A softer Nintendo Direct may signal an imminent Switch successor

Today was Nintendo's turn to participate in summer game announcement season with its seasonal Nintendo Direct—and instead of throwing a high-speed fastball, it opted for a soft underhand toss, with more promotions of re-releases, remasters, and only two first-party titles targeted at the company's core family audience: Pikmin 4 and Super Mario Wonder.

But despite the lighter touch on marketing, Nintendo's smaller showcase doesn't feel as surprising as say, the relatively light Summer Game Fest. Why? Well you can either look to the company's recent past—or its imminent future.

In case you'd somehow forgotten, Nintendo just released its biggest first-party title since the Nintendo Switch first launched in 2017: The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. The company spent the first half of the year building suspense of the Zelda sequel, only revealing the game's innovative new mechanics a month before launch.

Choosing not to show off Metroid Prime 4 or a new 3D Super Mario game lets that game still stay at the center of the company's 2023 marketing—and make no mistake, Tears of the Kingdom will continue to be a blockbuster seller through the end of the year.

Let's turn then toward the future. Rumblings about a successor to the Nintendo Switch have circulated for several years now, and six years after the console debuted, said successor may finally be around the corner. Recent comments from Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot about the success of Mario + Rabbids strongly indicated that Nintendo is preparing games for the next console. Guillemot himself expressed regret that the publisher hadn't waited a bit longer to launch the Mario + Rabbids sequel.

When will Nintendo unveil its next console?

Even if seemed like Nintendo was holding back its juiciest titles for an imminent Switch successor, it's hard to pin down when the company might reveal said console to the world.

The timing of such an unveiling would come down to when it plans to release the console. The Nintendo Switch was first revealed in October 2016, ahead of a March 2017 release date.

Releasing the console in the spring gives Nintendo two major sales spike windows in the following year—first a launch, and then in the holiday season nine months down the road.

But Nintendo's major competitors—Sony and Microsoft—released their ninth generation consoles in autumn of 2020, dropping them right into the holiday sales window. Nintendo could follow a similar plan if neither of the other companies has any mid-generation hardware refreshes planned next year.

All of the games debuted in today's Nintendo Direct

Getting away from the broader console analysis, there was one other major theme in today's unveiled games—a steady drumbeat of re-releases and remasters of classic titles. The peak of these reveals was Super Mario RPG, a remake (remaster?) of Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. But other titles like Star Ocean The Second Story R and Metal Gear Solid Collection 1 kept the theme going.

Here are all of the games Nintendo featured in today's Nintendo Direct: