E3: Nintendo’s Magic Mix of the New and Nostalgic

Jeremy’s Take: “…We will work harder to meet your expectations.”

Honestly it was probably a little too accommodating of Satoru Iwata to respond on Twitter to heavy criticism of the Nintendo Digital Event on Tuesday. Nintendo constantly walks a fine line of double-standards with respect to its franchises. There is a hair’s breadth between “too stale” and “too different”, and Nintendo is swimming in a post-Blue Ocean sea, navigating a daunting transition from their traditional console-and-handheld strategy to something potentially entirely different. “Transformation” was the theme of this event, and there truly was very little staid material on offer.

Nintendo set the tone for the event by continuing their recent pattern of wackiness, putting their executive personalities front and center in a Henson-esque puppet skit that actually played really well, and moved directly into a gameplay demo for Star Fox Zero, as well as a developer profile exploring the inspirations of Star Fox. The game itself combines elements from past Star Fox games (including the chicken-walker concept from the unreleased Star Fox 2) but uses the Game Pad and for reticule aiming in tandem with typical analog stick controls. In some ways it seemed like exactly the kind of game you might imagine, but appears to add enough to the mix to make it worthwhile.

This was followed by a surprising announcement of a partnership with Activision for Skylanders Superchargers, in which Donkey Kong and Bowser will make an appearance as custom Amiibo-Skylanders hybrid sculpts. Nintendo is certainly aware of the technical limitations of Amiibo and the non-persistent nature of the Wii U Gamepad NFC component, and it was nice to see some Nintendo characters get a more fully-realized implementation in the toys-to-life realm. It remains to be seen if this partnership will bear more fruit, but the execution seems bold enough to really pay off.

The Legend of Zelda: Triforce Heroes builds on the Four Swords multiplayer formula, but with a Link Between Worlds implementation. This title seems to be much more focused on straight cooperative play rather than the competitive-coop of Four Swords, but adds a “costume abilities” element that may add a bit of spice. Also on the 3DS, a remake of the recent Koei Tecmo collaboration, Hyrule Warriors.

In what may be the most controversial departure, Metroid Prime: Federation Force on 3DS eschews the typical “isolation/exploration” formula and focuses on the Federation space marines from the GameCube-era titles. Although not much was shown in the initial presentation, later demonstrations seem reminiscent of a light “Monster Hunter” style game, complete with task oriented loadouts to facilitate various objectives. There may be some DNA from the woefully underrated Metroid Prime: Hunters in there too, and it will be very interesting to watch the progression of this game leading up to its release in 2016.

A brief cinematic of Fire Emblem Fates followed by Atlus’ Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem, and then Xenoblade Chronicles X played next, although they were more mood pieces than actual demonstrations.

A brief look at Animal Crossing Happy Home Designer showed off a little domestic engineering using Amiibo in card form, without much extra detail to go along with it. We also got a first look at Animal Crossing Amiibo Festival, which felt a lot like a Milton Bradley’s Game of Life but using Amiibo tapping just a little too frequently for comfort. Both games are likely less demanding of your time than an actual Animal Crossing game, and assuming they have good hooks, either could certainly be worth playing.

A cuddly profile of Yoshi’s Wooly World and the story behind yarn Yoshi Amiibo may have been simultaneously the most traditional in terms of gameplay and also the most “aww” inspiring. Everybody wants a yarn Yoshi, and the game doesn’t look too bad either! We got a lot of good information about specific features, and generally got to have a good time looking at yarn sculptures and clever gameplay.

We got a brief glimpse at Yo-kai Watch, which we’re vaguely aware is a Pokémon-style “capture” game and will be a potentially important title for Nintendo, but occupied a disproportionately small space in the presentation. May as well throw it on the pile with the other would-be contenders in the Pokémon market, unless we get something interesting from Nintendo soon. Yo-kai Watch launches later this year.

In what may be the best mash-up of the year to date, Mario & Luigi Paper Jam crosses the 2D and 3D worlds of the two ongoing light RPG series Mario & Luigi and Paper Mario into one hybrid based on the mechanics of both. The footage showed some very creative use of alternating 2D and 3D worlds, and is being produced by Alpha Dream. It’s safe to say that Paper Jam will be a must-have for anybody who loved either (or both!) of those franchises.

In the last of the developer profiles, a history of the Super Mario Bros. series provided a lot of great insight into the original designs of SMB and a few comments from Shigeru Miyamoto and Takashi Tezuka about the design theory behind some classic levels. A few original sketches and design documents unearthed during the development of Super Mario Maker might be the coolest individual things to feature in the presentation, second only to Super Mario Maker itself.

Overall, for those willing to explore the possibilities of variety with long-standing franchises, there was a lot here to process and look forward to. For those who would rather have more of the same, then argue on the Internet about whether the franchise has stagnated beyond redemption… you can always re-create Super Mario Bros World 1-1 in Super Mario Maker.