All right folks, this is it, time to distribute Eternal Glory. Let's find out whose crystal balls were the least foggy this year!
First up is
Luigi Dude. After scoring 5th and 7th, will this be the year of the Dude?
1. Metroid Prime 4 will finally have a reveal trailer, but then be listed as a 2023 release.
2. A remake of a previous Fire Emblem game will be released later this year.
3. The rumored Toyko EAD Donkey Kong game will come out later this year.
4. Xenoblade 3 will be announced but will have a 2023 release date.
5. The rumors now say there was never a Metroid Prime Trilogy HD but instead Retro has been remastering the first Metroid Prime. There seems to be enough smoke coming from this that I'll say Metroid Prime 1 will be coming to the Switch this year. Whether it's considered a remake or remaster, Switch owners will at least get to play the first Prime game this year.
6. Pikmin 4 will finally be revealed.
7. Good Feel will make a new Wario Land game again.
8. A new 2D Zelda using the Links Awakening remake engine will be revealed, but will have a 2013 release date.
9. A new 2D Mario will be revealed this year and will be their big Spring 2013 game. Nintendo is probably hoping the Mario movie at the end of this year will be a huge hit, and will want the first new 2D Mario in a decade to come out shortly after in March of 2013.
10. Wind Waker HD and Twilight Princess HD will either be announced in the next few months and be out by June, or they won't come out until at least second half of 2023. Breath of the Wild 2 will be Nintendo's big holiday title but they don't want to risk any thing similar taking attention away, so if they don't come out at least 6 months before Breath of the Wild 2, it'll be 6 months after. This is the same reason I believe the rumored Xenoblade 3 will be a 2023 release, since I doubt Nintendo wants another one of their open world games taking any attention from Zelda and if Xenoblade 3 was going to come out in the first half of this year it would have probably been announced by now.
- Xenoblade 3 was indeed announced in 2022 (during the February Direct), but released just months later. ½ point
- Pikmin 4 was indeed revealed! 1 point
Total: 1½ points. Lot of ambitious calls, Fire Emblem is an unfortunate one with it being both a new game but also remixing elements from past titles. The Mario Movie delay also threw a spanner in the works, and it's very unlucky you went big on Zelda during the one year they break their "a Zelda product releases annually" cycle.
Next up is the sophomore effort from
TOPHATANT123,
- The Legend of Zelda Breath of the Wild 2 is NOT coming out this year. It's been moved back to the launch of the Switch 2
- Speaking of the Switch 2, it's going to be announced at E3, with one of its features being backwards compatibility.
- Metroid Dread gets a DLC expansion, again, I don't play it either.
- Xenoblade 3 gets announced and released, it's got a whole new art style for the characters, different from 1, X & 2.
- A brand new Fire Emblem releases, not a remake. Releases in the 2nd half of the year, after E3.
- A port with new content for NES Remix.
- I want to try and guess some new IPs with these next few. So let's go with an Intelligent Systems developed puzzle game with multiplayer.
- Under represented genres on Switch? Let's say Nintendo put out an eShop only, 2D platformer roguelike game.
- Nintendo release some internally developed visual novel, beautiful art style. The phrase "passion project" is used in the marketing material. Doesn't chart once on the US eShop monthly listings.
- Lastly let's say some cool rhythm game that's a new franchise, not Rhythm Heaven or Band Brothers or Donkey Konga or something.
- Zelda was indeed delayed, although we don't know if this is Switch 2 related. ½ point
- Metroid Dread did indeed get DLC, albeit a boss rush and difficulty modes. Hopefully you didn't play it, so you can cash this 1 points
- Xenoblade 3 is indeed announced and released. Not sure if I'd call the art style very different, so let's say ½ point
- Fire Emblem Engage is a new game, but not out this year. Don't think you meant to count Fire Emblem Warriors 2 either so let's say ½ point
TOTAL: 2½ points Bit of a safe year for Nintendo, with mostly iterative releases, so that really hinders your score.
