During Nintendo’s last financial report, President Shuntaro Furukawa spoke about Nintendo’s next-gen console and how far it is.
Nintendo has for years beaten at his own pace, not really keeping up with the rest of the industry, and doing his own thing. Nintendo’s latest financial report shed light on the company’s future plans for the next generation, and people expecting a new console soon should lower their expectations.
With the launch of the PS5 and Xbox Series X / S last year, the gaming community naturally turned its attention to Nintendo to see what its next step was. Earlier this year, Nintendo unveiled the Switch OLED, which features some general improvements over the original console, especially with its display, but it’s certainly not the much-used (and desired) Switch Pro. Other aspects of the Switch, like the growing propensity for cloud-based games like Dying Light 2 and the recent guardians of the galaxy, along with the general lack of features still lacking in the system, has fans hoping for a new system sooner rather than later. Despite this, the Nintendo Switch continues to break sales records, gradually approaching the 101 million units of the Wii.
During Nintendo’s last financial report, questions were asked about the successor console to the Switch, with Nintendo providing some insightful information. David Gibson, co-founder of Astris Advisory Japan KK, shared highlights from the Q&A section of the presentation. To the question “What can you say about the next generation 20xx device?” Gibson writes the response from Nintendo President Shuntaro Furukawa, “Nothing can be said, Switch thinks it’s in the mid-cycle, now has OLED and the momentum continues with a wide variety of software.” The response continues in another tweet: “On the next gen, we’re not saying right now, we’re still in internal discussion about the concept, timeline, etc. and discussing everything.”
The aforementioned “next-gen 20xx device†refers to a slide from Nintendo’s presentation outlining the company’s future prospects. This graph presents an odd timeline showing the Nintendo DS and the Wii with the years 2004 and 2006, before jumping to the Nintendo Switch of 2017. Beyond the Switch is the ambiguous “next game system” with a time of “20xx” Which means there is at least one new console concept in development. However, the point of this slide is not just the new console, but the way Nintendo is trying to expand its IP through its physical offerings (new consoles and games) and digital services (Nintendo accounts and subscriptions).
This news is both exciting and disheartening for those invested in the future of Nintendo. While confirmation of a new console being considered confirms at least another generation of Nintendo magic, the fact that Furukawa thinks the Switch is only halfway through its cycle will disappoint some. At least they won’t have to try and buy a new console anytime soon, given how difficult it is to acquire video game hardware during the pandemic. It will be interesting to see how long fans have to wait before anyway. Nintendo officially unveils its next console.
Read more
About the Author
Comments are closed.