OK I was going to review a classic video game just now BUT E3 is happening and Nintendo’s was just before it came out so it seemed ideal, and Nintendo always gave me a good show (over 25 years of gaming and they have yet to disappoint me).

Now last year I did the 3 major consoles and Sony’s one nearly killed me. God it was bad, and I wasn’t the only one that felt that way to the point Sony haven’t made a showing of this year’s E3. I have seen Microsoft’s and it was good but felt that doing 3 this year was a bit extreme so wasn’t planning on doing that, but then I remembered the date for Nintendo’s so worth a shot.

Right away the age rating for games shown goes all the way up to 17+ so that means we are probably getting some dark more adult games as well as the colourful fun.

We open up seeing (spoiler) from Smash Bros Ultimate in the sky and Link fighting bravely against its minions, their eyes glowing darkly as the brave Link fights in the dark woods, sky shrouded in darkness. The forces of darkness begin to overwhelm him as a figure rides on a horse to his rescue. Just as Link is about to fall the mysterious figure slashes his opponents away with a very distinctive sword with Light shining through the darkness reflecting off it and music playing. That’s right The Hero from Dragon Quest XI has come to Smash. But he is not alone, it’s not just the Hero from Dragon Quest XI the heroes from many of the Dragon Quests all arrive as the next dlc fighter/s  for Smash Brothers, making our second square Enix rep and a much better choice than Sora given Dragon Quest has a long history to it.

Following that is a short trailer for Dragon Quest XI definitive edition S (yes silly name).

Next up we are greeted by Yoshiaki Koizumi from Nintendo who welcomes us to the Direct. He tells us before the next game is shown he wants to introduce us to someone. And on comes Bowser (gaming’s best dad) wearing a tie, to Yoshiaki’s surprise and Bowser starts to explain stuff to us. Now some people might not be able to understand him but it all came across very clear. However in comes Doug Bowser the new head of Nintendo of America since Reggie Fils-Aimé passed the torch, he explains to Bowser that they got mixed up and Yoshiaki and Doug wave good bye to the koopa king and its onto the next game.

Its time for Luigi to have another adventure with ghosts in Luigi’s Haunted Mansion 3.

This time it’s a large skyscraper like hotel. Seems he was invited to a gorgeous hotel along with his ghost dog, Mario and Peach (huh not had her in a Luigi game, cue Daisy fans complaining). While it all looked nice in the daylight at night… hehehe. Now armed with his vacuum and new moves he’s out on another adventure. It’s good to see all his facial expressions in this. The 3ds games were good but they lacked just how expressive he could be in the original, the 3ds ones just having a single look on his face outside of cut scenes.

Next up, a bit unexpected we see the Netflix logo in the bottom right corner, on close up to the figure. But it’s someone I recognize the style too, it’s the Dark Crystal (a rather dark movie made by Muppets creator Jim Henson). Seems we are getting a tactical turn based strategy game based on it.

We now move to The legend of Zelda, Link’s Awakening. A switch remake of the GB game. This was already revealed in a Nintendo Direct a while back and I love it. Rather than trying to make some weird new telling of the game with changes in everything, they make the game stylized, it’s still top down Zelda but almost looks like the world is weird it gives a distinctive unreal feel to it which given the plot makes sense. Always welcome to see distinctive differences in art, too many games all seem to be trying to go for that “realistic” look to it these days, which given Nintendo goes for bright and colourful is a reason I love them. A new feature though seems to be some sort of custom dungeon making thing, neat.

Now we see a serene piece with the square Enix sign showing over a large water logged tree. This is going to be a Secret of Mana game I just know it, played one of those awhile back and the visuals stuck with me. And indeed as our cast of heroes are shown one by one it is indeed a Mana game, Trials of Mana, but it is not alone as the original three Mana games are coming as well in the collection of Mana erm… collection

Our next game is quite starkly different in colour to the bright and full of life Mana game, but yet it is one I too recognize, a smile appears on my face as The Witcher 3 is announced for the Nintendo Switch (given the Switch has been the best selling console of all time makes sense to get a big game like Witcher 3 onboard).

What follows is more scenes from the story of the next Fire Emblem game Fire Emblem Three Houses. The game is coming out next month so it’s not a huge surprise but we do see a big dragon in it, and not certain similarities in characters.

We return to Yoshiaki Koizumi who mentions that the Switch is the only console that can be played anywhere, even Resident Evil. We are then shown a small film of two people going into a seemingly abandoned house in the woods and they set their Switch up to play the Resident Evil remake before noises in the house scare them away, they also announce Resident Evil 5 and 6 are coming to Switch but those games are 5: is a misstep in the franchise and 6: a pile of s***e that stained it.