Up next is, well, myself:
Don't have a lot of great ideas this year, but here's what I got:
- Nintendo will port one first-party GameCube or Wii game to mobile, charge $40 for it, and be flabbergasted when it doesn't sell.
- Castlevania: Symphony of the Night gets ported to Switch, but something significant is wrong with it. Could be technical performance, or maybe it's always-online, or has weird microtransactions, idk.
- Splatoon 3 releases in Summer and becomes a Really Big Deal. It gets some kind of professional league in Japan.
- NSO N64 adds the following games: Lode Runner 3-D, Tetrisphere, and Hybrid Heaven.
- People will hope for a new Mario game alongside the movie, but Mario+Rabbids 2 gets that holiday spot instead.
- A new Kingdom Hearts spin-off is announced exclusively for Switch.
- Netflix Game Studios publishes a Squid Game themed battle royale thing on Switch/mobile/other platforms.
- Bandai-Namco resurrects Lost Reavers and somehow gets Nintendo to sign off on adding various character skins. I'm thinking Captain Falcon and Princess Zelda maybe?
- Koei-Techmo announces Fatal Frame 6 for Halloween 2023, Nintendo's involvement remains unclear.
- Hollow Knight Silksong is announced as a timed Xbox Game Pass exclusive, Nintendo fans riot on Twitter.
- Splatoon 3 released in Summer and was a big deal, but I haven't heard about it becoming an eSport. ½ point
- Koei-Tecmo did announce a Fatal Frame for 2023, but it's a remake and Nintendo seems fairly uninvolved. ½ point
TOTAL:
1 point, oof. Was pretty close with my Mario + Rabbids 2 prediction but missed by a month, and also the movie got delayed. Ditto on Hollow Knight, but went too specific.
Next up, the beating pulse of the forum and overall reigning predictions champ
M.K. Ultra:
Here we go 2022
- Breath of the Wild 2 launches in Summer 2022, Bayonetta 3 launches in Fall 2022
- Kirby is delayed to Summer 2022, Splatoon 3 is delayed to 2023
- A third Game in Watch is released (Metroid themed) edit 2/3/2022 Kirby themed
- Metroid Prime 4 trailer with 2023 release window
- Mario Paint is revived in some way
- A new Donkey Kong game from Good Feel is announced edit: It's all mine cart levels
- Xenoblade 3 (or X 2) is announced from Monolith Soft
- No (non-Pokemon) mobile games are released by Nintendo in 2023
- I will double down on last year's failed prediction for a Switch release of the Battletoads reboot
- Nintendo will launch the first round of Nintendo Selects titles for Switch
- Right on the money with Bayonetta, but the dual-prediction costs you. ½ point
- XB3 right on the money. 1 point
- Another one with the mobile games. 1 point
TOTAL: 2½ points. Another strong showing from M.K. Ultra, who leaps to a shared 1st place so far. Will they hold onto it...?
Moving on to the loremaster
Evan_BBreath of the Wild 2 is 2022. It happens. The world is changed for the better.
Xenoblade 3 is announced for 2023.
Metroid Prime gets a trailer but no release year/date. Make us suffer.
Some stupid platformer gets made that is very milquetoast.
Nintendo experiments with roguelike design, or at the very least, Pokemon releases a Rumble game using the mechanics.
- Some stupid platformer in a year with just two Kirby games, and one of them being good. I'm gonna count ½ point for Dream Buffet for including platform elements and supposedly being quite milquetoast indeed.
TOTAL: ½ point, unlucky with the Zelda and Xenoblade 3 predictions both falling the other way. Nintendo
should make a roguelike, maybe that could be Star Fox's next genre change?
Let's hear from last year's shared 3rd place,
Nickmitch:
- Detective Pikachu finally comes out. I think this year offers the most room for that game to breathe. With Legends Arceus out soon, I don't think we get Gen IX this year, so it's that or Johto re-remakes. And I think Detective Pikachu 2 is more likely. The other option is DLC for SwSh or Legends.
