Nintendo kicked off its Nintendo Direct event in style, confirming the release date for the highly-anticipated Pikmin 4 to be July 21, 2023. Nintendo's Pikmin series has consistently enjoyed critical acclaim since the first game released on the GameCube decades ago, and so expectations are understandably high for Pikmin 4.Pikmin 4 was first announced at the September 2022 Nintendo Direct presentation with a short trailer that confirmed its existence, but not much else. The latest trailer for Pikmin 4 reveals a lot more about the game, showing gameplay and confirming its release date.Besides confirming that Pikmin 4 is releasing July 21, the new trailer also confirmed that many of the fan favorite Pikmin characters will be returning in the new game, though there will be new Hocotate characters to control. Along with the standard red, yellow, players will also have Ice Pikmin at their disposal this time around. As seen in the trailer, Ice Pikmin can be used to freeze enemies, obstacles, bodies of water, and more, and should add an interesting layer to exploration and combat.
Pikmin aren't the only companions players will have in Pikmin 4. As revealed in the latest trailer, Pikmin 4 players will also have a dog-like companion named Oatchi on their team. Oatchi will be useful for dragging resources back to the ship, as well as getting to areas players would otherwise be unable to reach. It will be interesting to see how this dog creature impacts the traditional Pikmin gameplay loop, but players will likely have to wait to play the game for themselves to find out.
This new Pikmin 4 trailer gives franchise fans a lot to think about, but it leaves one of the biggest questions unanswered. Pikmin 3 Deluxe introduced a co-op mode that proved to be quite popular, but there's no confirmation yet if it's returning in Pikmin 4. There are still quite a few months between now and Pikmin 4's release date, though, so Nintendo still has a lot of time to reveal its new gameplay features. For now, Pikmin fans will have to analyze the new trailer for clues about what else the new game might entail.
Pikmin 4 launches July 21, exclusively for the Nintendo Switch.
