Former Nintendo staffers share details about the one time a Nintendo Direct was delayed

Nintendo Directs tend to go as planned, but you may recall that there was one time that a broadcast was delayed. That happened back in 2018 following the Hokkaido, Japan earthquake. Originally lined up for September 6, Nintendo would end up moving the presentation date to September 13.

Former Nintendo of America employees Kit Ellis and Krysta Yang shared some behind-the-scenes information about what was going on at the time during a new episode of their podcast. While the earthquake was ultimately what prompted the delay, it turns out that wasn’t the only thing Nintendo was mulling over back then.

Just a week prior, the Jacksonville Landing shooting took place during a Madden NFL tournament. This shook up the industry and Nintendo of America was wondering internally if it should move forward with its Direct. EA also had a segment of the show, so Nintendo needed to reach out to see what the publisher wanted to do. Although Nintendo of America didn’t “go as far as suggesting” the event be cancelled, the matter was raised to the teams in Japan.

According to Yang, the process of making Directs was solid by this point. However, one problem was that Nintendo didn’t really know “what to do in the face of an emergency.”

Yang and Ellis went on to say:

Yang: So we went into this with one on the Nintendo of America side having this really uneasiness around the shooting, and then when the thing in Japan happened, it was even obviously more devastating, and so it was just this like coming together of like how how are we going to navigate all of this stuff?

Ellis: So yeah, this happened and I remember late that day, it was like, ‘Oh, Doug Doug Bowser got a phone call from Mr. Furukawa and we’re delaying the Direct.’ There was no like, ‘Oh well, we’ll submit our request and it’ll go through the channels and maybe…’ It was just like, ‘No, this is happening’. From the man himself.

Once the Nintendo Direct was pushed back, it was then a mad dash to reach out to everyone involved, including third-parties. Employees were working into the night to communicate with those that needed to be informed about the new plan. Given the sudden delay, there were concerns about leaks. Surprisingly though, there wasn’t much that made it out before the broadcast happened a week later.

This wasn’t the only time a Nintendo Direct was affected by outside circumstances. Out of respect for the late Queen Elizabeth II, the September 2022 presentation was not live streamed in the UK. It did go on as planned elsewhere, however.