While E3 will be a bit different this year, at leats it will be happening at all. But with less than 2 weeks before the event, Nintendo has been oddly quiet, almost like they are preparing for something major. While Nintendo’s presentation at E3 could either be a rousing success or a major dissappointment, here are some of the things we want to see at the event.
News on Switch Pro
While information like a release date and price point would be great to hear, at the very least Nintendo should acknowledge that the Switch Pro, Super Switch or whatever the hell they decide to call it is at least REAL. The Switch is now 4 years old and while its competitors have been handicapped lately with getting new systems out the door, it goes without saying that Nintendo should at least offer a choice when it comes to performance of their system, similar to what they did with the “New” 3DS lineup a few years ago, offering 4K output, larger storage and battery life, maybe integrated bluetooth and voice chat features as well as offering performance upgrades to some of the systems beefier titles like DOOM Eternal and The Outer Worlds.
While sales at the moment would suggest Nintendo is leading the pack following the Wii U’s failure. Production delays won’t hinder Microsoft and Sony forever and Nintendo shouldn’t rest on its laurels. Even better, Nintendo could reveal the Switch Pro BEFORE E3 to ensure hype and allow third parties to reveal games arriving for the new revision of the system
Mario Kart 9
It was a smart idea to release a Deluxe version of Mario Kart 8 in the Switch’s first 6 months, a VERY smart idea. The number one selling game on Wii U is also the best selling game on the Switch with over 33 Million copies sold (With New Horizon right behind with 31). When Deluxe was being released though, there was a suggestion that the game would receive even more DLC beyond the expansions that gave us Link and Isabelle, but ultimately it never showed up.
I have a theory though, DLC was being planned for the game but, like a lot of times it kept growing and growing to the point they decided to just begin work on Mario Kart 9. It won’t just be enough to make another Mario Kart on the system though, which is why Nintendo should go back to the days of the Gamecube. Double Dash introduced a slew of new features that have sadly been left behind as the series progressed, namely the two person karts and special moves. While at the time of its release many people didn’t “get” Double Dash, it has since become one of the most loved games in the series and more than deserves a revisit, and besides who wouldn’t want to see Wario’s Colosseum in 1080P (or 4K!)
News on one of the “Big 3”
It’s been four years since that 4 showed up at E3, three and a half years since that 3 showed up at the Game Awards and two years since we found out Breath of the Wild was getting a sequel. Since then, barely anything has been known about any of them. Kamiya had to assure us that Bayonetta 3 was still in development and Metroid Prime 4 has seemed countless stops and starts. Anouma has assured us that BOTW2 news will be shown later in the year, but it’s no guarantee that news will be shown at E3.
At the very least, one of these three needs to make an appearance at the event or at least something to quench fans’ thirst. The obvious choice would be Metroid Prime Trilogy finally arriving on Switch, the title made news earlier in tn the year when former Retro Studios designer Mike Wilkan expressed doubt on the remaster as “Rebuilding the hundreds of interaction sets in MP3 alone, not to mention retuning the game play to take in the slower engagement pacing of conventional controls would probably take a year with a 4-5 person team full time by itself.”
While it would indeed be a task to get the game, especially its Wiimote style controls on the system, Retro has well over a 100 employees and a years work would certainly be worth it for the reception of the trilogy on Switch, that’s even if they do it in house and not farm it out to another developer like Monster Games
On the Zelda side, while Skyward Sword is nice to see, the other 3D Zelda games should get some love too during the 35th Anniversary or even better, take the Link’s Awakening engine and bring the Oracle games into the modern era.
New System for Switch Online
While the Switch Online is undoubtedly the best value for money in regards to Console Subscriptions at just 20USD a year, it goes without saying that the retro offerings are seriously lackluster. We are now four years into the consoles lifecycle and still we only have NES and SNES games to show for it and what’s worse, new releases are few and far between and EVEN worse than that the releases we do get are seriously middle of the road titles while ignoring major hits like Chrono Trigger, Super Mario RPG and Earthbound
At the very least, a new system should be made available on the Online Service. The obvious pick should be N64, several months ago I even predicted that the day after Super Mario 3D All Stars was removed from the store, the games would be made available separately with Mario 64 part of the new Nintendo 64 Switch Online app……yeahhh that didn’t happen. If N64 did arrive though there may be some issues with some of its biggest hits now being owned by Microsoft.
The only other system that could potentially see release is the GBA, with many huge hits like the Minish Cap, the Mario & Luigi series, Golden Sun, Advance Wars and many many other titles. The GBA was already available on Nintendo’s previous home system so emulation and performance shouldn’t be a problem and odds are if GBA did arrive on Switch, Mother 3 would be released on the Japanese version only just to spite fans worldwide once more.
Major IP Revival
It goes without saying that Nintendo have a vast number of IPs that have barely seen any action in many years, F-Zero is the most common one with its last major title released back in 2003 on the Gamecube. Other franchises like Golden Sun, Chibi Robo, Punch Out and Kid Icarus have also been a hot topic of discussion when it comes to revivals. With the recent release of Famicom Detective Club, it goes to show that Nintendo is at least willing to give a long dormant franchise another chance in the spotlight
While this pick is certainly the most unlikely, it would certainly be one of the main highlights of a Nintendo presentation, just look at Kid Icarus Uprising.
Honourable MentionsWaluigi in Smash
Come on, just give it to him already
The founder and Editor in Chief of UnboxedTV. Nintendo lover and not afraid to admit it, can always go for a good Indie Metroidvania with a nice cold Cider.