In April, many gamers despaired at the news that Nintendo had discontinued its retro NES Classic Edition console. But a week after that bombshell, a report claimed that Nintendo is working on a "SNES Mini", giving new life to its much-loved Super Nintendo Entertainment System of yesteryear.
That report suggested that Nintendo plans to launch the updated SNES in time for this year"s holiday shopping season. But as Eurogamer reports, a Microsoft survey for members of its Xbox Live Rewards program specifically mentions the new SNES console, in reference to anticipated announcements at this month"s E3 2017 gaming expo.
One of the questions in the survey was: "On a scale of 1 to 5, where 1 means "Not Interested" and 5 means "Extremely Interested", please rate your level of interest in these specific E3 announcements." Respondents were presented with five categories, including the "Nintendo SNES Classic Edition".
Along with announcements relating to Sony"s PS4 Pro and the Nintendo Switch - both of which have already been released - the survey also referred to Xbox Project Scorpio, which Microsoft has described as the "most powerful console ever". Microsoft has said that it will unveil Scorpio at E3, but Nintendo hasn"t even confirmed that it"s working on a new SNES yet.
So does Microsoft know something about Nintendo"s plans that we don"t? Well... probably not. A more likely explanation is that Microsoft was simply asking a hypothetical question to gauge potential interest in the SNES Classic Edition, compared with Project Scorpio, which is also due to launch later this year.
Source and image: Eurogamer