Nintendo Reportedly Delays June Direct Broadcast

Reports from Venturebeat and Eurogamer indicate that Nintendo will delay its previously planned June Nintendo Direct stream which was originally scheduled to serve as the company’s E3 2020 presentation.

Those reports indicate that Nintendo is experiencing some first-party development delays related to the spread of COVID-19. Like so many others during this time, the company has had to adapt quickly to working from home, and that process has seemingly pushed back their development timelines for projects that were scheduled to be showcased during the presentation.

Nintendo has not yet officially confirmed this delay nor have they commented on when they plan to host the next major Nintendo Direct presentation. Current speculation suggests that the next Direct will likely stream sometime later in the summer. It’s also been said that Nintendo is telling third-party developers to not wait for their own reveals if they wish to showcase them before the next Nintendo Direct presentation.

With little in the way of official information coming from Nintendo at this time, we’re left with quite a bit of speculation regarding the status of the next Nintendo Direct presentation. As it turns out, though, previous reports regarding what Nintendo is working on seem to strongly suggest what is happening.

Basically, it sounds like Nintendo is preparing to celebrate Mario’s 35 anniversary by releasing remasters of classic Super Mario games for the Nintendo Switch. At present, it seems that the plan is to bundle these remasters together as part of a retail collection (although individual games may still be available to download). We don’t know which games will be included as part of this rumored bundle, but the Super Mario Galaxy series has been floated around quite a lot as a likely candidate.

It’s also been suggested that Nintendo could reveal at least one entirely new Mario game set to release on Nintendo Switch. Most reports point to a new Paper Mario game, but there have been rumors that Nintendo could be working on a new Super Mario Odyssey title.

If those remasters are real and set to be released this year, then it makes sense that Nintendo would need more time to work on them before they reveal them. Given that Mario’s anniversary is set to run in September, it makes sense that the next Nintendo Direct presentation would take place around that time with the release of at least some of those Super Mario titles set to occur shortly thereafter.

As for what else could be on this Direct, we suspect it will include an update on Metroid Prime 4, Breath of the Wild 2, and more info on the next series of Super Smash Bros. DLC update.