So you all may know about Pikmin and Super Mario Galaxy. One of them (Pikmin) is a Nintendo franchise and the other is a game (Super Mario Galaxy) which is part of an already larger franchise, Mario.
Let me tell you why Pikmin 4 and Super Mario Galaxy 3 are not coming out yet.
Let’s start off with Pikmin 4. So you may or may not know about the Pikmin franchise. It is a Nintendo franchise that originally started on the Gamecube and has gotten 3 mainline titles, 1 spin-off, and a remaster. When it originally started on the Gamecube, Nintendo was having high expectations for the franchise and they hoped that it would sell well. In under 4 years, the second game for the franchise was released, and things were looking promising on stage. Unfortunately, behind the curtains, things were going for the worst. Pikmin 1 only managed to sell 1.18 million units, and its successor sold even worse than the original game. It would be nine years before Pikmin 3 released, and even then it would still sell poorly with 1.5 million units sold. Hey! Pikmin released in 2017 to barely any positive reviews and the game suffered the worst sale count in the entire franchise, making the series a low priority for Nintendo.
As stated, Shigeru Miyamoto said that Pikmin 4 was close to completion in 2015. When asked about it after Hey! Pikmin was released in 2017, he said that development was still progressing. It is likely that since the game is such a low priority for Nintendo, development often goes without supervision for Pikmin 4 and when it is complete, it does not meet Nintendo’s quality standards and the development often has to be reset, leading to a major gap between major releases. It is also likely that development for Pikmin 4 has stopped with the release of Pikmin 3 Deluxe.
So, Nintendo will not release Pikmin 4 just yet. They have paused development to see the figures for Pikmin 3 Deluxe. What I mean by this is that they will not make Pikmin 4 just yet. They will have to wait and see the sales figures for Pikmin 3 deluxe, Conclude that it has sold well, and if it has sold well then Nintendo might make Pikmin 4 for the next Nintendo console. If it has not sold well, then they can just put the franchise into a coma for a decade like Metroid or stab the franchise to death with a machete and dump it in the grave with Chibi Robo and Mario & Luigi. Now that Pikmin 3 Deluxe has sold about 2 million units and has already surpassed the series bestseller, the chance for a new Pikmin game is higher than ever before and we might see Pikmin 4 on the next Nintendo console.
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Now, onto Super Mario Galaxy 3. I am sure everyone here knows about Mario and Super Mario Galaxy, but if you do not know let me just explain real quick. Super Mario Galaxy was released for the Wii in 2007 to an almost perfect score on Metacritic and an extremely high sales count of 12.8 million units sold. Because of this, Nintendo decided to make a sequel for the game, and the series still managed to sell a good 7.4 million units while still managing to be critically acclaimed. As you may know, unlike Pikmin, Super Mario Galaxy has sold well and is widely considered to be one of the greatest videogames of all time. Miyamoto wanted to continue the franchise with the installment of Super Mario Galaxy 3. Along with Pikmin 4, Miyamoto also said that the franchise would be getting a new game very soon, but 5 years have passed and we still have not gotten Super Mario Galaxy 3. What is the exact reason? Well, let me tell you.
As you may know, although Super Mario Galaxy 2 was critically acclaimed, one common criticism about the game was the fact that it wasn’t as innovative as other games in the Mario franchise. Miyamoto may have wanted to create it, but he was most likely stopped by other Nintendo employees who did not really see it as a good idea, since people would view it as capitalizing on an already good game. And you know Nintendo is all about innovation. This is also the other reason F-Zero is not getting a new game. So, my likely guess is that although it is a good idea, most employees at Nintendo do not want to capitalize on an already good game aswell as the fact that it won’t innovate or do something new. And you know Nintendo is all about innovating. This is the same exact reason F-Zero cannot get a new installment. The team who works on F-Zero at Nintendo cannot find a way to add new ideas to F-Zero as they have been all used up, unlike the team that works on Mario Kart.
There you go. I just spent over an hour explaining why Super Mario Galaxy 3 and Pikmin 4 are not coming soon. Thank me later.
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Link to source:
[https://www.wired.co.uk/article/nintendo-pikmin-4-mario-galaxy-3](https://www.wired.co.uk/article/nintendo-pikmin-4-mario-galaxy-3)