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[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

The Nintendo Switch is six-and-a-half years old, but don't mention it to Doug Bowser. "I've stopped counting years," the Nintendo of America President says when asked if he's surprised about the ongoing demand for the aging hybrid console.

Instead of making judgments based on the console's age, Bowser points to Nintendo's strong first quarter where Nintendo Switch sold 3.91 million units, propelled by the huge success of The Super Mario Bros. Movie and The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom. Times are good at Nintendo right now, as the company is continuing to release a steady cadence of first-party software while also giving more attention than ever before to entertainment experiences beyond its video game business.

Even with a global box office hit and a theme park grand opening in the books, Nintendo is still not done pushing into new entertainment spaces in 2023. On the first day of the company's Nintendo Live fan event in Seattle, Washington, IGN sat down with Bowser to talk about the mission behind bringing Nintendo Live to the United States, the decision to make longtime Mario voice actor Charles Martinet a new Nintendo ambassador, and the continued focus on making Nintendo's brand approachable to everyone — even folks who haven't picked up the controller yet.

"And if I think about folding [Nintendo Live] into the bigger strategy, this year has really been a very unique, and I dare say banner year for Nintendo in a lot of ways," Bowser says in his opening remarks. "It started with the opening of Super Nintendo World at Universal Studios in Hollywood, which follows the opening of the park two years ago in Osaka.

"We launched The Super Mario Bros. Movie, which very quickly became the second-largest box office grossing animated film of all time at $1.3 billion. We launched The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, which, 18 million units later after a very brief period of time, it's one of our fastest launch titles ever, and then the event today. So it's really this drumbeat of activities, entertainment-based activities where we're trying to find ways to continue to introduce more and more people, not just players, but people to Nintendo IP… So that's what we're excited about."

Read on for IGN's full interview with Nintendo's King of the Koopas himself, Doug Bowser here: https://www.ign.com/articles/ninten...talks-switch-demand-charles-martinet-and-more

 

[Woopah]

IGN: Where are we in the Switch's lifecycle?

Doug Bowser: We are where you said we were. And I'll leave it at that. Nothing to talk about there.

Avoiding any talk of the successor as expected.

 

[Sojiro]

Avoiding any talk of the successor as expected.

We got another Mario game and holiday season to get through. Switch 2 what? I am curious how far into 2024 it will be before Nintendo changes it's tune on acknowledging a successor.

 

[LavitzSlambert]

While I fully believe it's in the worlds and ready for release by the end of next year, I don't think Nintendo is in any rush to debut next console. In fact I think they are kind of dreading it simply because it will be a reset from their Switch userbase. This is why launch software is so important - they need some big system sellers at launch to justify people upgrading. They won't have a big Zelda game, and there's no way they are going to release a new Smash game soon (I think Ultimate is going to be it for quite a while). Splatoon 3 just released.

That means 3D Mario and Metroid Prime 4. Perhaps a Mario Kart and another Animal Crossing game. Perhaps a 2D Zelda. I also increasingly believe Nintendo is going to save any Zelda ports (WW/TP HD) for the new console, otherwise we are not getting a new 3D Zelda game for a long time.

 

[Woopah]

We got another Mario game and holiday season to get through. Switch 2 what? I am curious how far into 2024 it will be before Nintendo changes it's tune on acknowledging a successor.

My guess is that I will be announced before the end of March.

 

[Oberstein]

The Nintendo Switch is six-and-a-half years old, but don't mention it to Doug Bowser. "I've stopped counting years," the Nintendo of America President says when asked if he's surprised about the ongoing demand for the aging hybrid console.

IGN: Where are we in the Switch's lifecycle?

Doug Bowser: We are where you said we were. And I'll leave it at that. Nothing to talk about there.

Oh, not the easy "we're in the middle of the cycle" answer, but the "move along" one, which is guaranteed to announce the first news on Switch 2 soon.

 

[Robb]

IGN: Where are we in the Switch's lifecycle?

Doug Bowser: We are where you said we were. And I'll leave it at that. Nothing to talk about there.

Let’s go!

 

[Davevil]

What a downgrade from Reggie Fils-Aime

 

[majorgamer10]

I wonder how Reggie would have handled it.