 So, look, there are some things we could be talking about today in regards to Nintendo, right? There's a fake 4chan leak running around for Nintendo Switch 2, talking about the T254 chip or something. I don't know. It's completely made up and not actually in any of Nvidia's documentation. And it happens to pretty much have this pipe dream wishy-washy, pretty much mobile 4090 in your Nintendo Switch 2, kind of a crazy, crazy out there thing pipe dreamy that some people are talking about today. But I don't really want to talk about that because I just, look, it's 4chan and it's so pipe dreamy that it's clearly fake. But there are other things being talked about today as well, such as the fact that, hey, Thousand Year Door has this frame rate halved from the original release. It's running at 30 FPS, not 60 FPS. And while it includes a number of impressive things, it doesn't have anti-aliasing and we might bring that up in a moment. But what I really want to focus on is the future of Nintendo and what this Nintendo Direct to me signified. Now, it's fine if you disagree with me. Of course, we are talking about opinions here and we're all free to put our Analyzation hats on and speculate in many different directions on what this Nintendo Direct meant if anything. Now this was a Direct that was targeted just for Nintendo Switch with games through winter, although they still did that thing where, hey, some of the games are outside of winter, right? Luigi's Mansion 2 HD, notice they dropped Dark Moon from the title. An interesting choice. That's coming in summer. That was outside of the window. And then obviously games like Thousand Year Door that was announced at the end just has a blanket 2024 date probably coming in the second half of 2024. I do want to dive into what this Direct to me signified, why I personally wasn't that excited about the Direct but I am excited for you folks out there that are super pumped. There's a lot of you guys out there, especially for Thousand Year Door. I get it. It is one of the goat of goat games. But before I dive in, I just want to remind you, we are on our road to 150,000 subscribers. So I'd appreciate if you hit that like button, subscribe to the channel and wrangling that dingling to be notified of all notifications. All right. So I want to first look at this from the perspective of Nintendo has new hardware coming. I think this is something that some people live in denial of because Nintendo hasn't made some sort of reveal of this hardware. They haven't even talked about things like NX. They mentioned NX themselves as Nintendo, but Nintendo already actually referenced new hardware back in 2021. It was at an investor's meeting and they talked about the future of Nintendo accounts and how they are going to be forward compatible to the next dedicated gaming hardware coming out in 20XX. You guys have probably seen this chart many times. If you haven't, here it is, you know, it's like definitive proof that Nintendo literally said in 2021 they were working on new hardware. Just no idea when it's coming out. They didn't want to set any expectations. Nintendo has also stopped calling the switch in the middle of its life cycle. They actually stopped doing this almost two years ago at this point. So yeah, if it's been outside of the middle of its life cycle for a couple of years that already tells you, well, that probably means we're on the tail end. And then in addition to that, they have answered questions on hardware by saying, well, we're always working on new hardware, which is the blanket company statement that yeah, they're always working on something new. So if you want to live in denial that Nintendo is working on their next generation platform, working on new hardware, that is your personal choice. But I understand you probably felt burned by all the Switch Pro reports and rumors that existed back in 2019, 2020. And ultimately, we ended up just getting Switch OLED at the end of all of that. So I understand the frustration. But look, we have all the reports out there that are coming from developers, coming from Gamescom. We're likely about to get another slew of reports in about two weeks or so coming out of Tokyo Game Show, right? Tokyo Game Show is coming up. It happens next week. And probably about a week or two after Tokyo Game Show, we're going to get some reports out of there. They'll probably bring, if I assume, the same demos to Tokyo Game Show. But since it will be Nintendo of Japan showing it off, there is that potential of maybe even more information getting out there on this system coming from the Japanese developers. So there is high potential, obviously, for more information on the system to come out. One thing that is very, very clear is that the next system is coming. Nintendo has talked about the fact they're working on new hardware. They have mentioned that Nintendo accounts are forward compatible. We obviously have all the developer reports coming out. And then on top of all of that, stuff for manufacturing was coming out earlier this year as well. And we haven't have like some spec details, right? 8-inch LCD screen coming from Video Game Chronicle and everyone else seemed to corroborate that. The idea of a 3D Mario being the launch game doesn't really sound that far fetched. It's probably what we expect. And then on top of all of that, well, guess what? The Nintendo Switch is declining in sales. It is down year over year in software and hardware sales. And I know you can point it to the Kingdom and point to Mario Wonder and talk about how this software sales are still incredible. And on an individual game basis, even Pikmin 4, that is absolutely true. Overall software sales are down year over year. This is just a fact. It's not something I'm pulling out of a rabbit. You can look at Nintendo's financial reports for yourself to verify, yeah, sales are down year over year. So what does this really mean? It means that Nintendo is transitioning, right? They're planning to release some piece of new hardware, whether you want to call it another