[Prepared to be wowed]
A new year and new line-up of predictions are here. I love to speculate about the future and making bold predictions about what will happen. I’m not always right and I’m not always wrong either. What follows are twelve predictions I have about the video game industry and other things regarding entertainment. Some are more conservative than others. Some are going to seem like extreme reaches, but I think that each of these have at least a 50/50 chance of occurring. Without further ado, here are my 2018 predictions.
The PS4 will outsell lifetime PS3 sales
Sony recently announced that it had sold over 73 million Playstation 4’s since the system launched in the Fall of 2013, with almost 6 million of them coming from holiday sales from the end of last year. That’s an impressive number, especially considering the lack of any major exclusive for the system since the end of summer. With a large first party slate next year, it’s fairly safe to say the Playstation 4 will eclipse its predecessor, the Playstation 3, sometime in the next 12 months. It won’t, however, pass the 100 million mark. Sony obviously wants the PS4 to cross 100 million units and part of me believes that they won’t reveal a true successor to the Playstation 4 until they reach that goal. But I’m fairly certain, they’ll be able to cross that milestone come 2019, barring a surge in sales from the competition or an economic crisis.
Red Dead Redemption 2 and many other games will miss 2018
Red Dead Redemption 2 was announced the same day as the Nintendo Switch. Since then we've seen a total of two trailers and no gameplay, yet Rockstar Games claims the game will be out before summer of this year. I don't buy it. In part because the lack of any marketing for the title means that we're constantly forgetting the game exists. The lack of gameplay is the real kicker. The game has presumably been in development for more than a year and a half given it's announcement and it wouldn't be too much of a stretch to say that the game had entered development around 2013 when Rockstar finished it's last project, Grand Theft Auto V. The cynic in me wants to take a step further and claim that Red Dead Redemption 2 is simply vaporware at this point. The unoriginal title and somewhat dull story concept leave me wondering why exactly Rockstar is being so coy with the title. My theory points to internal development struggles as the team looks for their next cash cow after GTA V sold like crazy and keeps the developer afloat with GTA online.
Red Dead 2 won’t be the only game missing 2018, however. The Last of Us Part II, Death Stranding and Ghost of Tsushima will all be out in 2019. Metroid Prime 4 will also fail to release this year as well. Even my beloved Kingdom Hearts III may not make it to the West before the end of the year. Of course, many games will be delayed. Some will probably be announced this year and be delayed as well.
Nintendo will meet its lofty Switch sales goal
Nintendo has sold over 13 million Nintendo Switches so far. While this is huge for the company, they’ve already stated their goal for 2018, 20 million more units. This would make Nintendo’s ultimate goal for the end of 2018 to have over 35 million Nintendo switches sold. That’s a hefty number made even heftier when the biggest games Nintendo has for the system next year are two platformers, a third Bayonetta game and Fire Emblem. That’s nowhere near the heights that Nintendo saw in 2017 that featured some of the highest rated games of all-time from two of their biggest franchises. That’s on top of a port of Mario Kart, a new IP with Arms, a follow up to both Splatoon and Xenoblade Chronicles as well as other titles from Nintendo and third parties.
There is the possibility of an enhanced port of the most recent super smash bros game; a title which managed to sell over 10 million units across two platforms when it released in 2014. However, unlike other Switch ports, Super Smash Bros also appeared on the 3DS. While this wouldn’t mean certain doom for the title as it would likely become a bestseller in no time, it’s not the kind of game that will move 20 million Nintendo switches. Nintendo doesn’t have any other titles barring Mario Kart that can really push those numbers either. That is, of course, except for one. And that leads me to my next prediction…
[Everyone reading this right now]
A new mainline pokemon game will come out this year on Switch, but it won’t be Gen 8
Twenty million looks at lot smaller when you consider Pokemon being added to the picture. My guess is that Gamefreak is cooking a new Pokemon title for the switch to be released in November of this year. There were rumors of a Pokemon Stars before E3 of last year that quickly went away after Pokemon Ultra Sun and Ultra Moon were announced. Given the lack of effort Gamefreak put into USUM (it’s the worst third version ever when considering new content), I believe that the bulk of their development staff is working on a brand new title for the switch.
I also believe that it won’t be an 8th generation of Pokemon. Mostly due to the most recent generation being so new. Could it be another version of Pokemon Sun and Moon, or perhaps a much anticipated remake of gen 4? Hard to say at this point. Excluding 2015, Pokemon has been an annual franchise for Nintendo. A new title has been released almost every year since the series debuted in 1996. With no other major 3DS titles coming from Nintendo in 2018, it’s safe to say that Pocket Monsters will next appear on the Switch and I expect to happen this fall.
Halo 6 will be out this Fall
I was certain going into 2017 that Halo 6 would be announced for a Fall 2018 release date. That never happened and I assume it’s because Microsoft didn’t want to shift focus off of the Xbox One X. Halo 6 is coming and will likely launch on both Xbox One and Windows 10 unlike Halo 5.
