Bring out the dowling rods and Ouija boards everyone. It’s Switch 2 prediction season!
Now, we should emphasize once again, that the only official word Nintendo has given us so far, is that they will reveal their next console after the Nintendo Switch before the end of this fiscal year. That will be on March 31, 2025, and it came straight from Nintendo Co. Ltd.’s president, Shuntaro Furukawa.
Furukawa also did not call it the Switch 2, and neither has anyone working for Nintendo communications. That is a nickname of sorts that the press and fans have used to refer to the console, partly out of wishcasting that that would be the name, and partly because it’s easier to refer to it that way.
Now, over the week word spread around from GameIndustry.Biz editor Christopher Dring that Nintendo told his sources not to expect the Switch to release in this financial year as well.
We reported on that rumor, but as some fans have pointed out, Dring isn’t particularly known to be a source for Nintendo related rumors, as opposed to sales metrics for the UK game industry. In fact, his track record for correct vs. wrong Nintendo related predictions is mixed at best.
Eurogamer’s EIC Tom Phillips has since backed up Dring’s rumor, claiming that he heard the same from his sources. We don’t know if they happen to be the same sources, and really, how credible those sources are. But whether the rumors are true or not, it has gone out there.
Now, Bloomberg reporter Takashi Mochizuki shared new insight from those who want to predict Nintendo’s actions from the other side of the pond. He tweeted this:
“Toyo Securities analyst Hideki Yasuda says Nintendo’s next-gen would come first half next year.
http://GamesIndustry.biz previously said it wouldn’t come this fiscal year. That means the launch would be sometime between April and June 2025?”
Mochizuki then revealed in a follow up tweet that Yasuda also predicted that Nintendo’s console would be launching at $ 499 or cheaper.
While Mochizuki attempted to relate Yasuda’s prediction to the rumors from GamesIndustr.Biz and Eurogamer, we may relate them differently. Toyo Securities’ job in their industry is to make smart guesses, and they can sometimes be off the mark.
But the value in those predictions really lies more in giving investors information in making better investments. Yasuda’s prediction may be seen as a signal to investors not to expect business to pick up again for Nintendo in a big way until that second half of 2025. BTW, if you were curious how serious this company is, it was a Toyo Securities representative who asked Sony CFO/PlayStation Chairman Hiroki Totoki to explain what their company was planning to do with Bungie.
Really, with more games slated to come to the Switch this year, such as The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, and the heavyweight Metroid Prime 4: Beyond still slated for 2025, it’s credible that Nintendo still isn’t releasing their next console anytime soon. And of course, they aren’t going to rush a launch release, that had to be organized months in advance, out of panic from potential market jitters. They could, however, speed up things like presentations and announcements for the console, and we think that rumor still has traction.
