With The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time remake on the way, Nintendo of America's former PR leads say the company should put more remakes in development to help fill out the Switch 2 library.
Nintendo has a bit of a weird relationship with remakes when compared to other major publishers.
Capcom is out here remaking every Resident Evil, Sony is probably already developing a third remake of The Last of Us, and Xbox recently released its second remakes of Halo: Combat Evolved and Gears of War.
However, outside of the Pokemon games, Nintendo remakes are seemingly at random, with only a few dropping in each console generation; and, as over the last decade, they've felt like ways to re-introduce somewhat dormant series' such as Metroid, Star Fox, and Advance Wars, as opposed to being remakes of "bigger" games.
The Ocarina of Time remake is naturally a bit of a break away from this as it's a remake of what is perhaps Nintendo's biggest game ever – but a duo of former Nintendo leads hope it's the beginning of a wider initiative.
In an new episode of their podcast, former PR leads Krysta Yang and Kit Ellis discuss as much, with the latter saying "Nintendo should be even more focused on remakes." He cites Star Fox and Ocarina of Time's 2026 returns as "really proving that there is a significant audience" and "significant interest when these games are handled in a premium way."
Ellis also notes "if you're Nintendo, nobody has a library that's as deep as you" while stating that the original Switch lineup was bolstered by a plethora of Wii U ports throughout its life.
He adds, "it's really an important thing for them to be able to keep the lineup strong throughout the year; not everything needs to be from the ground up original game. We can supplement that with these remakes."
Granted, Ellis does say "you need to be careful" when it comes to what the percent of remakes vs original titles is in a given year, as to not be seen as relying on remakes and remasters.
However, he reckons Nintendo could make the remake percentage a bit higher and "not face any significant pushback."
Yang agrees, noting that these projects that need less resources will be a good way to supplement a lineup of "the big games," saying "no company can survive if they only do like the crazy big like AAA innovative experience for every single game."
"You'll be Sony," she adds. "You'll have a problem." She's referencing the PS5's long-term exclusive droughts that have been the subject of player complaints here, although Sony is also very keen to release a ton of remakes and remasters.
However, Yang points out the "dangerous thing" is "they're getting such positive reinforcement from these remakes." And, when Ocarina sells well, there could be the thought of "that was a way easier way" to sell 10 million copies of a game, as opposed to taking a risk with a new out-there Zelda game.
She explains, "that is the danger of this path that they're going down, I think, is you could overindex on that pretty easily because you're getting so rewarded for it, making tons of money for very little work."
Saying that, Nintendo has been supplementing its series in other ways too, with the likes of Splatoon Raiders and the Mario Sports titles, which are smaller entries to help bridge the gap between major releases.
Having unique spins on existing franchises is a far more interesting prospect to me than endless remakes of games I can already play, but hey, people love a remake.
