Pokemon Pokopia will launch for Switch 2 on March 5, 2026 for $69.99, The Pokemon Company and developers Game Freak and Koei Tecmo announced.
Digital pre-orders are available now via Nintendo eShop. Physical edition pre-orders will begin on November 13 in Japan.
The physical edition will ship on a game-key card worldwide, as revealed by a new video about game-key cards (English, Japanese) released today by Nintendo.
Pokemon is not a first party title, so it does not have to follow first party title rules.
Game Freak is a third party studio. Apparently their next game is going to Xbox, PlayStation, and Windows but not the Switch.
The Pokemon IP is jointly owned by Game Freak, Nintendo, and Creatures Inc. Nintendo probably has the majority vote in that arrangement, but they still need to act in the best interest of all shareholders.
Yeah, this jointly owned stuff should be the reason. I should look up some more info about how this all internally works.