Topic: Next Nintendo Direct?

@SplatRay001 I wouldn't put it past Gamefreak to release it in November. They never said they were going to start delaying their games. Wouldn't surprise me if it comes out this year (given a new generation releases every three years, and it's the one pattern they tend to not break due to how it could collapse the series). The 2026 anniversary will probably be DLC for Gen 10.

I hope I'm wrong on this all, since I really want Gen 10 to be a polished game, but from the way that TPCi was talking after Scarlet and Violet, it sounds more likely that the release schedule isn't going to change- and that they're going to try to find other ways to increase quality.

@VoidofLight I could see that. I guess the fact that Legends is releasing so late makes the whole thing feel kind of awkward. I know they promoted both BDSP and Legends Arceus at the same time, but a remake is significantly less important than a full new generation. There is that three year pattern, though, so who knows.

If Legends and Gen 10 are coming out shortly after the Switch 2, I’m curious to see if they’ll make only switch 1 versions or have some sort of next gen upgrade

@SplatRay001 The interesting thing to me is that Legends Z-A is slated for May-July. That's usually the gap period between the teaser on Pokemon day for the next generation of Pokemon until the next big piece of news for the game (august is when the news cycle tends to officially start for the next generation usually).

So technically if Z-A releases during the summer, it wouldn't interfere with Gen 10, and Gen 10 wouldn't interfere with Z-A. Z-A's cycle would just close the gap in-between information that Gen 9 and Gen 8 had with its games.

@VoidofLight I suppose I could see that. There was one a time where I thought three mainline pokemon games in one year was impossible, but I was proven wrong (BDSP, Legends Arceus, Scarlet/Violet). At this point I wouldn’t put anything past TPC, though I’m really hoping the quality of the games aren’t compromised too much, and that this isn’t another Arceus-ScarVi situation where both games should’ve been more polished than they were.

@skywake Mario Hoops was Square Enix and they're no longer doing exclusives so Nintendo would need to find a new studio if it was to be brought back. A fair few Nintendo franchises have been revived over the past few years so Bandai Namco working on a new Mario Sluggers meanwhile Camelot working on Golden Sun would be a potential way to revive 2 more dormant franchises.

@VoidofLight Gen 4 was four years long so it's not entirely out of the question that Gen 9 is also four years. Them breaking the 3 year pattern they've insisted on since won't damage the franchise, they'll just have to come up with more TCG sets to stretch that aspect out.

I personally think the most likely scenario is that Gen 10 is a November 2026 release and they simply don't have a November 2025 release (and have some other Nintendo release instead).

As for Direct timing, the 2022 and 2023 general Directs in February were really early in the month (February 9th and 8th respectively) so I think if they do one in February 2025 it'll be on February 5th.

I find it hard to imagine Nintendo having enough still in the works for Switch 1 to even justify a Direct.

@IceClimbers One can hope they don't have a November 2025 game, but people were like this with 2022. They thought Gen 9 was coming in 2023 due to Legends, only for it to drop in 2022.

February game shadow drop, more about the March game, an April game, a May Switch 1 game, buncha Switch 1 third party for the rest of the year so they can focus on Switch 2 exclusives next direct.

@FishyS I could see maybe a Direct Mini or something along those lines. Just a proper full length Direct would be pretty surprising to me. I think they could get away with not really doing anything if they wanted, if Switch 2 release is May or early June.

@BenAV
Plenty of reasons to be gently optimistic.
People thought that before the last Direct and we got new Mario games and a new Zelda.

Nintendo has demonstrated that it is very happy to hold things back from release until there is a blank spot in its calendar, for over a year in extreme cases (e.g Fire Emblem Engage).

They are also just very good at suprise announcing things coming out in a couple of months.

While I wouldn't expect any major original releases I'm sure they will have a handful or HD ports/remakes and a spin off game or two to cover the first half of this year as well as NSO and dlc like new Mario Party boards.

I DON'T CARE IF IT IS NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE, I WANT MARIO SPORTS MIX 2 BAYBEE!

And MUST Have BOXING on it with six pack Mario & Luigi. 😁

@Anti-Matter Honestly? I would be down for that

@Anti-Matter ok that's just never going to happen

@Groovz But neither is MSM2 so why not add more wishful thinking while we are at it lol?

@BenAV I could see something like:

• February shadow drop
• More info on XCX Definitive Edition (perhaps a long segment like they've done with Xenoblade in the past)
• More info on Prime 4 (Direct closing with that)
• Announcement of 2-3 more unannounced games (2 if Legends Z-A is May - July, 3 if Legends Z-A is August - November)
• A new sport added to Switch Sports
• New update for F-Zero 99
• 3rd kits announced for Splatoon 3
• Something do with NSO retro game additions

@Anti-Matter I highly doubt that Mario and Luigi are going to be muscular. We've seen them shirtless countless times before.

Any chance Switch will get a price cut this year? If so, will it be before or after Switch 2 release? Would it be 50 dollar price cut (150/250/300) or less than that (like 175/275/325)?