Nintendo Provides Brief Update for Pokemon Switch Release

Nintendo's latest earnings report contained a brief note about the upcoming Pokemon title for the Nintendo Switch.

Nintendo released their quarterly fiscal report today and it was all good news for the video game giant. Not only are sales up a whopping 261% from this time last year, the Nintendo Switch has also officially outsolde the Wii U.

There were even a couple of intriguing tidbits for Pokemon fans. On a table listing upcoming releases for primary Nintendo products, the untitled Pokemon Switch title is still scheduled for a "2018 or later" release.

When Game Freak officially announced they were developing a new Pokemon series for the Nintendo Switch last year at E3, they warned fans that the game wouldn't come out for a "year or longer." There have been reports that Nintendo is trying to pressure Game Freak to have the game ready for the 2018 holiday season, and this report seems to indicate that Nintendo is at least optimistic about its release. After all, Metroid Prime 4 was also announced last year at E3 but that has a more nebulous "TBA" release date on the same schedule.

It's expected that the upcoming Pokemon Switch game will be a sales juggernaut for Nintendo, with many projecting it will outsell Super Mario Odyssey, which has currently sold over 9 million copies to date.

The report did note that there was one major Pokemon game with a firm release date. Detective Pikachu is scheduled for a worldwide release in March 2018, one of only three major Nintendo 3DS titles coming out in 2018.

The same fiscal report also noted that Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon sold over 7.1 million copies since its release last fall, which officially makes it the third highest-selling "companion" game, behind Pokemon Black 2 and White 2 and Pokemon Crystal. The new Pokemon games were predictably Nintendo's highest-selling 3DS games of the year.

Overall, it appears that the Pokemon franchise helped Nintendo reach unprecedented heights over this year and could make 2018 an even better year for the company. We'll see if Game Freak can get out the new Pokemon Switch game in 2018, or if we'll have to wait a little bit "later" to finally play Pokemon on a household console.