Monday, March 30, 2020

About the Super Mario 35th Anniversary Rumors

Mario on top of a flag pole in Super Mario 3D World

So, there have been some incredible rumors going around about the Super Mario franchise and its 35th Anniversary, see for example on videogameschronicle.com. If these rumors from different major sources are to be trusted, Nintendo will celebrate Super Mario's 35th birthday big time with various remasters/ports of most of his 3D games to the Nintendo Switch, as well as a new Paper Mario title.

The 3D titles include the following:

  • Super Mario 64
  • Super Mario Sunshine
  • Super Mario Galaxy
  • Super Mario 3D World Deluxe

Rumors about the latter have been going around for a while now together with an enhanced port of Pikmin 3. And a enhanced port of Super Mario 3D World seems very likely in any case, since this takes the least effort. In the end Nintendo will probably have ported all major Wii U titles to the Nintendo Switch that didn't get a direct sequel (like Splatoon 2 or Super Mario Maker 2). So, this is entirely possible.

But getting HD remasters of three of Mario's previous 3D outings almost sounds too good to be true. Unlike a port of a game that was already in HD, this will take some significant amount of effort, but Nintendo has hired various studios in the past to do their remasters for them, like GREZZO or Tantalus in case of Zelda.

Speaking of Zelda, if these rumors hold true, then this could translate to Zelda next year as well. So far it was questionable whether Nintendo would be celebrating a 35th Anniversary to begin with (it's not a decade, nor a quarter century), but if they're willing to use this date for advertisements, it could lead to a similar line-up in 2021 for Zelda.

We're talking...

  • The Wind Waker HD
  • Twilight Princess HD
  • Skyward Sword HD
  • Oracle of Ages & Seasons
  • The sequel to Breath of the Wild

Not necessarily all in one year, but all being in development. Skyward Sword HD still might come even this year, but more about this in the next post...

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