Ah, Nintendo Direct. You never quite know what you're going to get with these things. Today, at least, proved to be one of the more interesting slates of announcements delivered by Satoru Iwata, as he brought out a couple of new games, as well as at least one major HD remake, for the Wii U.
Let's just get that big one right out of the way now. Yes, there is a Zelda game headed to the Wii U this fall. Namely, it's the GameCube Zelda game, the criminally underrated Wind Waker, remade in HD for Nintendo's new console. The remake, which includes fully remastered visuals and GamePad support, will release for the console this fall.
Mention was briefly made of a new Zelda game as well, but series producer Eiji Aonuma had no significant details to share at this time. So we likely won't be seeing this new entry in the series at E3 this year. However, we should be seeing several other new entries in familiar franchises at the show, including a new Mario game from the Mario Galaxy team, a new Mario Kart title, a new game from the Wii Party team, and...
...a new Yoshi game! Yes, Mario's perpetually put-upon dinosaur friend will get his first new starring console adventure since 1998's Yoshi's Story. This new Yoshi game is currently in development, and being headed up by Takashi Tezuka, alongside the team behind Kirby's Epic Yarn. Yes, Yarn Yoshi is a thing. Squeal.
Lastly on the game front, Nintendo also unveiled one of the...odder combinations for an RPG mash-up one could possibly dream up. Intelligent Systems' Fire Emblem series will be crossing over with Atlus' Shin Megami Tensei series for a game currently just titled Shin Megami Tensei x Fire Emblem. So that's weird.
Oh, and for those holding out hope for some Virtual Console business on the Wii U, you won't have to wait too much longer. Nintendo announced that the VC store would be launching with the system's spring update, and would include a "selection" of NES and SNES games, with Game Boy Advance joining the fray as well later on. Pricing is expected to be the same as on the Wii.
And that, ladies and gentlemen, concludes of the more immediately interesting Nintendo Direct recaps we've had to do in quite a while. Look at Nintendo, doing things like a company with games to show. Ain't it just delightful?
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