© NintendoNobody can deny that Nintendo had a enormously success in 2020. With operating profits at 98%, Animal Crossing: New Horizons reaching 31 million sales and 87% of the console market in Japan, the company’s recent financial report confirmed that extremely well lately.
Despite this, we don’t hear much about the next line of software for 2021. Super Mario 3D World + Bowser’s Fury is coming next week and New Pokémon Snap is released in April, but – outside Bravely Default II (which is being published outside Japan) – Nintendo’s current plans seem rather hollow.
Discussing these financial results during a conference call, an issue was raised about Nintendo’s software plans for the next fiscal year. In response to this, Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa confirmed:
Our software line for the next fiscal year is a topic that we will discuss at the appropriate time. We already announced our plans to launch Super Mario 3D World + Bowser Fury in February, followed by MONSTER HUNTER RISE in March (see note 1), and New Pokémon Snap in April (see note 2). As always, we are preparing a variety of software titles for consumers in the coming fiscal year.
In other words, we will have to wait and see. Nintendo does not normally announce its upcoming games much in advance – with a few rare exceptions – so this is not an unexpected response from Furukawa. For now, however, it seems unlikely that we will hear anything new yet.
Is there anything you expect to see in 2021? Share your opinion in the comments below.