New Switch 2 Cozy Game Leaked Ahead of Nintendo Direct

Nippon Ichi Software seems to have accidentally revealed a new game in the popular survival horror Yomawari series, presumably ahead of the Nintendo Direct showcase planned for July 31. So far, there are three Yomawari games, all developed and published by NIS, with the first being released exclusively Japan in 2015 for the PlayStation Vita. Within a few years, it had received PC and Nintendo Switch ports and was available worldwide to a receptive audience.

Part of the draw of the series is its combination of cutesy graphics and unsettling Japanese horror elements. Yomawari: Night Alone, the first game, follows the story of a little girl wandering the streets of her town at night and encountering terrifying creatures as she searches for her missing dog and sister. The second game, Midnight Shadows, introduces players to two protagonists, friends Yui and Haru who get separated and similarly lost in a spooky town. Yomawari: Lost in the Dark is the most recent entry in the series, released in 2022, and it again follows the adventures of a young girl, this time as she tries to find her way out of a ghost-filled forest after a curse has been placed upon her.

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Many people consider the Yomawari series to include some of the best horror games set in Japan, and fans have been hoping that they might eventually be ported to the Nintendo Switch 2. While the possibility of that happening is still up in the air, it seems that a new series entry may indeed be coming to the recently launched platform. Developer and publisher NIS seems to have prematurely posted an announcement on its Twitter account, revealing Yomawari: The Garden of Honolulu—a machine translation of the Japanese-language post. Though the tweet was promptly deleted, quick-fingered fans like Redditor Joseki100 managed to save images of it first.

A Yomawari Farming Sim Would Be an Interesting New Direction for the Series

Yomawari: The Garden of Honolulu apparently has a planned release date of July 30, 2026, and in a departure from the survival horror gameplay of previous titles, it seems to be a farming sim. The platforms listed in the announcement included the Switch, Switch 2, PS5, and Steam, with Xbox conspicuously absent. However, none of the previous games have been released on Microsoft’s console either.

Given the timing of the post, it’s believed that it was meant to coincide with the July 31 Nintendo Direct showcase, which will highlight games for both Switch consoles that are being created by Nintendo’s publishing partners. This means that gamers shouldn’t expect to receive updates about Metroid Prime 4: Beyond, for example, but a new Yomawari game fits the event’s criteria perfectly.