It has been a long road filled with few updates, weird spin-offs, and a potentially devastating fire to get here, but Pikmin 4 is real and Nintendo slapped a 2023 release window on the game.
Fans of the series have been looking forward to that confirmation since creator Shigeru Miyamoto confirmed that it was “very close to completion” all the way back in September 2015. And as information on the game dried up post-2017, it became harder and harder to keep faith that the niche sequel was going to be coming anytime soon.
That down period lasted for more than five years, with Miyamoto’s last update being made in June 2017. And in that time, one fan decided to try and keep their hopes for the franchise alive by playing a little bit of Pikmin every day and uploading it to YouTube.
The aptly named Pikman uploaded their first video on Dec. 21, 2020, and has since uploaded every day consecutively for over 600 days—all featuring them playing Pikmin 2.
The first video is an outlier at just over 16 minutes long that makes it seem like Pikman will be posting a “Let’s Play” of sorts for the game in sizable chunks and then maybe moving on to others in the franchise. But basically every subsequent video lasts no longer than two minutes and begins to incorporate a minimal amount of gameplay into a meme of some kind.
That progression into meme posts only scales up as the depravity of the task at hand begins to sink in. “Playing Pikmin Everyday Until Pikmin 4 Comes Out – Day 36” is where the wheels start to go off the minecart, and things don’t slow down from there.
Once you get toward the end of year one, the gameplay is all but secondary to whatever Pikman decides to implement into their gameplay—even if all there is in the video is 50 seconds of Pikmin 2 gameplay with no context. They even updated their bio with a statement regarding frequently asked questions about their uploads.
“stop asking for this:
-The stats at the end of the day
-For me to get more purples and whites
-If I can play pikmin 1, 3, and Hey pikmin
-If I can complete the game already
-and if I’m gonna upload more on this channel after the daily series. (I’ve already said no)
~Go sub to Pikmeme.”
So with no plans to expand to other games or a set schedule for completing Pikmin 2, Pikman pressed on with memes and short bursts of gameplay every day.
That wouldn’t change until the fabled “Day 612,” when Pikman uploaded their longest video in months where they discuss the official reveal of Pikman 4, featuring a mix of Pikman 2 gameplay and other assets for the sake of discussion.
“Thank you all for watching and I’m glad we’ve made it to this goal of actually seeing a Pikmin 4 trailer. I hope we get to see more along the way,” Pikman said. “I’m not doing a Pikmin 5 version of this OK? Someone else can pass down my legacy.”
Accounts using the gimmick of “posting X every day until X happens” are nothing new, especially when it comes to content creation and video games, but at least one of those dedicated accounts will finally be free in the near future—barring some serious delays to Pikmin 4.
As many of the comments on Pikman’s hundreds of videos state, even when this series does end, it will forever be a cornerstone of the Pikmin fan base and a representation of how dedicated a game’s community can be.
Pikman will continue to upload until Pikmin 4 actually releases for Nintendo Switch—after all, the series is called Playing Pikmin Everyday Until Pikmin 4 Comes Out. So everyone can keep that same “yep” energy rolling for more funny plant game content until they finally escape from the planet.