Our next game starts with a unkempt man sitting on a  chair and hearing a noise outside, going out he sees large pyramids floating in the air and puts on an Ironman suit, fights some humanoid fighters before taking off the suit of armour to reveal he’s Travis Touchdown! No More Heroes III just got announced, WEEEEEEEE.

As you can see all the things announced have me rather excited already and its growing as a new Contra game is next, Contra Rogue  Corps a game that can be played with local or online multiplayer co op. Here’s hoping it lives up to the franchise hard core difficulty, what was that code again two up two down, left right left fight B A start? Also a Contra collection, good I got the Castlevania one (was going to review something from that before doing this) so here’s hoping it’s fun.

More exposés come as we get more of Demon X Machina the mech piloting action game, though I note frame rates seem to drop with mech piloting, hope they fix that up before the game comes out. It was shown at last year’s E3 Still looks like a good anime mecha action game, but we shall see.

Ah but now we see the  welcome return from an old franchise, and not a Nintendo one as the unmistakable design of Panzer Dragon appears before us. I don’t recall them ever being on Nintendo consoles before so I am very much welcoming playing this.

Pokémon news is next, now we already this month got a bunch of Pokémon news (we all still love how the female protagonist is clearly Scottish, though people also fell in love with the adorable Wooloo) so we didn’t get much new info, just the Water Gym and the new Water Gym leader Nessa… wait a moment, water, in a region based on the UK… and her name is Nessa…. well anyway people are working on fan art as we speak.

Next up is more of the platinum games new entry Astral Chain. I have no idea what’s going on here, outside of awesome platinum games combat, and I’m very much ok with that.

Empire of Sin is after that, a game where you appear to play as the mafia; anyone who thinks Nintendo only has games for kids please sock yourself in the face repeatedly now. Not sure what kind of game it is, though, tactical turn based probably from the top down perspective.

Now for those of you that saw Endgame (which is probably everyone reading this article) the people we see next should be very familiar as following his big use in the cinematic universe Thanos and the Black Order are the title characters in the Third Ultimate Alliance game, and seems he’s after the infinity stones. It’s been a long time since Ultimate Alliance 2 so we are very happy with the third game coming to Switch.

Next is the spiritual sequel to the indie game Crypt of the Necro Dancer Cadence of Hyrule. It’s a good showing of faith that Nintendo have let one of their settings to an indie game, and you can also play as Link and Zelda in it good to see she’s getting more playable appearances.

And now we see an Olympic stadium and a toad at a camera, must be Mario and Sonic at the Olympic games again. Now people will say it’s odd for Eggman to run against Sonic, but you never played Sonic 3 where he outran Sonic to get into a giant robot. Some nice new sports this time, like surfing, skateboarding, Tails and Peach fighting each other and an odd moment where the game goes 16bits, huh…

And now with some relaxing music it’s time for what a lot of my friends online were waiting for, Animal Crossing.

Tom Nook has marooned you on an island and forced you to pay for it which by the looks of it you slowly turn into a new settlement from its original untamed island look and more cute people show up, no sign of the ever adorable Isabelle yet. They did say they have had to push back its release to next year, but everyone I’ve talked to is ok with that. Game companies like Bethesda of late are rushing out incomplete bug filled games and killing their staff to do it while Nintendo comes out and honestly tells us it’s not ready and not good enough for us, very politely and formally. Good on you Nintendo.

Next is a small montage of games coming but I will skip this part, I’ve already written a lot besides….

YES YES YES! YES BANJO AND KAZOOIE FOR SMASH YES YES YES WAIT DID THEY JUST REFERENCE THE UNUSED JIGGYS! YES THANK YOU YES YES YES.  Ahhh well at this point we are all exhausted from that very hyper moment, but there is one more announcement to come.

Silently a strange glowing energy comes from above, as darkness comes from below in strange ruins. Voices that seem unearthly can be heard, or perhaps music played backwards. All coming to one point. Familiar figures ride a strange beast along the ruins and odd pictures adorn the walls lit by a flaming torch.  The figures look at the strange swirling mass and they are now recognizable, as Link and Zelda from Breath of the Wild. A rat is then consumed by the strange darkness, also Zelda has cut her hair, I like it.  It is then we see the strange figure in the center of the swirling mass, and my jaw drops, the desiccated remains, of Ganondorf a wizzened glowing hand imbedded in his chest. However the corpse wriggles and its eyes glow before we see the Hyrule of Breath of the Wild, and a rumbling and we are told, a Breath of the Wild sequel is now in development. If this is indeed Ganondorf then I am very psyched as the human incarnation of Gannon has not been seen since Twilight Princess.

But that is my viewing of Nintendo’s E3 showing; I have yet to see the Tree House that came  after , though I hear people have found new Pokémon in the demo and a new amiibo for Zelda Links Awakening.

Next week I hope to return to normal review as I have something from the NES era to show you.