December’s Smash Bros. Ultimate includes every existing character, plus Ridley

Every third-party and DLC character from prior games, including ‘s Solid Snake, ‘s Ryu, and ‘s Cloud, will join —as too will the fan-favorite weirdo pair of characters Ice Climbers. (“I kind of hope you aren’t expecting too many new challengers,” series creator Masahiro Sakurai added, before revealing one more new character on top of ‘s Inkling: ‘s popular, tentacled boss Ridley.

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Move sets, “final smash” attacks, and mechanical tweaks were described at length, with the most notable mechanical tweak being the ability to charge certain attacks in mid-air. Support for Gamecube controllers and all (approximately) fifty gazillion existing Amiibo was confirmed, as well.

The nearly 25-minute long breakdown of characters, combat stages, fine-tuned combat maneuvers (like “short-hop attacks” and “perfect shield”), and “assist trophies” was so long, in fact, that the special began to feel less like a Nintendo Direct and more like a Smash Direct. This all appears to emphasize Nintendo’s burgeoning esports aspirations, with a list of ridiculous details clearly meant for a specific hardcore audience.

Other games, too—and multi-Switch insanity

Nintendo did announce other games, we swear. In particular, the new party sequel  looks quite familiar to anybody who’s played that series before, only with a particularly crazy trick: a way to connect multiple Switch systems together so that gameplay from one screen extends to another. Some, but not all, of ‘s mini-games take advantage of this feature. Its reveal confirms that Nintendo’s crazy multi-screen patent, which emerged in April, is indeed being employed for Nintendo Switch games.

As had already been spoiled via rumors, the hugely popular mode is coming to Switch—as in, today, at 1pm ET, as Nintendo announced the game is going live at the Nintendo eShop. Joining in this immediate-launch party is the hugely popular indie metroidvania game .

Lucky us, we already knew about another new Switch sequel, the cooking co-op game , but not just because of the same Switch games leak. We went hands-on with a near-final build at a pre-E3 event and found that it has enough to make it a fully fledged sequel, not just a glorified DLC pack.

Last on that leak-reveal list in today’s news was , the first home-console port of the wild five-on-five arcade series from Wild Thrills. Its “2018” home-console launch will be “first” on Nintendo Switch.

Nintendo finally followed through with its promise of a “mainline” Fire Emblem game for Nintendo Switch by revealing , set for release in Spring 2019.

The show began with a segment of new game , an explosive mech battle game, from Marvelous Entertainment. The flashy reveal was scant on details but looked like it will push Switch hardware to its limits.