It’s not often that Nintendo launches a new console without a new mainline Mario Bros. platform game coming quick sharpish thereafter. However, over a year after the Switch 2 console was announced, fans of the eponymous sibling plumbers continue to wait for the follow up to 2016’s Super Mario Odyssey.
While we do have Mario Kart World to blast the Switch 2 into the new era, we can’t wait to see how the capabilities of the Switch 2 moves the main series forward, as it did on the SNES, N64 and the original Switch.
And, reassuringly, neither can Nintendo. The company has broken its silence about what’s next for Mario and it comes straight from the series creator, the legendary Shigeru Miyamoto.
Speaking to Casa Brutus (via Comicbook.com), he says: “With the achievement of Super Mario Odyssey, I think we’ve gotten everything we wanted out of the Switch system. Up to now, we’ve released new [Mario] titles with the advent of each console; I’m excited to see how the current team will handle that.”
Unfortunately, Miyamoto didn’t offer a timeline on when the next mainline Mario game may arrive. We’d hope that by now Miyamoto would have had a pretty good look at that game. And that he’d be talking about how the team “has” handled that challenge, rather than “will handle that.”
Maybe he’s just being coy. He probably is.
Super Mario Odyssey was released in October 2017, just six months after the launch of the original Switch console. It proved to be an enormous success and helped to drive the success of the new hybrid machine. However, we’re probably looking at at least a decade between releases now and that would certainly be the longest time period in the series’ 40-year history.
Our reviewer gave Odyssey a five-star review, concluding: “Super Mario Odyssey is an incomprehensibly fun video game. One that’s big and silly and totally essential if you’ve already got a Switch sitting at home. Not only does it show off what Nintendo’s new console is capable of, but it reminds you why Mario has endured for so long now: roaming free with the fella around the vast new kingdoms just feels great.”
“Not yet indulged in a Switch? Odyssey is good enough to have you reconsider. I mean… Mario as a T. rex: what more excuse do you need?”
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