mid-gen refresh that we never got or you want to call it their next generation system. They're going to be transitioning to something more powerful and something different at some point in 2024. And to me, that's what this Nintendo Direct signified. This is the first Nintendo Direct that I could find. I went back through the entire Switch era of Directs even and then a little bit before. So some of the Wii U era, bit of the 3DS. And this is the first Direct I could spot that Nintendo did not announce a brand new published game. Now, they announced new games coming, ports and remasters. And technically, if you want to throw it out there, F-099 is not a prior existing game. And yes, they are putting that on Nintendo Switch Online. So you could argue that that is the new game. But they're not really publishing it. It's a free game being added to a service. It is not something that you can actually purchase individually and own. And that obviously means it's also temporary. Those that don't know, Pac-Man 99 leaves in October. This is the replacement game for Pac-Man 99. Why they keep making these 99 or Mario 35 games temporary beats me. The only one that really stuck around because it got released outside of NSO was Tetris. It's whatever. The point is that there wasn't a new published game that we could purchase coming from Nintendo outside of, yes, the Super Peach game. But again, they announced that, you know, the Super Peach game. Why do I call it? It's got a name now. Princess Peach Showtime, right? That game, by the way, looks incredible. Can we just talk about that for a hot minute? Man, Princess Peach Showtime looks way better than I ever expected it to. It still sort of gives me vibes of like a Yoshi Woolly World sort of game in that it's probably going to be fairly easy, but also extremely fun. And I can't wait to dive into that one. But again, it's more of a side dish. I wouldn't really call that a, you know, AAA game from Nintendo. So when we're looking at this, and by the way, that was announced in June. So that wasn't a new announcement. The title was a new announcement, but the game itself existing. That was announced back in June. Mario Wonder made a brief appearance at a sizzle reel. Again, announced back in June. There wasn't anything new announced in this one, which is weird, because Nintendo typically announced two brand new games every September. And they didn't do that this time. It said they announced more ports and remasters. And look, for me personally, I don't really replay a lot of games. I beat the hell out of a thousand year door back in the day. In fact, I think I've beaten that game like three times. It's literally one of them. I'm going to be honest. It's one of the top 10 games Nintendo's ever made. Like, I'm just, I'm going to be frank. The game is utterly amazing. And I am so happy for not only people that do replay games. I'm so excited for people that get to deep dive into this game again, that are really excited for it. And yeah, visually, it looks great. I'm also excited for people that are going to play it for the first time. You know, all the Paper Mario fans that really came on from the Wii on forward, I'm excited that they're going to get to experience this for the first time. I fully suspect this game itself, two, two and a half million, maybe more. We'll have to wait and see. It depends on when it releases and what else is releasing around the same time. Because again, we don't know. It's just some time next year. I am excited for that game existing. I'm not excited for it personally. And if you eliminate an excitement for that, what am I left with? Well, maybe the most exciting new announcement was actually Unicorn Overlord. And that wasn't from Nintendo. It's a third party game. But Unicorn Overlord to me looks absolutely fantastic. If you don't even remember what that game is, it's probably just because you remember this game that at first reminded you of Fire Emblem and it looked really, really good. But you don't remember the name because the name doesn't seem to line up with what you were watching. Like why the hell is this game called Unicorn Overlord? I don't know. It's one of those things you probably have to play the game to understand the context of the title. But I'm just looking at Nintendo and what they announced. And look, we have Donkey Kong. More sorry, Mario versus Donkey Kong got to put it in the direct order. But that's again, it's a remake slash remaster of a Game Boy Advance game. It's not a new game. And they didn't even show off new content in it. So I look at everything that we got. And outside of the port of the, well, I guess the remastered port of the Wii game coming from Japan. We didn't really get anything that tickles my fancy from Nintendo themselves. So for me, it really wasn't that great of a direct. That's why I gave it a grade C. I predicted it was going to be a grade C. Even though I wanted Metroid Prime 4 and stuff to be here, that was in my predictions video. There was my predictions and then there's my realistic expectations. My expectations were a C direct. And I felt like that's exactly what we got. And that doesn't necessarily make it a bad direct. What it did to me is signify Nintendo is transitioning. The Nintendo Switch 2 is coming. Whether you want to admit it or not, whether you want to live in denial or not, it's coming. It could come as soon as March. It could be summer next year. It could be fall. It could be obviously holiday season. The Nintendo Switch 2 is coming. Nintendo is not going to continue to allow their system to lose momentum. They're also not going to just carry the system for years on end with ports and remasters of GameCube games. It's just not going to happen. Nintendo is obviously making a lot of brand new video games, but they are waiting for a platform to put it on. And when we think logically about it, this might be why Metroid Prime 4 wasn't here. Because Metroid Prime 4 could become a cross generation title between Switch and Switch 2. Now no, I'm not saying a launch game. I