Where Were Nintendo’s Big Games at E3?

If there was a single abiding image left behind at the conclusion of Nintendo’s E3 digital presentation, it was of those wonderful puppet versions of Reggie Fils-Aime, Shigeru Miyamoto and Satoru Iwata gamboling around the screen. Created by Jim Henson’s workshop, they’re shorthand for Nintendo’s enduring appeal: its playfulness, its humor, its quiet self-effacement.

Yet isn’t it also a little troubling that the most memorable and disarming moment in Nintendo’s lengthy reveal was the cutesy packaging rather than the games themselves?

Of course, this isn’t to say that some of those games weren’t utterly delightful. Yoshi’s Woolly World is as airy and beautifully crafted as we’d expect from the team behind the equally fun Kirby’s Epic Yarn. Star Fox Zero looks as zippy and enjoyable as the best entries in the series ever were, even if it doesn’t exactly redefine what we’d expect from an arcade-style 3D shooter. Super Mario Maker offers an intuitive set of tools for budding course designers. 

But these are all games we’ve known about for quite some time. Yoshi’s Woolly World and Super Mario Maker have been shown off in detail in the past, and many journalists have already managed to test them out at earlier events.

So what about the games that were newly unveiled? Well, there’s Hyrule Warriors Legends and Triforce Warriors, two Zelda spin-offs for the 3DS. There’s Metroid Prime: Federation Force, a multiplayer shooter/action game for the 3DS. There’s Mario And Luigi Paper Jam, which is a twist on the Paper Mario series.

There’s Animal Crossing: Happy Home Designer for the 3DS. And in case you were fearful that the Wii U had been forgotten about entirely, there’s Animal Crossing: Amiibo Festival, a weird kind of Mario Party-like board game, Mario Tennis Ultra Smash, plus the aforementioned Star Fox Zero.

Unless you’re feeling particularly uncharitable, it’s probably fair to say that most of these games look fine. Triforce Warriors, which returns to the co-op format of the Four Swords series, looks great. So too does Mario And Luigi Paper Jam. But none of these are what you’d call the jewels in Nintendo’s cabinet.

EvenStar Fox Zero’s not exactly a first-party game - it’s being developed in partnership with Platinum, and Shigeru Miyamoto has openly admitted that its design ideas are taken from an abandoned Wii project from years ago.

Ahead of the presentation, there was widespread speculation that Nintendo was preparing to unveil its eagerly-anticipated new Zelda game, a version of Animal Crossing for the Wii U, or maybe - just maybe - a new Metroid title, given that next year’s the franchise’s 30th anniversary.

As it turned out, the speculators were only half right: what we got was a series of spin-offs based on those properties instead of full sequels. On social media, Nintendo fans have been vocal about their disappointment. An online petition has even emerged, vainly demanding that Nintendo cease development on Metroid Prime: Federation Force. At the time of writing, it’s garnered around 12,000 signatures.

The more hysterical reactions aside, it’s easy to see why E3‘s presentation has been met with disappointment and suspicion rather than joy. When Nintendo announced the existence of its NX project this year, some voiced their fears that the struggling Wii U is already being phased out - and worse, that Nintendo is pushing back its biggest games so that they’ll emerge close to the launch of the NX.

In an interview with IGN, Reggie Fils-Aime has insisted that the Zelda sequel is still coming out for the Wii U - it simply wasn’t shown off at E3 because it’s not due out until the second half of 2016.

But even Super Mario Maker, as good as it looks, doesn’t really seem like a dramatic way to celebrate the 30th anniversary of Nintendo’s biggest character. And even if Nintendo is still planning to support the Wii U, that it seems more intent on spreading out into such arenas as toys (amiibo and its team-up with Activision’s Skylanders was a prominent E3 reveal), theme parks and mobile gaming suggest that its focus is on everything but major releases for the Wii U.

In fairness, Nintendo’s simply following a growing trend right now; handheld and mobile gaming are huge in Japan, and the success of amiibo seems to have surprised even the Big N itself. And the lack of big, grin-inducing announcements could be just another sign - along with those mischievous puppets - that Nintendo doesn’t take E3 particularly seriously. Instead, it could wind up announcing something new and exciting at any one of its other Nintendo Direct broadcasts.

For now, though, we can’t help but share in the twinge of disappointment that the new Animal Crossing game turned out to be a clothes horse for more amiibo figures and cards (which, admittedly, we’ll still probably end up buying), or that the new Metroid game’s a faintly generic-looking multiplayer game for the 3DS.

The puppets brought a smile to the face, but the announcements that followed failed to really quicken the pulse.