With that in mind, Halo 6 will likely be the last of Microsoft's big exclusives for the Xbox One. Sure, we’ll see another Forza title every fall and it’s likely that Gears of War will continue. I believe that Microsoft is looking beyond the console market and could potentially focus on Xbox as a piece of software as opposed to hardware. There will be more Xbox consoles of course, but Microsoft will use 2018 as the building phase to expand Xbox to other devices. An AR or VR headset isn’t completely out of the question, nor are other manufacturers creating their own versions of the Xbox. Perhaps the most interesting potential system would be a handheld/console hybrid similar to the Nintendo Switch.
Attack of the Battle Royale Clones
The break out of star of 2017 might be the Battle Royale sub-genre of shooters. Player Unknown’s Battleground is one of the best selling games of all-time and clones of the format have already started popping up. The genre will explode in 2018 with major and minor developers and publishers releasing Battle Royale titles and modes in their titles. It won’t just be shooters either, many competitive titles will begin to create their own version of a Battle Royale mode.
Retro Studios and Rocksteady will reveal new projects
Both Retro Studios and Rocksteady have been relatively quiet in recent years given the pedigree of their previous releases. Retro Studios last title launched in early 2014 and Rocksteady last released Batman: Arkham Knight in mid-2015. Retro isn’t working on the new Metroid Prime title either. The rerelease of Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze on Nintendo Switch could point to a new DKC title from the studio, but given the large amount of time since the initial release, I find it unlikely. A possible explanation could be a new IP. While Retro is best known for making Nintendo games, they started off by developing unreleased new IP titles for the Gamecube. The long development time and secrecy would then add up.
Rocksteady has stated that they wouldn’t be working on a new Batman title so the questions as to what they’re working on are also a mystery. While I personally joked in 2015 that their next title would be an open-world Superman game, I think it’s safer to say that the company is working on a new IP as well. The most interesting thing of all of this is the possibility of Rocksteady using fellow Warner Bros developer Monolith’s Nemesis system from their recent Middle-Earth Duology.
Shadow of the Tomb Raider will be revealed
My last game prediction is that Square Enix will finally reveal the third title in the Tomb Raider reboot, Shadow of the Tomb Raider. We’ve known about the title for awhile now due to a leak. The last Tomb Raider launched as an Xbox exclusive in 2015 before hitting PC and PS4 in 2016. I suspect that the next title will launch on all systems this fall, perhaps in conjunction with the home media release of the new Tomb Raider movie based on the reboot trilogy.
[Disney has refused to call me back about my ideas for a Porg focused Star Wars Film.]
Disney will rule the Summer (and probably the year)
Moving outside of video games for a few minor predictions, the movie industry will be dominated by Disney this year. May alone has two large Disney movies dropping with the third Avengers film and a new Star Wars spin-off film starring Han Solo. Regardless of quality, both film’s will likely cross $1B worldwide. Disney also has the star-studded A Wrinkle in Time which will likely draw in massive audiences with its unique visual style and massive cast. June has the long-awaited sequel to The Incredibles, The Incredibles II. Pixar has been hit and miss as of late, but the hype surrounding the film will be enough to launch it into the top 5 highest grossing summer films and potentially crossing $1B. Black Panther and a sequel to Ant-Man are also coming in 2018. Disney’s animation studio is also releasing two new features, Gigantic and Wreck-It Ralph 2. In short, Disney will rule the summer box office and will likely have another record-breaking year at the box office.
Warner Bros. hits the reset on DCEU
For a brief moment, the DCEU seemed to have finally turned around. Wonder Woman was loved by critics and fans and ended up being the highest grossing film of the summer in 2017. Then Justice League came out and became both a critical “meh” and a box office flop (by comic book standards). Talks began shortly after Justice League came out that Warner Bros and DC Films was looking to change up the leadership in charge of the DCEU. While Aquaman could *turn the tide*, it’s hard to say if audiences will continue to show up. A reboot is coming and talks will begin this year. We won’t see anything just yet, but outside of the films with release dates through 2020 and possibly Matt Reeve’s The Batman, the DCEU will end and be restarted.
Attack on Titan Manga will officially end
Season 3 of the anime for Attack on Titan is coming this year, but the manga will come to close. The current arc is wrapping up and with no other major mysteries left, the sick and twisted series will come to an end. It’s unlikely that this will be the end of the franchise. The anime could easily produce 2 additional seasons alongside video game adaptations to the seasons. On top of that, various spin-off series are still on-going and more are likely to crop up.
Democrats reclaim the US House of Representatives
Don’t click away just yet. There’s a reason this is here.
Net Neutrality met its end in late 2017 and throws the bulk of the entertainment world into a sense of panic, at least in the states. This is going to give democratic candidates running for congress this year a rallying point for younger voters and internet users (i.e. everyone). This won’t make Net Neutrality immediate law as the earliest possible time for this to happen would be 2021. This could also put other entertainment laws up for discussion too, notably Loot Boxes and whether or not they’re legally gambling. While this might seem minor to most, this singular prediction will have the longest reaching results of anything that could happen in the year.
Those are my biggest predictions for 2018. I did skip out on some minor predictions as well as some things that I don’t think will happen. Let me know in the comments what you think 2018 will hold whether it’s video games, movies or any other entertainment.
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