Nintendo has confirmed that the Close to You animated short film that it had released earlier this week is the first one to have been created completely in-house at Nintendo Pictures. Along with this, the company has also confirmed that Nintendo Pictures will continue to create more video projects down the line for other Nintendo properties.
“These are the first short films created by Nintendo Pictures Co., Ltd,” said the company on social media. “Nintendo Pictures will continue to explore new creative possibilities through video content.”
The short film essentially acts as a teaser for a new Pikmin-based project that Nintendo has seemingly been working on. The original teaser, which you can check out on YouTube, only really had hints of it being related to Pikmin in the form of a few musical cues, and objects moving around mysteriously. A second version of the teaser was released through the Nintendo Today app, which confirmed that Pikmin were responsible for the objects moving around.
For context, the teaser revolves around a baby, left alone for a few moments in its room, seeing its pacifier pulled out of its mouth and moving around of its own accord. This prompts the baby to playfully chase the pacifier as it makes it way around the room. The short film culminates with the baby slowly learning to walk on two feet in order to chase down the pacifier, at which point its mother walks in the room and is overjoyed to see her child walking.
Unfortunately, the Pikmin-ised version of the short film can only currently be viewed through the Nintendo Today smartphone app, which doesn’t really have any way to share its contents yet. However, it is very likely that the company will eventually release this second version of the teaser for everyone to see through the standard channels of the Internet like YouTube.
While the teaser works as a direct confirmation that Nintendo is working on something related to Pikmin, the company hasn’t yet confirmed whether it is a brand new game in the series, a spin-off title, or even just a more elaborate way to announce a Switch 2 Upgrade pack for Pikmin 4, which is currently available on the Nintendo Switch.
Speaking of which, Pikmin 4 was the last major release in the franchise, having come out on the Switch back in 2023. The title saw a fair bit of critical acclaim, including in our own review, thanks to its introduction of new features, like a space dog named Otachi that helps the players out throughout the game’s various missions. Interestingly, during the time of the game’s release, producer Takeshi Tezuka had also said that fans of the franchise wouldn’t have to wait for too long for the next game in the franchise.
The Pikmin franchise might be a niche one, but since its first release in 2001 on the GameCube, the series has been a fan-favourite owing to how well it mixes up real-time strategy gameplay with clever puzzles and fun stories.
