Nintendo’s Digital Event this year was, in a word, disappointing. While still miles better than the debacle that was Nintendo’s 2008 E3 Press Conference, this year featured a distinct lack of hard hitting reveals. The takeaway from this year? Wait for 2016. However, was Nintendo’s Digital Event really as bad as everyone says.
Nintendo kicked things off with a rather peculiar, but undeniably cute and endearing puppet Iwata, Reggie, and Miyamoto. They quickly transitioned into the new Star Fox game for Wii U, showing actual gameplay rather than a CG trailer. Nintendo once again decided to focus on the developer’s inspirations and stories, a nice change of pace from the in-your-face, extremely intense trailers that have become commonplace.
The Star Fox announcement was then followed by the reveal of collaboration with Activision’s Skylanders. A neat surprise but nothing terribly controversial.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QPDPSezEkcY
3DS’s The Legend of Zelda: Tri Force Heroes then followed. Yes, it isn’t the Zelda game people were hoping for, but it had already been stated that there wouldn’t be a Wii U Zelda reveal. By itself, the game actually looks fairly interesting. The multiplayer looks like it’ll give us some unique game mechanics. Even if you don’t have any friends, the game will feature online and solo play.
After the Tri Force Heroes revealed concluded, Nintendo launched a blitzkrieg of trailers. Hyrule Warriors Legends, Fire Emblem Fates and Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem were all shown. Considering we’ve been getting a steady stream of information about most of these games for months, the trailers are nothing Earth shattering. Regardless, it’s still nice to see.
Metroid Prime Federation Force. Oh boy. How do I even start. Yes it isn’t an actual Metroid Prime game. Yes, it’s disappointing. But no, it did not warrant all the hate lobbed at it. People were too busy hating on the game for not being a Wii U HD Prime game, they didn’t actually judge the game for its gameplay. The actual gameplay? It looks fine. It doesn’t look bad, it’ll be a perfectly enjoyable game to play with your friends at a party. Nintendo’s biggest mistake here wasn’t revealing the game, it was slapping the Prime logo on it.
Highlights of Animal Crossing Happy Home Designer and Yoshi’s Wooly World soon followed. We’ve gotten plenty of information regarding these games already. Not much to talk about here. Happy Home Designer still features the most addicting part of the Animal Crossing Games and Wooly World is still adorable. Both games got release dates, which is nice considering how long they’ve been announced for.
Now here comes the second most controversial part of the event, Animal Crossing: Amiibo Party. Once again, is it disappointing? Yes. Does it deserve all the hate? No. A running theme through Nintendo’s Digital Event is that the games themselves aren’t bad. They’re just not what people were expecting. Now we have mobs of angry people ready to declare a game garbage without even looking at the gameplay. Seriously though, how can anyone be mad at this Isabelle amiibo.
The rest of the event passed in relative peace. Yo-Kai Watch was shown, Mario Tennis was shown, and Mario Luigi: Paper Jam was revealed. Unsurprisingly, people were disappointed it wasn’t a full fledged Paper Mario game.
The stream wrapped up with Super Mario Maker and Miyamoto’s explanation of the Mystery Mushroom powerup. It was a nice touch, even if it wasn’t anything substantial content wise.
If anyone still wants to complain about the games themselves, the Treehouse stream showed us that most of the games are quite solid. Star Fox looks fine graphically and Super Mario Maker is actually deeper than people give it credit for. Metroid Prime: Federation Force? Actually looks quite enjoyable. The same can be said for Zelda Tri force Heroes
Was Nintendo the worst presentation this year? Probably not. Ubisoft’s obsession with memes was slightly disturbing, Square Enix managed to royally screw up the Kingdom Hearts 3 announcement, and don’t get me started on EA.
For everyone complaining about the lack of Pokemon, Nintendo very rarely announces Pokemon games at E3. Pokemon announcements are a huge deal in Japan, coming with their own TV event and Nintendo Direct. It’s also worth noting that Pokemon has practically had yearly main series releases in the US since 1997.
You know who actually got gimped? F-Zero fans. They haven’t gotten jack for over a decade.