- Splatoon 3 is delayed to 2023. I think the game is due for a delay.
- Metroid Prime 4 happens in trailer form.
- Breath of the Wild 2 is the big holiday release.
- We got Wario Ware last year, so the party game for 2022 is Rhythm Heaven.
- I know there are rumors of new hardware, but I'll say no new hardware announcements this year. The Switch is doing great, and the supply chain is not. I think Nintendo would want Switch sales to peter out a little more.
- There will be at least one HD remake of a GameCube game released on Switch this year. I think Nintendo would want to explore HD ports over putting games on NSO, and I base that opinion on absolutely nothing. I will also count this as a win if the Zelda port rumors are true.
- Might as well dust this one off: Bayonetta 3 is the Halloween release.
- I think there's been enough time for a new Donkey Kong game to be announced. I'm not confident enough to predict who's developing.
- I think I want my wildcard to be either Chibi Robo or Pikmin. So, I'll go with a Chibo Robo announcement this year.
- Correct on the no new hardware front, unless we count the Splatoon and Pokémon OLED themed editions (which we don't). 1 point
- Bayo 3 for halloween let's go. 1 point
TOTAL: 2 points. Unlucky with the Chibi-Robo/Pikmin coin-flip. Pokémon gen 9 probably
should have been delayed, but 10 million units sold say differently...It's also a year in which Nintendo released zero remakes/remasters (I guess Live-A-Live kinda qualifies), so that didn't help Nickmitch either. Still, a respectable haul of points!
Adrock is back from hiatus, let's see if they meant business:
- A new Mario game will be released in December to coincide with the movie. It will have nothing to do with the movie.
- Nintendo will acknowledge Metroid Prime 4's development without mentioning a release date then charge full price for a Metroid Prime remaster. This is very specifically not Metroid Prime Trilogy. (I’ll begrudgingly buy it anyway)
- Nintendo will also charge full price for a remaster of Metroid: Samus Returns.
- Splatoon 3 will be released in the Summer.
- Bayonetta 3 will be released in October. PlatinumGames will justify Hellena Taylor not returning as as the main character because you play as Cereza even though canonically Cereza is Bayonetta. Taylor cameo at the end and to voice grunts and screams for Bayonetta as an unlockable character.
- The follow up to Breath of the Wild will be delayed. It won't be a sequel to Breath of the Wild.
- A multiplayer Legend of Zelda will be released for free on Nintendo Switch Online, $19.99 USD to play local/offline.
- A bunch of Rare games will show up on Nintendo Switch Online including GoldenEye 007. There will be cross-platform online play with the inevitable Xbox Live version.
- Some weird gimmick peripheral like Labo or Ring Fit Adventure with an accompanying game will be released. Either no one will care or everyone will.
- I need something outlandish so something something F-Zero something, developed by the Mario Kart team.
EDIT: clarified #9. Also, I wanted to add a prediction not about a release (outside of the numbered list): Nintendo will acknowledge a Switch successor then release no other information. Waiting out the chip shortages before committing to new hardware seems like a more Nintendo thing to do.
- Splatoon 3 release you had nailed on. 1 point
- Bayo 3 completely correct too, although the circumstances around the voice actor change were harder to follow. Still easily 1 point
- ½ point for the Zelda delay, but it does kinda seem like a sequel
- Very good shout on the Rare games coming to NSO. Banjo-Kazooie appeared, and Goldeneye 007 was announced but did not release. ½ point
TOTAL: 3 points, rocketing to the top of the charts so far! Will Adrock still be surpassed?
Newcomer
MrGlubGlub is here to mess y'all UpUp.
Here's my predictions purely for the first half of 2022 aka the Nintendo Direct for feb 2022
1) F-Zero
2) Kirby 99 style game
3) Mario Odyssey 2
4) Zelda 2 remake
5) Content updates to Mario Kart Live, Pokemon Arceus
6) More weird cloud ports of games too intense for Switches hardware.
