I know it's a strange time and all, but it's just confusing how out of tune Nintendo has been. I know from insiders statements, that Nintendo was extremely unprepared for COVID; but it's just annoying that they can't give us a solid update on certain things, and pretty much hold off on telling us anything until the literal last second. Even Mario's 35th anniversary and HW 2 ended up being shadowdropped, when they (at least Mario) should have been revealed back in August at the latest.
It's also annoying that we are 8 months in from a presumed 23 month development timeline, with 1 fighter to show for it; and 5 fighters still unrevealed. At this point, I'm pretty sure Fighter 7 should be done or at the very least at the last stages of development; but I feel that Nintendo should just give us a heads up for when we can expect more info about the character to drop, officially. They don't have to reveal the character, but just say something like "more info relating to character 7 will be released in late September/October". So we can actually have an idea for how long we are waiting for.
At the very least, TGS will happen soon and likely give us a lot more 3rd party news on the Switch; and likely a MH announcement.
I do fully agree (I believe
Wunderwaft
and others have made the same point), but there's also a point to be made that Nintendo's historical stubborness and secrecy is what might've bitten them in the ass here.
Disclaimer: I'm going to hardcore speculate here. Could be off, but I'm basing this off of Nintendo's past ways of thinking and actions.
I should note, not everyone within Nintendo thinks like that of course, but organizational ideology is really, really hard to change. Especially when said ideology has been successful in the past (the Catholic Church is an extreme example of this since it's existed for 1500 years+ and has had significant political power during the majority of said timespan. There has been at least one Pope that have gone to war for example.).
In Nintendo's case: historically they've announced games on their terms, and it's evident by the fact that they announced Melee at E3 2001, complete with the entire base roster at once. Fast forward 5 years, and Brawl's E3 trailer highlighted four veterans + five newcomers (including the big one at the time, Snake). Ditto with Directs and them releasing info on their terms.
To produce loads of hype etc.
Now there's a problem where not only is E3 cancelled, but it's much more difficult to cook up Directs. "What if BOTW 2 gets delayed? Then we can't include that at the Direct! What about Pikmin 3 Deluxe?! TOK?" Etc. Thus the decision to change plans.
Of course, Nintendo's also the type of company that's not willingly admitted weakness - at least not publicly. There could certainly be quite a few voices arguing against announcing delays etc. They didn't announce MP4's delay / restart until it became clear that MP4's original development was not going anywhere for instance.
Also, quite a few voices within Nintendo might have argued against announcing a change of announcement style because
it'll lead to less hype with each announcement or something else. Announcing the changes would be against the Nintendo way.
Point is, organizational ideology is one hell of a drug.
At least Aonuma did aknowledge BOTW2's development and stated that it'll take some more time there. Nintendo should IMHO do more of that (as well as provide that roadmap re: rest of FP2).