Topic: Next Nintendo Direct?

@Grumblevolcano
No new Mario? Surely they can't be that cruel...

@NotASockPuppet I'm sure 3D mario will at least be announced next year but I wouldn't bet on it arriving next year.

But I also think there is a decent chance it will be announced in February for late 2026. 2026 is already packed but, aside from Gen X Pokemon, it is mostly packed with smaller games, DLCs, and spinoffs.

@FishyS I kinda have to disagree on that. It would be a shot in the foot not releasing a 3D Mario (or even a new 2D Mario), it's Nintendo's killer app alongside Zelda and Super Smash Bros., not releasing one of them in the second year would hurt potential sales. The whole thing feels like Sonic X-Treme for the Saturn.
I might be wrong, but I have a feeling them depending on "smaller games, DLC, and spinoffs" for over the year without a major installment of either Mario or Zelda is going to make them sink rather then gain.

@NotASockPuppet Gen X Pokemon will be a killer app but I agree it would be good to have 2 of them next year to keep Switch 2 momentum. And... the recent news basically guarantees new Animal Crossing (another killer app) won't be in 2026.

@NotASockPuppet Looking at how lineups of the year a brand new Pokemon generation released have been, I think the combo of Splatoon + Luigi's Mansion + Pokemon would be more than enough to drive big Switch 2 momentum during fall/holiday 2026. My guess with 3D Mario would be announce February 2027 for release in October/November 2027.

I personally still think there's a good chance of a mainline 3D Mario in late 2026, around October, like what happened with Odyssey, as long as it gets announced early enough in the year. I won't be surprised at all if I'm wrong though 🤣.

I wouldn't rule out a new Xenoblade release in 2026. Yes, XCX DE just came out in 2025, but it came out at the very beginning. . . and also, was a remake of an existing game, not a new one.

I wonder what a Rosalina game would play like. Back in 2023, Nintendo had the Mario movie and then used the June Direct to announce some games connected to characters that featured in the movie (Super Mario RPG remake, Princess Peach Showtime, LM2 HD, SMB Wonder). As the next movie is Galaxy, surely Rosalina has to be in the movie so maybe Nintendo would announce a Rosalina game.

@metaphysician if nothing else, I hope we get a remaster of Xenogears/saga

@Grumblevolcano there was a thread a few years back talking about that! My thought is most likely they'll push out the big "reveal" that she is playable in Mario Wonder's S2E, but maybe there'll be more! Who knows...

@Grumblevolcano I mean the easy answer is to just give her the Galaxy series. Mario is a bit too broad a character and an IP to be pigeonholed into space themed games should they want to make a Galaxy 3, and 4, and 5 (and I do believe they could continue the gravity mechanics forever). So rather than take resources away from a new Mario game for Galaxy 3, I think they should just create a new team to make the next Galaxy game a Rosalina game. As for how Rosalina could potentially differentiate herself from Mario, she could potentially use more star magic (one thing I think she could do is rather than Mario's acrobatic platforming she could potentially summon Sling Stars for higher jumps) and potentially partner with different colored Lumas that could give her different effects (like maybe there are Lumas that could help her jump higher, Lumas that could increase her attack, etc.).

@SplatRay001 A xenogears/saga remake is probably never happening since Monolithsoft doesn't own the rights to those IPs, and Square Enix is squatting on the rights to Gears while Bandai doesn't see any value in remasters as "there's no demand for Xenosaga."

@Grumblevolcano Honestly, I'd love to play a Rosalina game. Maybe it would play somewhat similarly to Super Mario Galaxy, with some open-world gameplay? That's my best guess.

@CaleBoi25 Missed this post. Yeah, I think the biggest thing they can do for Rosalina right now is to put her in Wonder S2E. I don't think they have the resources to have her star in her own game right now, especially if I'm right about wanting to give her the Galaxy series. That's going to take time and resources and if it is happening, I would expect that later in the generation, especially if they do develop a 3D platformer like the Galaxy games. I was kinda hoping that she might get her own side mode in a Galaxy 2 remake to tease something like this, but they didn't go for that and instead we just got more Storybook chapters. So it's hard to say if they're actually interested in having her star in her own game at some point. So that leaves the only other thing they can do relatively quickly to coincide with the movie is toss her into Wonder.

@VoidofLight

While Xenogears is dubious because it depends on Square-Enix and their nigh random decision making, I'd say Xenosaga is possible. It just hinges on whether Nintendo is willing to foot most of the bill. After all, they did do a rerelease of Baiten Kaitos, and that almost certainly had lower sales prospects.

@metaphysician The Baten Kaitos remasters suggest that Saga remasters could also happen, but if they do, they'll probably be on the cheap and with minimal involvement from Monolith and Nintendo.

I suspect that Monolith will mostly be busy on a new game for release a couple of years now, plus the next Zelda, whenever that happens.

@Matt_Barber The next Xenoblade is probably deep into development now, and we should see it around 2026 or sometime in 2027 I'd imagine.

@VoidofLight I mean XC3 was 3 years ago so pretty safe bet we see something around then. Either 4 or a Definitive/Switch 2 Edition of 2. I want to say it'll be 4 but we've been seeing a lot of S2Es lately with actual new entries seemingly far off for so much I'd kind of expect the worst here (I'm not a Xenoblade fan so I don't actually care, but if I was I'd be hoping to see 4).

I think 4 is the most likely at this point. X DE came out not too long ago, but it was more than likely being worked on by a separate internal team given how Monolithsoft is structured. Xenoblade 3 released three years ago, but from the sounds of it- Nintendo was sitting on it for a while after it was finished. Especially given how they moved the release date forwards to give Splatoon 3 more time to finish development.

I'd imagine that they started production on 4 after finishing up production on 3.. so 2026 is probably the earliest we'll see XC4 revealed.

Xenoblade Chronicles 3 felt like a conclusion to the series so it wouldn't surprise me if Monolith's next game has a new title. Hopefully it's far into development either way but I'm not going to set my hopes too high for an announcement any time soon just in case whatever they're making needs a bit more development time than usual.