7) BOTW 2 release date
Kirby Game and Watch
- Kirby Dream Buffet kinda counts as a battle royale I think. ½ point
- A Plague Tale: Requiem was this year's perfunctory cloud release. 1 point
- BOTW 2 did indeed get a release date, but not in the February Direct I believe? ½ point
TOTAL: 2 points! Very solid first showing, bit unlucky on the Mario Kart Live call when they instead spent the entire year rolling out updates for the previous Mario Kart.
I'm going to predict that we'll see a remake of the second set of Pokémon Mystery Dungeon games this year. The Pokémon Company is blatantly milking nostalgia from that era of the series and those games did get some references in BDSP as well.
Oh and BOTW2 will be delayed to 2023
- Pokémon Company were too busy rushing Scarlet/Violet out, so just the BOTW 2 delay here. 1 point
TOTAL: 1 point. Bit of a letdown after last year's solid 2½ points, but in fairness your hit ratio is basically 50% this year.
-The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 will release this year! Probably in November. "Oh, so you're spouting that nonsense again."
-Some sort of new Fire Emblem game will be announced this year, but may not be for release this year. "Yeah and it'll probably still be for you filthy casuals."
-Possibly in celebration of its 30th anniversary, some sort of new Mario Kart release will be announced. "This is at least the 30th time you've said something stupid."
-Super Mario Odyssey 2 baybee it's still gonna happen you'll see! "Do you enjoy embarrassing yourself?"
-We'll finally see footage of Metroid Prime 4 but still no release window, or maybe a vague 2023. "A vaguely sane prediction."
-Some sort of new game as an NSO exclusive (like Tetris and Pac-Man 99), possibly needing the expansion to play. "Your mind needs expansion."
-Crazy guess: something Star Fox-related will be announced. "Cocky little freak."
-Monolith Soft will announced a new game. Probably Xenoblade, but may not be called "Xenoblade Chronicles 3."
-Another HD port of a Wii game, no guesses as to what it could be though. "Wii Port"
-No new Switch models or a successor will be released nor announced this year. "A shortage of brains too it seems."
-Call of Duty finally comes to Switch in some form or another. "Heh heh, heh heh, you said doody, heh heh."
-At least one more port of a Wii U game, could even be the Xenoblade game mentioned earlier with Xenoblade X. "X is such a cool letter."
-At least one more apology for Joy-Con drift. "Your mind is clearing drifting."
-Game Boy added to NSO expansion at the end of the year, no GBC functionality. "I'm colorblind anyway."
-Microsoft finds a way to buy Nintendo, probably for $100 billion. USD, so whatever that is in yen. "You heard it here first folks!"
-Mop it up wins the award for "lamest poster ever" on the NWR forums. "Finally an accurate prediction."
- Oh yeah, I guess if the pattern holds, Next Level Games is due for a new game soon eh? I'll boldly state that they're working on a new Donkey Kong game!
- Correct on Fire Emblem, and it's already seeing complaints about being too casual too! 1 point
- Mario Kart 8 did get new content, but the anniversary was not highlighted. ½ point
- MonolithSoft did release a new Xenoblade, but it was called XC3 after all. ½ point
- No new Switch hardware. 1 point
- Next-Level did release a new game, but it's soccer instead of DK. ½ point
TOTAL: 4 points! Very close with Wii Port, but Wii (s)Port(s) got a sequel instead. [EDIT: whoops forgot about Kirby, added half a point.] We did get Phil Spencer mumbling about a Calladoody Switch deal if only those pesky regulators let him complete the biggest deal in this industry ever.
Also a big whiff on MopItUp being the worst poster, that prediction was way off the mark.
