nice, ill be getting this at launch!

Yes, well, they've gone 2 holiday seasons without Mario Kart on Wii U too, which passes as insane, imo.

First of all Zelda U was never formally announced, it was only stated to be in development and to be shown at E3. Also u cant delay something that never had a target launch window. Nintendo has never stated or hinted at Zelda U coming in 2014.

Mario Kart on Gamecube and Wii both missed 2 holiday seasons so its just following the trend of console Mario Kart releasing 1.5-2 years after console launch.

Melee was released about 2 weeks after the GameCube launch.

I sense there may be another drought this year...

Yup, quote still says "by", thread still says "at." Just checking.

Indeed, official, translated quote says this:

"By the end of this year, we will have “Mario Kart 8,” as well as “Super Smash Bros.” "

So unless people expect Mario Kart 8 to also be a holiday title despite Nintendo's official schedule released on the same day the briefing was held listing it for "Spring 2014" in all three regions, I'm fairly confident that we can reject the "at" interpretation entirely.

GameCube is Nintendo's lowest selling console ever, and widely considered a failure, and Wii was on fire anyway, with or without MK. Wii U could've very, very much done with MK8 at launch or during its second holiday on th market.

And u think Nintendo knew Wii U would be selling poorly at this point? In order to get Mario Kart 8 out in time for holiday 2013 they would have had to bump the game up 6 months which would have given us a Mario Kart 7 scensrio where it feels rushed.

Mario Kart 7 released holiday 2011 and I assume developers take a small break before jumping right into making a new game so lets say they started development January 1, 2012. That would give the Mario Kart team less than 2 years to make a game on new hardware while also making there first HD game. Yeah its possible but it would have been rushed and not up to standards.