Topic: Next Nintendo Direct?

Very good news, all previous Direct NSO updates are now 100% completed. The Japan exclusive GB game announced in the February 2023 Direct is out now for Japan NSO as part of a GB wave.

• Super Mario Land
• Alleyway
• Baseball
• Kaeru no Tame ni Kane wa Naru (Japan only)

@Grumblevolcano We'll likely learn what's next for NSO in the next Direct!

Anyways surprised Super Mario Land took this long. Cool to see it!

If we're getting a new NSO roadmap, I'm really hoping for Zero Mission, Sacred Stones, and Pokemon gens 1 and 2 to link with the stadium games.

Gonna echo the sentiment that we'll be getting another NSO roadmap next Direct to close out the current Switch's lifecycle. As for what those games could be, I've got some thoughts myself:

Metroid Zero Mission: Perhaps the most obvious choice of the lot. It's a highly beloved remake, its been released on Virtual Console in the past, Fusion is already on NSO (the first post-launch GBA game at that) and hell: they found references to it in Fusion's NSO port back when that originally came out in MARCH of last year. Suffice to say, if any other GBA game is coming to NSO, its absolutely going to be this one.
Fire Emblem: The Sacred Stones + Kirby's Nightmare in Dreamland: Two seemingly easy locks for the service given how both Blazing Blade and Amazing Mirror already made their way over last year.
Wario Land 4: Not as confident on this one given how we've only got Wario Land 3 in terms of Wario Land games on NSO but given how popular WL4 is within the general Nintendo/gaming space, I imagine it'll probably come over sooner rather than later.
Grab-Bag: There honestly aren't THAT many GBA titles left that aren't either on NSO already or a part of Switch collection so here's a handful of smaller-scale games that I think miiiiiiiiight come over too:

• Drill Dozer
• Mega Man & Bass
• WarioWare Twisted
• Klonoa Empire of Dreams
• Mario Party Advance
• Mario Tennis Power Tour/Mario Golf Advance Tour
• Gunstar Super Heroes

They usually also have one last MAJOR NSO announcement at the end of these segments as well (Goldeneye and Earthbound being the prime example) and for GBA, there are two options:
A. Pokemon Gens 1, 2 and 3 (highly unlikely but you never know)
OR
B. An officially translated version of Mother 3 (not expecting this in a million years but it'd be the perfect capstone for the Switch generation if you ask me )

It came to mind that Just Dance completely deconfirms the first week of June. Considering Just Dance appeared in the June Direct for 2018, 2019, 2021 and 2023 it's pretty much guaranteed that the June Direct is happening after June 10th as the Ubisoft Forward event would be where Just Dance 2025 is announced and then it would appear in the Direct.

Makes sense. I bet the direct will be relatively late in June.

@Grumblevolcano Yeah it didn't seem likely to be the first week anyways, so looks like we're looking at 2nd or 3rd full week

You could think of a reason that "deconfirms" any week in June. At the end of the day, it's going to break some of these fan made "rules", it's just a matter of which ones.

@Sigran102 less a fan rule and more (basic) statistical analysis of past Nintendo behavior. Your point is fair, but since we focus on what Nintendo usually does, not shockingly these directs usually end up being one of the short-list of dates we don't rule out. Considering the name of this thread, feels like a fair thing to try to predict 😆

@FishyS Yeah, definitely fair to try and predict. I'm just saying that there's not a single date in June that satisfies every prediction people have made here, so I don't think anything can be completely deconfirmed. Nintendo is going to break their patterns one way or another. It could be the just dance pattern, it could be the summer game fest pattern, it could be the pattern of no directs in the release week of a big game. I just think we shouldn't be so confident in what patterns can't be broken and what ones can.

I don’t see any problem for 12.6.24 (or 6.12.24)

Sony has a big meeting on Thursday 2:30am - 4am UK time (Wednesday 9:30pm - 11pm eastern time), it's a long shot but maybe there's Zelda movie info there.

@Grumblevolcano Nah that's TTYD's release date, doubt Nintendo would allow that. Zelda movie is likely to get it's own presentation, or at least a presentation from Nintendo.

I guess it's probably slightly before TTYD's official release, but I still don't think it's likely.

@PikminMarioKirby @Grumblevolcano I think it's possible to get mentioned as a notable upcoming project, but no actual info is coming out of this, and probably not for a while.

Less than a month away from Nintendo outlining their Summer / Fall release schedule

Still holding hope for a Xenoblade Chronicles X Switch port, the last game I do not want lost on the Wii U.

I mean...Fatal Frame Maiden of Black Water was rescued, for crying out loud.

I bought XCX right before the closure, so I'd be way too tempted to buy it again on switch. For that reason, part of me hopes it stays on wii u, but that's a selfish personal problem.

So... We know of 7 Nintendo games this year and a massive 5 of them involve Mario characters. I wonder what the record is? If they keep up that pace, we can expect 3 more Marioverse games this year 😝 What could they be?

• Mario Wonder DLC - medium-likelihood.
• Mario sportball or a smaller one such as Mario and Sonic - seems possible.
• 3D Mario or Mario Kart - definitely no.
• Captain Toad? Seems more likely it would be on Switch 2 but conceivable.
• Mario and Luigi? Seems unlikely since we have had so many rpgs in a row but there have been some (likely false) rumours.
• Yoshi? Seems unlikely since Peach just came out from the usual suspect devs.
• Mario Party? It is about time for one by the usual release schedule, although I feel like that would take away profits from Nintendo World Championship (although they treated Everybody 1-2 Switch like that last year by ignoring it and promoting Warioware).
• Warioland sumthin? That would be a surprise but would be neat.
• Some port of one or more of the New Super Mario games? Plausible if Wonder has no DLC.
• Rhythm Heaven with Mario characters?? We can wish.
• Mario Warriors? 😝

Ok, I'm out of ideas.

@FishyS
I'd like to see Wario Land or Rhythm Heaven and I think they're a fair shout. But I also feel like I've been saying I'd like to see one or the other just about every year for almost ten years. At the very least since they put out MegaMix on 3DS literally days after releasing the Switch and I thought "that's a nice compilation, I hope they port it to Switch, they probably will, I'll wait"

MegaMix is probably going to end up being the last of the Rhythm Heaven titles. The main music director for the series can no longer sing after they had to remove his vocal chords a few years back. Most likely why the series is missing in recent years.

I just want metroid prime 2 remastered with the same details as prime 1. I'm fine waiting for three if it means we get the whole trilogy looking like new games instead of just an upscaled port of the wii trilogy.