Smash Bros. Rumors Heat Up as Next Big Installment Timeline Gets a Window

There’s a fresh bit of talk circulating around the future of Smash Bros., and it all comes down to a rumor tied to a timeline of roughly the next year or two. According to claims being shared by content creator Reese Kiwi Talks Riley, you could be getting something related to the franchise sooner than you might expect.

The idea being floated is that there’s some kind of Smash Bros. development in motion within that window, and that alone already sets off a lot of discussion around what exactly that could mean for you as a player.

On one side of things, you’ve got the argument that it might finally be time for a new mainline Smash Bros. game. 

After all, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate originally released back in 2018, and that’s a pretty long stretch for a game that massive to remain untouched at the top level. It’s the kind of gap where you naturally start wondering whether the next full entry is finally getting closer.

But then there’s the other side, which ties heavily into how Nintendo has been handling the current game and the people behind it. You’ve got Masahiro Sakurai, who already pushed things to a pretty extreme level with Ultimate. Because of how ambitious that project was, there’s a sense that building the next entry could take a long time, even if it’s already being worked on in some form.

You also recently saw Sakurai finish up work on Kirby Air Riders, which adds to the idea that he may be juggling multiple projects at once. That feeds into the speculation that he could either already be quietly working on the next Smash installment or still shaping ideas for it while other projects are released first.

Another interesting part of this rumor is how Nintendo has treated Smash Bros. Ultimate during the current transition. There hasn’t really been any major push for a Switch 2 upgrade or any kind of official enhanced version so far. 

That silence has led to a lot of assumptions that something might still be planned behind the scenes rather than nothing happening at all.

Because of that, one of the more popular theories is that Smash Bros. Ultimate could be getting a Nintendo Switch 2 edition instead of an immediate sequel. In that version of events, you’d likely see the game upgraded visually, possibly running at a higher resolution like 4K when docked, along with a locked 60 frames per second and HDR support.

Alongside those improvements, there’s also speculation that additional content could be added, potentially something like a Fighter Pass Volume 3. That would mean new characters, new stages, and a reason to jump back into a roster that already feels massive and difficult to top. It’s the kind of setup that would extend the life of Ultimate even further without needing a full reboot right away.

From that perspective, it starts to make sense why Nintendo might hold off on a brand-new Smash game for a while. The current roster is already something that would be extremely hard to recreate, and instead of rushing into a sequel, extending Ultimate on new hardware could be the safer move.

At the same time, there’s still the possibility that things are moving faster behind the scenes than expected. If Sakurai has indeed been multitasking across different projects, then it’s not impossible that early work on a next-generation Smash Bros. entry is already underway. That would line up with the idea that you could hear about it within the next year or two.

The uncertainty really comes from Nintendo’s usual approach. 

They don’t tend to telegraph their plans early, and that leaves a lot of room for interpretation when it comes to silence around a major franchise like Smash. The absence of updates, upgrades, or even small mentions can easily be read in multiple ways depending on what you expect to happen next.

Right now, the situation sits in that in-between space where you could either be looking at a Switch 2-enhanced version of Smash Bros. Ultimate or the early reveal of a brand-new mainline entry is still years away from release. Both ideas fit the current gaps in information, just in very different ways. For now, the only clear takeaway from this round of speculation is that Smash Bros. is still very much in the conversation for Nintendo’s future plans, even if the exact direction is still unclear.