Topic: Next Nintendo Direct?

@RR529 Looking at the other 2 years you have:

2017:

March - BotW, 1-2-Switch, Snipperclips
April - MK8 Deluxe
May - Nothing
June - ARMS

Total - 5

2019:

January - NSMBU Deluxe, Fitness Boxing (NA only as the rest of the world got it in December 2018)
February - Nothing
March - Yoshi's Crafted World
April - Labo Toy-Con 04 VR Kit
May - Nothing
June - Super Mario Maker 2

Total - 5 (4 outside NA)

If you add in digital titles, you also have:

May 2018 - Pokemon Quest
February 2019 - Tetris 99
April 2019 - BOXBOY! + BOXGIRL!
June 2019 - Cadence of Hyrule

So overall there's:
2017 - 5 retail games
2018 - 9 retail games + 1 digital game
2019 - 5 (4 outside NA) retail games + 3 digital games
2020 so far - 4 (3 outside EU) retail games

So we're generally looking at 5 retail games for the first half of which Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition is a likely candidate for the 5th of this year (announced in the September Direct, ESRB rating already done). So we could see something like:

April - No retail title but digital titles and DLC/updates make up for it (e.g. LM3 pack 1, Smash Ultimate Challenger pack 6, Mario Maker 2 3.0)
May - Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition
June - 0 or 1 unannounced retail games but maybe Isle of Armor is big enough that one isn't necessary, also some more digital titles and other DLC/updates

Honestly the September Direct opening with Overwatch and there only being 3 unannounced 1st party game announcements (Super Kirby Clash, Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE Encore, Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition) made me think 1st half of 2020 would be light back when the Direct first aired.

Did somebody say... MAR10...?

@Grumblevolcano
There are some upcoming Switch games in physical have been announced from playasia but you haven't include them on the list.

Yeah but lets not forget, they'd announced pretty much the whole year's schedule in January 2017. So even thought he first half was fairly sparse, everyone knew at that point that Odyssey, Splatoon 2 and Xenoblade 2 were all coming in the second half of the year.

If we knew that 3 games of that size and quality were coming in 2020, I'd probably just shut up and tolerate the slow first half of the year.

@Dezzy Metroid Prime 4 would probably have hit around this time without the restart. Xenoblade Chronicles can come sooner than later for me lol, but things like BotW2 are notorious for taking their sweet time to perfect (a good thing). So, I'm sure we will be getting Nintendo games (Odyssey 2 is my bet in time for the Olympics - which will have impacted scheduling if they know what they are doing), but Animal Crossing I think will set a tone for this year with broader audience reaching titles (like Style Saavy or Nintendogs etc) Stuff that outright doesn't need to compete with teraflops. Man, they must have so many plan B's for this virus outbreak too. It's clear we are entering a 'phase 2' type period of software but there does seem to have been some hiccups along the way.

@GrailUK plans such as?

@DannyBoi I don't work for Nintendo lol. But if a game is going to get delayed, or manufacturing slows down, then there is no point in them announcing something ahead of the new deadline if it's beyond their usual timeframe. Nintendo are transparent enough if anything does get delayed so we will know

@Dezzy They've announced pretty much the full 1st party lineup early on in the year every Switch year so far.

• 2017 - January Switch presentation (January 12th) - Only unknown afterwards was Mario + Rabbids
• 2018 - January Direct Mini (January 11th) and March Direct (March 8th) - Only unknowns afterwards were Pokemon Let's Go (Game Freak reveals Pokemon games on their own terms) and Super Mario Party
• 2019 - February Direct (February 13th)

Now Japan has closed all their schools for the month of March, one has to wonder how much impact this has on their staff? Does this also go towards delays in software development if staff are spending more time at home to look after children?

@GrailUK When Metroid Prime 4 was shown off, they only had a logo, not even a teaser, so I don't think they were very far in development. Late 2020 if we were lucky, but no sooner.

Maybe Nintendo say something tommorow as it is March? It is the weekend though.

@DannyBoi Doubt it. Not on a Sunday. Maybe this week they’ll announce a Direct. But maybe not as there’s 2 games coming out in March that will sell well.

Indie World is probably the most likely "Direct" for next week.

@Octane I'm the optimistic sort lol but you are more than likely right, the Prime series has a history of releasing later in the year

I knew I recognized 4th year being very limited with quantity of 1st party games for a successful Nintendo system somewhere before, it's the Wii and DS. The Wii and DS were such a massive success that Nintendo rested on their laurels from 2009 onwards and it costed them in the Wii U era.

This severe lack of games for those systems from 2009 onwards was what led to me getting a Xbox 360 in 2009.

I'm not complaining, but it is kind of confusing how they jammed everything in from June to November in 2019. I had a great time obviously, but not sure why they didn't sandbag some of that into 2020. There wouldn't be as much a need for a direct if they had a couple big releases in January, February, and March.

Animal Crossing New Horizons is one of those titles that was originally going to be released in 2019, likely in the already busy last quarter of the year, but it got pushed to March.

For me, New Horizons makes this the best early year from Nintendo since 2017 with BOTW. There's no contest, in fact. New Horizons is looking fantastic.

I'm mostly concerned with what little we know of beyond New Horizons. What have they got in store? Just a Xenoblade remaster? Come on. That was concerning that was the "biggest" announcement of the September Direct. Why is Nintendo being so silent?

The industry in general is being pretty silent right now.

@IceClimbers I noticed that as well for the past 2 months. Some news here and there, but near deathly quiet.

@Neoguardian86 Apart from Nintendo it was like that in 2013 before Playstation Meeting 2013 revealed the PS4. I'd imagine once Sony reveals the PS5, it'll be a lot louder as more studios will be able to reveal their next gen projects.