Nintendo has published its earnings report for FY3 2020 Q4, which has a great deal of discussion about the company's current plans for its future release schedule, which is highly uncertain due to the ongoing COVID-19 coronavirus epidemic. Nintendo expresses a lot of uncertainty about the disease, which is also a constantly changing situation. Nintendo is concerned about "product deterioration and land use" and the COVID-19 consequences of being "longer or worse". This means that Nintendo, who can influence their development plans. Although the company says "we expect that production and sales will be able to meet year-round needs and that we will be able to release software titles now for development as planned", Nintendo is clearly preparing that they may have to change their plans. You can see their comments on the situation in full below.
"Statements regarding future considerations reflect the decisions made by Nintendo's management based on information available at the time of their writing, and therefore include certain risks and uncertainties. With regard to the impact of COVID-19 on earnings forecast, production and sales prices may decline for some time, but expect production and sales to to meet the demands of the full year and that we will be able to release the software titles now in development as planned. observable in these forecasts (including but not limited to financial forecasts and forecast forecasts).
There is concern that COVID-19 will lead you to a global decline in product and consumption. Given this situation, we will work to continue to appeal the Nintendo switchch and Nintendo switchch Lite hardware and expand their installed base. Our plans for Nintendo software include the release of the Xenoblade Definitive Edition in May and the Clubhouse Games: the 51st World Classics in June. In addition, we plan to distribute the Isle of Armor for Pokémon Sword Expension Pass and Pokémon Shield Expension Pass by the end of June as content for the first addition to the Pokémon series, and follow that up with Crown Tundra in the fall. Some software publishers are also planning to roll out a variety of interesting topics, and a combination of existing popular topics and a continuous stream of exciting new topics will work together to strengthen the platform.
If the effects of COVID-19 are prolonged or worsened, development schedules may be affected by differences in developmental environments between home and office work. In particular, the impact on overseas companies and other joint ventures involved in development is expected to be more difficult to predict than in Japan. Due to these factors, we may not be able to continue the release of Nintendo products and the start of operations as planned. This is also true for some software publishers, so it may not be possible to offer game content on Nintendo platforms as planned. "
