Following a flurry of HD ports for older games, the Nintendo Switch is set to play host to two truly original sequels in the latter half of this year.
Nintendo’s summer Direct did much to instil confidence that there’s still plenty of exciting games to come to Nintendo Switch before the end of this year.
Let me this start off by saying that there’s never really been a bad time to be a Nintendo Switch owner. Ever since the hybrid console first launched in 2017 – over seven years ago, if you can believe it – Nintendo has done an excellent job supporting it with first-party exclusives that are equal parts innovative and charming. Both Super Mario Odyssey and The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild in the same year! What? However, so far in 2024, the Switch hasn’t played host to a lot of truly new instalments into beloved franchises. Thankfully, following a slew of constant ports, last month’s Nintendo Direct proved that the house of Super Mario is intent on seeing the year out in style.
The first major indication that Nintendo Switch’s holiday season was in safe hands was via the surprise appearance of Mario & Luigi: Brothership, which kicked off the Nintendo Direct. Seeing a brand-new entry into the plumbing duo’s spin-off series of smaller scale RPGs was a bit surprising – not only because the last entry, Mario & Luigi: Paper Jam, released close to 10 years ago, but also because since then, original developer AlphaDream has long since shut down. However, if there was any doubt that a franchise previously confined to handheld-only devices wouldn’t be able to make the jump to a home console safely, Mario & Luigi: Brothership’s debut trailer easily brushed away any such concern.
While Mario & Luigi: Brothership won’t be the best-looking Nintendo Switch game to release this year, seeing the titular brothers engage in co-op action together in HD for the first time was a treat. Complete with an equally as wholesome colour palette and art style, I was pleased to see that this is very much the same rub-your-head-and-pat-your-belly style of turn-based RPG Nintendo has been building upon since 2003’s Mario & Luigi: Superstar Saga for the Game Boy Advance. The only mystery that remains is actually who is making it. But since Nintendo has a track record of maintaining a studio’s secrecy until after launch, we likely won’t know until November 7, 2024 , when the game releases.
The other big showstopper from the June 2024 Nintendo Direct was of course The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, a brand-new entry into the longstanding fantasy series portrayed in the classic, top-down view. Borrowing the same art style from the Zelda: Link’s Awakening remake from 2019 feels like a smart choice, too, especially since players like me have been left wondering about 2D The Legend of Zelda since the more sandbox approach adopted by Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom and its predecessor. Not one to present players with simply the same concept again, however, Echoes of Wisdom looks to be doing a lot different – even breaking new ground by not having Link be the protagonist.
Hero of time
Much more than being the first The Legend of Zelda game to feature Zelda as the main playable character, Nintendo looks to be integrating mechanical elements from the 3D games into Echoes of Wisdom, evidenced by Zelda’s ‘echo’ ability where she can imitate objects seemingly infinitely. Just how well such a concept will work from a top-down perspective remains to be seen, but it’s already a sure-fire way to have this be a distinctly different flavour of Zelda game. We’ll know how different when it launches on September 26, 2024 . Nintendo could have easily remade A Link to the Past or either of Capcom’s Oracle games using this art style, but it’s much more exciting to see it return in an entirely new adventure.
Speaking of which, entirely new adventures is what the Nintendo Switch has been lacking so far in 2024. Don’t get me wrong, while I enjoyed replaying the likes of Mario vs Donkey Kong, Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door, and Luigi’s Mansion 2 HD with new or cleaned-up aesthetics, HD ports such as these are simply no replacement for seeing these beloved franchises' progress with bold fresh entries. The only taste of something like this we’ve had this year is the promising but ultimately shallow Princess Peach: Showtime! back in March. Since then, however, the Nintendo Switch’s first-party release calendar has felt a tad sleepy.
It's no secret that 2025 is likely the year when the Nintendo Switch 2 will be released. So while it would have been easy for Nintendo to take its foot off the accelerator on Switch leading into the latter half of this year, it’s heartening to see that with both Mario & Luigi: Brothership and The Legend of Zelda: Echoes of Wisdom, 2024 still has a lot of life left in it when it comes to Nintendo Switch first-party essentials worth looking forward to.