Nintendo shares traded on the Tokyo stock exchange fell 6% after the announcement that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild 2 had been postponed until 2023.
Before this sudden decline, Nintendo shares were up around 25% year-on-year.
In fact, Nintendo’s roster this year isn’t bad, and analysts say the postponement of Breath of the Wild 2 hasn’t diminished this year’s power much. Nintendo Switch Sports will be released in April, followed by Splatoon 3, Xenoblade Chronices 3 and Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet towards the end of the year.
“If there’s one year where Nintendo will delay Zelda and not be harmed, it’s this year,” says Serkan Toto, CEO of Tokyo-based gaming industry consulting firm Kantan Games. The fiscal year hasn’t started yet (starting April 1), and Nintendo is spreading all the big games nicely into the fiscal year, Toto says.
The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild was released in March 2017 and became switch’s fourth best-selling game with 25.8 million copies by the end of 2021.
