(Warning: Nothing major beside spoilers for today's Nintendo Direct and some politics.)
Welp, I wasn’t expecting Nintendo to make a surprise announcement yesterday that there’s going to be TWO Nintendo Directs, instead of the big Switch 2 Direct that won’t happen for another six days!
But why now?
I’m going to guess they’re going to make it up for not having a Nintendo Direct last month. Or due to how “lackluster” the Switch 2 announcement they made back in January, thanks to the numerous leaks and Nintendo being silence over them didn’t help anyone. Or that they want to announce the remaining upcoming Switch games (if there’s any left beside Metroid Prime 4) and get that out of the way, so they can focus on the Switch 2 announcement in their own Direct.
Then there’s the fact Nintendo knows not everyone is going to getting the Switch 2 anytime soon due to the cost (especially in America because of our current president…). But they did confirm that the Switch 2 has backward compatibility, so they figure that there are some who want to play the just announced Switch games and keep them busy while they wait for the Switch 2 to come out. Or they rather wait until the Switch 2 comes out because they expect it to run better than the original Switch.
Another reason is that they don’t want to overshadow the hype for the Switch 2, if they announce the regular Direct last month. And maybe give the Switch, a one last hurrah before they move on the Switch 2 (even though they won’t be abandoning the Switch for a while, as they were still making 3DS Directs when the Switch came out in 2017).
Whatever the case is, I’m happy that we’re getting two Nintendo Directs in a span of one week. But it didn’t help that there were some rumors from various people on the Internet, that there was going to be one more Direct before the Switch 2 Direct comes out.
Bah!
Oh well, you can’t do anything about that.
Then most of everyone on the Internet found today’s Direct to be “meh”. I get it. They’re more focus on the upcoming Switch 2 Direct and wondered why Nintendo even bother putting this one out, knowing the Switch 2 Direct is around the corner!
They say that because most of this Direct was nothing but announcements of either new, remastered or imported re-releases of indie and 3rd party games. Figures since that what the Switch has been doing in the past few years as we’re near the end of their life cycle.
Although I was surprised that they announced the remaster of Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha VS the Soulless Army (for not only the Switch, but for the rest of the consoles as well), a cool action RPG Atlus game that takes place in an alternative timeline where the Taisho era lasted longer than it did in real life (which was 14 years).
I only know that game because two years ago, I saw a Twitch streamer play the game for a bit on their channel. I also know that the game is very hard because it’s an Atlus game and that it’s hard to find a copy of it (as it was originally release on the PlayStation 2 back in 2006). And if you do managed to find a copy, you have to pay for it because it’s expensive! Now the remaster will allow anyone who wanted to play the game, but don’t want to cough up $120 for a used, boxed copy for the PlayStation 2! Unless you decided to play it on a different way, that is.
Arrgh…
Despite that, Nintendo did show some footage of Metroid Prime 4: Beyond and Pokémon Z-A, which made most of their fans happy. But the rest were meh, as they think the footage look lackluster and are waiting to see how it runs on the Switch 2. Ah, typical fanboys…
But Nintendo later announce the sequels of both Rhythm Heaven AND Tomodachi Life, which (surprisingly) made everyone on the Internet happy. They even said that Nintendo announcing those two games, is what saved this Direct from going bad!
The reason why I said that is because in the past few years, anytime there’s an upcoming Nintendo Direct, people on Tumblr were screaming and begging Nintendo to release (or import) the two games on the Switch. Mainly because it’s been nearly a decade since they were last released and it was on the 3DS (which many grew up with). But whenever the Direct came and went and didn’t announce the new games for the two, the fans become depressed and complain that Nintendo doesn’t care for their game and such. Then the cycle continued on. It’s a sad thing; I’m not going to lie.
But it was this Direct that finally put the end of their long nightmare and gave them a trailer for the two games, which then caused the fanbase to explode! Explode to the point that one of them, Tomodachi Life, became a trending topic on Tumblr shortly after the Direct ended! It’s mainly due to how many people were talking about as they grew up with this game and wanted the game to be on the Switch for the longest time. Heck, they even only bought the Switch to play, said game!
I’m happy that both the Rhythm Heaven and Tomodachi Life fandom finally got their wish. Then there’s the fact that the new Tomodachi Life game might give me a reason to pick up the Switch again after abandoning it last year, due to burnout and that I rather play emulated and Steam games on my laptop instead. Why yes, I also played the game when it was on the 3DS.
Back in late 2017, I saw the game on another Twitch stream, got fascinated by it and bought the game when it was on sale as it was around Christmas. I played this game for almost two years before abandoning it because I unlocked all the buildings and it was when everyone was ditching the 3DS for the Switch, so I didn’t have too many StreetPass, compared to five years earlier.
Just like everyone who played this game, I made Miis of me, my family and characters from various franchise, such as the Super Mario Bros. In my save, Luigi was once married to Buttercup from The Powerpuff Girls, had a kid and later got a divorce. Same thing with Waluigi and Daisy as well, which is ironic how they hate each other in the main canon! Actually, I think it was the second couple that got a divorce. Don’t know; it’s been years since I last touch that game.
One of things that the fans hope that the new game will have is the option to allow same-sex couples to appear. It never did in the past game due to “mortal” reasons and it’s now the perfect time to do it. I say that since Nintendo acknowledges Vivian as a trans woman in last year’s remaster of Paper Mario: Thousand-Year Door, they should allow same-sex relationship in the new Tomodachi Life game!
But I fear due to the political astrosphere that’s currently going on in the States, Nintendo might have to make some limit on same-sex couples in order to keep the conservatives and Moral Guardians off their backs. Hopefully, I’m wrong on that one.
At the end, Nintendo finally made a right for the two underrated series by giving their fans new games to get excited about. Too bad we have to wait until next year for them to come out.
Besides announcing new games, Nintendo made some surprising news about their software. First, they announced that starting next month; their digital games are now known as virtual game cards, where you can easily transfer digital games from one Switch to another. I’m going to guess they did this to make the transfer of people “switching” (heh, get it) from the Switch to the Switch 2 console easier. As I like mention before, the Switch 2 is confirmed to be backwards compatible, which makes sense for why they're allowing this. Then there's rumors that there's an enchanced version of original Switch games if you play them on the Switch 2. Hmm...
And it allows you to lend a game to a person and that they can only have it for two weeks. I feel like it’s a great thing for families and households who have multiple Switches and only have digital copies.
Then lastly, they announce yet another mobile app, Nintendo Today!, a news app that will keep players updated on everything they announce. I’m going to guess they made this as Nintendo want to slowly get away from the hell that is Twitter and hopefully keep the leakers from ruining things, like they’ve did to the Switch 2, which many said that they killed the hype even before Nintendo could offically announced the new console. At least this one doesn’t require you to have the Nintendo Online subscription, just a regular Nintendo account.
Now with the regular (and final) Switch Direct is done, I feel like this one was a small send-off before moving on to next week’s Switch 2 Direct. AKA, the one that everyone’s looking forward to. I know they won’t be abandoning the original Switch for a while, as I also mention before, not many people are going to get the Switch 2 right away due to the cost. But if next week’s Switch 2 Direct ends up looking bad, then at least the upcoming games for the Switch will be a perfect way to end the new Renaissance era that the Switch brought to Nintendo.
And that, I think will be a sad thing (even though I’m too broke to buy anything right now…).