019 at all. 2018 was mostly ports with the “Big Triple A” games being Octopath, Kirby, Mario Tennis, Smash, and Pokemon Let’s Go; which was overall pretty decent but the majority of the year was pretty plain to the average Nintendo fan.

In 2019 we are getting Yoshi, Fire Emblem, Daemon, Luigi’s Mansion 3, Animal Crossing, Pokemon Gen 8, and probably a handful of ports like NSMBU Deluxe that released this month. Metroid Prime 4 delevopment being restarted sucks, but this year was already packed anyways so I think that is it probably for the best regardless.

@Aozz101x
Nintendo have messed up by Happy Home Designer and Amiibo Festival.
Animal Crossing New Leaf was Really Great, but Nintendo should be really aware with Dragon Quest Builders 2.
DQB 2 has STOLE the show and everything from ACNL & Happy Home Designer features such as Building houses, shaping the environments, furnitures, etc.

No. January isn't even over yet. Still plenty of time for unannounced games to eventually get announced. Animal Crossing may not be the most ambitious or big budget series, but it's going to move a lot of units. Pokemon will be a huge draw too.
If we get another Mario or Zelda this year, I think they will be simpler. Mario would be 2D, Zelda would be top-down. Larger Mario and Zelda games typically are announced a year plus in advance.

@Buizel my point was that platform exclusives typically don’t hit the sales of big multiplatform games (whatever the platform). A reasonably successful Nintendo game sells 2-3 million units - the bar for multiplatform games is much higher and the funding reflects this.

Animal Crossing and Pokémon will sell a lot of units but they aren’t the games that people who bought for BoTW necessary want.

@StuTwo My bad, I thought you were comparing the current situation to Nintendo's old handheld/home model, rather than multiplat developers!

I agree we can't really expect Nintendo to put out many AAA games - I think one a year if we're lucky, tbh. But I think there are enough A-tier Nintendo exclusives that this isn't a problem anyway.