think it would be a mistake to make Metroid Prime 4 the definitive launch game. I don't think that that would be... It can't do a Breath of the Wild then. I just think it's too risky for Nintendo to risk a series that's never sold more than 3 million... Well, slightly more than 3 million copies with Metroid Dread. I think it's way too risky to make that a definitive launch game for Switch 2. But I do think it'll come out a few months in. I'm starting to agree with my dear friend, I'll just restart. That it'll probably be maybe that Splatoon 2 slot that we saw on Switch. Remember Splatoon 2 came out a few months after launch? I could see this being a few months after launch, except it's also still on Switch. Maybe. There is a small potential that they decided to make it Switch 2 exclusive. I don't know if that's the choice they made. And there'll be a lot of Switch owners really mad, but what are you going to do? Nintendo is going to make whatever decision they think is in the best interest of the game. But I just sit back. And the way this Direct sets up, if you just look at it, we have the another code slash trace memory combo, the WDS combo coming in, what is it? January, right? We obviously have the Donkey Kong vs Mario or Mario vs Donkey Kong, GBA remake landing in February. And then, yeah, we got our only brand new game announced for next year, that is Princess Peach Showtime coming in March. And then it's summer and I don't know. If you look at the Nintendo 3DS, there's a lot of interesting correlations that were happening as they launched Switch and as Switch continued to exist. And that is that there was a high reliance on a bunch of IPs being ported and remastered. Mario and Luigi, right? You know, Mario Party Superstars was sort of a new one. But the point is that they put out a lot of, like, new, but not new games, right? Metroid, you know, was that Metroid Prime 2? Samus Returns? Like, they had a lot of correlations in how they handled 3DS eventually stop being made and obviously assuming everyone who wants to play handheld owns a Switch. I see a similar transition happening here, where Nintendo is just so reliant on ports and remasters that Switch 2 is going to come out before some of the games they showed in this Direct come out. Can we, look, I don't know this as a fact, but if I had to make a bet and sometimes I do like to bet, I would bet a significant chunk of money that the Nintendo Switch 2 comes out before the entire slate of games that they outlined for Nintendo Switch even release. Look, you can call that a risky bet if you want. I don't actually think it's that risky. Thousand-Year Door is just randomly sometime in 2024. There's no hint at when it's coming. I mean, I hope it's not delayed out in 2024. That would be weird, but to me, this is just what's happening. And so if you were let down by this Direct, it's not necessarily a bad thing. I think the first half of next year, a lot of exciting things are going to happen. We're going to still have a Direct, I feel. We're probably going to have the unveiling of a brand new system, a major event for that brand new system, maybe even the launch of that brand new system. So if you were let down by this Direct, I think it's just accepting that Nintendo is in a transitionary phase. And if you weren't let down, then none of this really matters. Whether a new system is coming or not, you're super excited by all the games coming out. You're probably going to buy a lot of them. I've seen people say, oh man, there's like over $300 worth of stuff I'm going to buy out of this. And that is incredible. And I'm so happy for you. For me, it's basically, look, I'm going to get Super Mario RPG because I actually didn't play that when I was a kid. So for me, that's a fun new experience. It's not something I'm replaying. It's something I'm experiencing for the first time. Mario Wonder, obviously, but again, I'm not trying to give the Direct really credit for these games. So it's basically the Super Princess Peach game, which again was a credit to the June Direct. And then I'll probably end up picking up the Unicorn Overlord game. So for me, it wasn't much. I want to though, not just know what you guys think about the Direct, right? Obviously, I want your comments down below. I also know I want to know your thoughts on Thousand Year Door. I have a feeling, and this is something I'm just attaching on the end, that Thousand Year Door may be a cross-gen situation. And what do I mean by that? Well, it's slated to come out sometime next year, right? We don't know when. And the game is halved in frame rates. I have this idea that if they have a version of it on the Nintendo Switch 2, that they're going to use DLSS with it. And that's where you're going to get your full 60 FPS. That's where you're going to get your anti-aliasing enabled. And that's where you're going to see even higher resolutions. And who knows, maybe a ray tracing in that bad boy? I mean, look, the lighting and everything looks incredible as is. Well, maybe it could look even better. So I'm just throwing out there that I have this gut feeling, like just deep inside the Thousand Year Door, maybe a cross-gen thing. Which I mean, look, the system's backwards compatible. It's sort of a mute point if it is cross-gen anyways. But backwards compatibility is still not a for sure thing. And hopefully we get clarity on that when Nintendo announces it. So let me know what you think about this down in the comments below. Again, I don't want to rain on everyone's parade, and I think this is the worst direct ever. Oh my, this is not. I just want to have this conversation on, even though I was a little disappointed, and some of you guys might have been even more disappointed, that it's not necessarily a bad thing. Because something's coming in this direct, to me, was like the nail in the coffin that, yeah, Switch's time's coming to an end, and that next thing's coming much sooner than many of us expected. I am Nathaniel Rovelljans from Nintendo Prime, and I'll catch you in the next video.