Nintendo Direct E3 2021 Review
Nintendo Direct E3 2021 Review
Although E3 only ended less then a few weeks ago, it already feels like a long time has passed. With many outlets doing deep dives and now video game news is back to its regular cycle, gaming has returned to its norm. This was the first Nintendo E3 Direct since June 11, 2019, which would make it almost two full years since their last E3 Direct. Prior to the presentation, Nintendo announced that it would be approximately 40 minutes, focusing on software mostly coming out in 2021.
Needless to say between all the Switch Pro speculation flying around, all of the Breath of the Wild 2 anticipation, and the over two year gap between Nintendo E3 Directs, hype levels felt like they were off the charts. Being burned many times and over expecting from Nintendo, my personal expectations were quite low.
After digesting all that was E3 this year, the best presentation realistically only had two options between Nintendo and Microsoft. Microsoft’s presentation just felt like it had a more consistent tone throughout with very few lulls. Nintendo, surprisingly delivered a solid presentation that only had a couple of major announcements with a lot of smaller things for everyone to find something for themselves.
Metroid Dread
Arguably the biggest announcement from the Nintendo E3 Direct 2021 and likely one of the biggest surprises of all of E3 was that 2D Metroid is returning with an original entry for the first time in 19 years. Metroid Fusion landed on the Game Boy Advance on the same day Metroid Prime was released for the Game Cube. The last time before that was in 1994 with Super Metroid for the SNES. There has been Zero Mission and Samus Returns both those were both remakes.
19 years is a long time to leave a genre and what it did was leave people wanting more. Although, gamers have received more in the years since and this will make for a tougher return to the genre. Hollow Knight, Ori, Axiom Verge, Dead Cells, Shadow Complex and many more have come in to fill the demand for Metroidvanias that people so desperately wanted. These games also did more than just act as a placeholder until Metroid returned, many have made meaningful additions to the genre that have changed the game.
Metroid Dread is releasing on October 8, is going to continue the story line of the series, and is technically the 5th entry in the series based on the start of the trailer. Metroid Dread should help satiate the fanbase until Metroid Prime 4 releases. The release of Metroid Dread and that they mentioned that development is coming along well leads me to be optimistic for a fall 2022 release.
Advance Wars
One of the most pleasant surprises for me was the announcement that Advance Wars was making a return with Advance Wars 1 + 2 Reboot Camp, which is as it sounds a reboot of the first two games with a new engine. Having never played a single second of Advance Wars, the option of being able to have a new entry point into the series to see what all the hype is about is exciting.
Some of the games that I ended up putting the most time into over the past generation include a lot of turn based strategy games including Xcom 2, Into The Breach, and Gears Tactics. Strategy games along with deck building games seem to have gotten a renaissance over the past decade.
Reboot Camp looks to be going in a different direction with the art style which seems divisive but if the core gameplay remains same then people should be happy with the update. Reboot is also adding in some modern features including versus mode where up to 4 players can battle across dozens of maps and make custom setting including fog of war and funds.
The revival of Advance Wars is likely a temperature check to see if there is enough interest needed to create a whole new game from the ground up. The announcement wasn’t all positive as the game won’t be launching until December even though it seems like a perfect summer release and the game will be full price. With what little information we have about the game at this point, the price tag could possibly feeling a little high but Nintendo did say they will announce more information soon.
Breath of The Wild 2
After the trolling at the very start of the presentation with Ganondorf being thrown into a volcano which just turned out to be the next Smash character reveal. With over 80 fighters in Super Smash Brothers Ultimate, they could have easily chosen anyone else. While on the topic they also decided to depict Captain Falcon of F-Zero as well. With so many fighters, Nintendo has to be aware that there is a wildly rabid fanbase looking for more news on Breath of The Wild 2 and at least some type of fanbase, myself included, that would love to see F-Zero return in some form.
Many were likely waiting on their edge of the seat for the end of the presentation hoping that BOTW2 would be announced for the end of 2021. However, the initial reaction to the one more thing was an update on Hyrule Warriors, which would have caused quite an uproar, if thats how Nintendo ended their E3 2021 Direct. My expectations and assumptions for what we knew about BOTW2 were not in line with what was shown.
