With the Nintendo Switch hogging the limelight for Nintendo, helping it rise back to dominance in this console generation, one continues to wonder about the fate of the Nintendo 3DS. The handheld platform has had over 1,000 games release at this point but with the Switch providing an even more powerful portable solution, does the 3DS really have a future?
Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime says it does – the company actually has some new 3DS games to announce in the coming months. Speaking to IGN, Fils-Aime stated that, “We’re going to continue [focusing on the 3DS], we’re going to continue to have some new games on that platform. We’re going to announce [them], and we will over the next number of months, but it’s going to continue to be a vibrant piece of our overall business, certainly here in the Americas.”
What about Mario Kart Tour, the mobile version of the popular kart racer that was announced earlier this year? It was notably absent from E3 2018 but as per Fils-Aime, that wasn’t the right place to talk about it.
“Depending on the game, E3 could or could not be a place to shed light on mobile activity. In the case of Mario Kart Tour, we made the decision that there’s going to be another opportunity to shed more light on that app, especially shedding light when it’s closer to its launch. We continue to be on track to launch it in this current fiscal year for Nintendo.”
Nintendo has seen some very strong success in the mobile market thanks to titles like Fire Emblem Heroes and Animal Crossing: Pocket Camp. This combined with the Mario Kart IP more or less means another strong mobile IP but we’ll have to wait for more details on the release date.