Is There Going To be a Pikmin 4 or Not?
The Pikmin series started up in the early 2000s. Since then, it has managed to make itself one more name of note in Nintendo’s stable, which is no small feat considering its other occupants. As such, it is natural for people to wonder about the continuation of the Pikmin series.
What Do We Know About Pikmin 4?
There is both good news and bad news for this particular topic. On the one hand, it has been revealed that a Pikmin 4 is in the process of being made. On the other hand, that reveal happened in late 2015. Combined, this means that interested individuals should keep their expectations low for the moment because we know next-to-nothing and will continue to know next-to-nothing until something more substantial comes out.
Will There Be a Pikmin 4 or Not?
Still, there are very good reasons to believe that a Pikmin 4 will come out at some point in the future. Pikmin 3 came out in 2013, meaning that it has been close to a decade since the release of the last main installment in the Pikmin series. However, it is important to note that the Pikmin series as a whole is in excellent condition. Thanks to that, a Pikmin 4 is pretty much guaranteed to happen at some point. For those who are unfamiliar, there are a couple of reasons to believe that the Pikmin series as a whole is in excellent condition. First, Pikmin 3 has received an enhanced re-release on the Nintendo Switch. It has sold well, so much so that it has sold better than anything that was released before it. Second, there is a mobile game called Pikmin Bloom that came out in late 2021. It has been performing surprisingly well, though it isn’t comparable to its re-released counterpart. Regardless, the important thing is that these two titles make it very clear that the Pikmin series remains well-known to interested individuals, thus ensuring that they are primed for something more substantial that is still to come. Suffice to say that it would be very strange for Nintendo to fail to capitalize on that.
Of course, this doesn’t guarantee that Pikmin 4 will come out. Nothing is guaranteed to come out until it has come out. Still, a cancellation of the project hasn’t been mentioned, so it seems more reasonable to speculate that it is still being worked upon. As for when Pikmin 4 will come out, there isn’t enough information to make a very good guess on the matter. The chances of a 2022 release aren’t looking very good, particularly since the latter part of the year for Nintendo is relatively packed with multiple major releases. Beyond that, it isn’t even clear whether Pikmin 4 will come out for the Nintendo Switch or for some kind of successor to the Nintendo Switch. Considering how long it has been worked on, one would think that the Nintendo Switch would be the more reasonable guess. However, it is important to note that Nintendo is already working on the successor to the Nintendo Switch, with the result that there are rumors that it will be coming out as early as late 2022 and early 2023. The chances of those rumors being true aren’t that high. This is because Nintendo has outright stated that the Nintendo Switch is still in the middle phase of its life-cycle. Still, it isn’t unthinkable that Pikmin 4 will become one of those games that get released on not one but two consoles because it comes out during the transition period between the two. Of course, it is also possible that the title could come out even later still, in which case, it would presumably be a release for whatever the successor to the Nintendo Switch gets called.
Why Is Pikmin 4 Taking So Long?
Different games take different amounts of time to make. It isn’t uncommon for a big budget game to take 3 to 5 years to complete. In contrast, a smaller, less substantial game can be made within a matter of months. Of course, all of this depends a great deal on the size of the team that is working on such projects. Certainly, there comes a point when adding more people won’t actually help out with the rate of progress that is being made. However, more labor as well as more of other development resources can definitely have an important effect on the same consideration before that point. Ultimately, we just don’t have enough information to know why Pikmin 4 is taking so long. There are games that have taken longer than this to make. Still, there can be no doubt about the fact that the development of Pikmin 4 is starting to drag. It is hard to even come up with a guess for what is going on behind the scenes. Perhaps the development team is struggling with making what they consider to be a worthwhile successor to its predecessors. The Pikmin series is rather unusual, so it seems reasonable for people to have a harder time getting its formula right compared to more formulaic titles. Perhaps the development team is struggling with technical issues of some kind. This is particularly true since the Pikmin series is so reliant on good AI to make sure that the titular critters function properly. Something that seems like it could get quite complicated. Whatever the case, we can’t know at this point because companies tend to be very secretive about what is going on within their operations for very good reasons. In fact, we might never know what caused the delay even once the game comes out because it is entirely possible that the whole thing is being caused by wholly unexceptional circumstances that make for wholly uninteresting stories.
Further Considerations
In any case, interested individuals don’t have much of a choice but to keep a watchful eye out for more information about Pikmin 4 at some point in the future. Perhaps this will happen sometimes soon; perhaps this won’t happen until quite some time later. However, the popularity of the Pikmin series does suggest that there will be a Pikmin 4 at some point, presumably sooner rather than later in the grand scheme of things.