The last time we got a tease at the end of the E3 2019 Nintendo Direct we saw Link and Zelda in what looked to be the underground of BOTW map and it might have seemed like it was using a lot of the same elements, but from the first second you see Link falling from the sky, it seems a lot easier to understand why this game has been taking as long as it has.
The brief trailer showed off many new mechanics and elements considering that it was just a few minutes long. You can see floating land masses, which will likely be able to teleport or traverse to somehow, we see Link with some type of arm enhancement which resembles the sheikh slate, we can see Link will all kinds of new abilities including reversing time and even being able to move through buildings somehow.
The game looks stunning thanks to its art style but with the amount that is seemingly available on the screen at once, it seems like it would really benefit from a new and improved Switch. Breath of The Wild ran overall well on the Switch back in 2017, but this looks to expand the world that we already knew.
If BOTW2 isn’t slated to realease until 2022, then it might be a while until we see the next iteration of Switch hardware. At this point, we have seen nothing else that should launch alongside more powerful hardware.
Digital Foundry did confirm that the original Breath of the Wild was running at 900p when docked and 720p in handheld so there is room for improvement as well as helping with things like draw distance and frame rate as when docked the frame rate would dip from the targeted 30 all the way down to 20 at times. Considering the world seems even bigger since it looks like the same map but above and below as well, this would be a title that would largely benefit from new horsepower.
No Switch Pro
One of the biggest rumours before and right up until the E3 2021 Nintendo Direct was that a Switch Pro was going to be revealed with plenty of credible sources but nothing ever came of it. Nintendo has been riding a streak of success since the release of the Switch back in 2017 and one thing that seems likely is that they will continue to follow in the pattern of what has been working.
Back in July 2019, Nintendo revealed their handheld exclusive Switch Lite. Less than a month before this reveal Nintendo had their E3 2019 conference and there wasn’t any mention of a new system coming. They revealed Luigis Mansion 3, Links Awakening, an Animal Crossing deep dive, and we got our first teaser for the Breath of the Wild sequel.
This leads me to believe that Switch Pro still has a strong possibility of landing this year based on their behaviour with the Switch at this point. The component shortages that have been caused by the pandemic might alter this plan pushing it back into 2022 as well as many of the titles that are planned for 2021 releases don’t seem like they would be a flagship title to truly display why you need to purchase a Switch Pro. Its likely that a title like Metroid Prime 4, Breath of the Wild 2 or the next 3D Mario would be able to fully display the capability of the improved hardware. All three of those titles have a strong chance at landing in 2022.
Sales of the Switch and the Switch Lite have been selling very strongly over four years into the life cycle of the Switch having sold over 84 million as of March 31, 2021. The Switch is likely on its way to becoming the best selling Nintendo console of all time and while improved hardware would be a nice jolt to sales it might not be required just yet.
When speaking with The Washington Post, Doug Bowser said “We are always looking at technology and how it can enhance gameplay experiences. It’s not technology for technology’s sake. Whats the right gameplay experience with that? Theres a host of factors that go into it and its something we are always looking at” this statement sounds like it could be released at any time but reading between the lines it will launch alongside a title that can show off the improvements.
Nintendo’s Future Looks Bright
This wasn’t the best Nintendo Direct of all time, but what was shown was promising. It’s promising to see Nintendo return to some of their beloved, forgotten IP whether with a remake in the case of Advance Wars or with a completely new entry in the case of Metroid Dread and Wario Ware. It’s promising that Nintendo will give the same treatment to some of their other IP that may have fallen out of favour over the years like F-Zero, Wave Race, and Earthbound just to name a few. It’s also extremely promising that they made a lot of people happy with this Nintendo Direct without a lot of their top tier franchises, which bodes well for an amazing next few years on the Switch.
Bayonetta 3, Metroid Prime 4, New 3D Mario title, BOTW2, Donkey Kong, Mario Kart and that is just naming a few of the more household names. Considering that Nintendo isn’t making games for the 3DS anymore, it seems that it may have taken a few years of development to shift completely to the Switch. Heading into 2022, we may be about to enter the best few years the Switch has to offer and considering how good to great most years have been, this is exciting.