Speaking of the worst poster, here's
Safe Khushrenada:
Safe Khushrenada
1. Nintendo will finally talk about the Switch Successor, their next gaming system, and when it will launch.
2. Games will be shown for the Switch Successor including Mario Kart 9 with BotW2 also to release on it.
3. Earthbound will finally be released for the Switch SNES Online app.
4. Nintendo will release three non-Smash (or Monster Hunter) Amiibo figures for the year.
5. More DLC will be available for free to those with the Online Expansion + subscription.
6. A spinoff Pokemon game will revealed and released this year.
7. Metroid Prime 4 footage will finally be shown.
8. A new Xenoblade game will be revealed.
9. A Fire Emblem game will be revealed.
10. There will be a new Mario platformer game released this year.
- Early get with Earthbound way back in February. 1 point
- Exactly 3 Monster Hunter amiibo did release. 1 point
- Splatoon 2 Octo Expansion got added to NSO+ so that's also 1 point
- Xenoblade, check 1 point
- Fire Emblem, check 1 point
TOTAL: 5 points. Big score for Safe Khushrenada, once again proving how safe and dull predictions are the way to victory.
If only we got more daring prediction from people like...
Bold Khushrenada:
Bold Khushrenada
1. Game Freak reveals and releases a non-Pokemon IP game.
2. Two new Nintendo IP’s are revealed with one released this year.
3. Ring Fit Adventure gets some DLC content.
4. Another non-Nintendo System is added to the Expansion + subscription
5. Goldeneye 64 is released on the Switch N64 app with online multiplayer.
6. Ever Oasis gets a Switch port.
7. Style Savvy has a game released on the Switch.
8. A new Donkey Kong game is revealed.
9. Super Mario Strikers gets a new entry.
10. A Mario RPG is revealed for the Switch.
- Mario Striker is a bingo. 1 point
- GoldenEye got announced, but not released. ½ point
TOTAL: 1½ point. See, this is much more like it. Finally a respectable poster. Get out of here with those winners, 2022 was all about madness!
Speaking of
Madness...
Madness Khushrenada
1. Pikmin 4 is revealed and released.
2. SNES Remix (a sequel to the NES Remix games) is released.
3. A Zelda Mobile game is announced.
4. A Star Fox game is released this year.
5. Fortune Street gets a new entry for the Switch.
6. Paper Mario: The Thousand Year Door is re-released.
7. Ice Climbers get a new game.
8. The Switch successor has a second screen on the controllers
9. Chibi-Robo returns from the grave and has a game release on the eShop
10. F-Zero Demolition Derby (a sort of Battle Royale)
- Pikmin 4 got announced but not released. ½ point
TOTAL: ½ point. Rounding out a mad year with some mad points for a mad last place. Happy new year.
Whew, that's all our entries done & dusted.
Congratulations to Safe Khushrenada for the most boring victory of all, next time I'm disqualifying you for submitting late though. Big congrats to Mop It Up for another close-but-not-quite victory.
2022 LEADERBOARD:Safe Khushrenada: 5 points [WINNER]
Mop It Up: 4 points [RUNNER-UP]
Adrock: 3 points [BRONZE MEDAL]
M.K. Ultra: 2½ points
Tophatant123: 2½ points
MrGlubGlub: 2 points
Nickmitch: 2 points
Bold Khushrenada: 1½ point
Luigi Dude: 1½ point
Pokepal148: 1 point
Order.RSS: 1 point
Evan_B: ½ point
Madness Khushrenada: ½ point
And finally, here's what the combined leaderboard of the past 3 years looks like.
Lifetime achievements ranking:M.K. Ultra: 15 points
Nickmitch: 11½ points
Mop It Up: 9½ points
Luigi Dude: 7 points
MASB: 6 points
Khushrenada: 5½ points
Stratos: 5½ points
TopHatAnt: 5 points
Safe Khushrenada: 5 points
Order.RSS: 5 points
Insanolord: 4 points
Adrock: 3½ points
Pokepal: 3½ points
MrGlubGlub: 2 points
Oedo: 2 points
Bold Khushrenada: 1½ point
Lemonade: 1 point
Fawful: 1 point
Broodwars: ½ point
Evan_B: ½ point
Kairon: ½ point
Madness Khushrenada: ½ point
Shaymin: ½ point