10 "Next Big Thing" Video Games That Disappeared Overnight

The Wii was huge for Nintendo, its motion controls spiralling both ways into great, creative uses and also cheap, gimmicky ones. From there, the company took another gamble with the Wii U’s dual-screens. It felt as though the Nintendo Switch, by comparison, was far more straightforward and missing Nintendo’s growing desire to experiment.

And then the company announced Nintendo Labo, an idea that is still hard to explain. Combining the console’s controllers with cardboard to create “Toy-Con”, Labo was meant to be a blend of construction and video game that, whilst bold, many couldn’t quite get their heads around.

Early reviews for Labo were at the very least mixed, and several remarked that, despite the interesting approach, there just wasn’t much replayability in each game associated with the Toy-Cons. Even later releases, such as the VR kit, met the same fate and Toy-Con integration into existing Nintendo titles was not going to convince those who had already made their mind up about the concept.

Nintendo pushed hard for the Labo to be their next big innovation but all it seemed to generate from the large majority of gamers was mild curiosity at best. The company hasn’t produced a new kit for Labo since 2019, but most people stopped thinking about Ninty’s cardboard kits overnight.