A leaked 2020 email from Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer reveals his sustained interest in buying either Nintendo or Steam developer Valve. The Northern District Court of California released the email—along with many other documents from the Federal Trade Commission v. Microsoft lawsuit that, earlier this year, unsuccessfully attempted to block Microsoft’s proposed merge with Call of Duty publisher Activision.

Microsoft first made a pass at acquiring Nintendo back in 1999, when it gave the Zelda developer an offer that caused its execs to “[laugh] their asses off” for at least an hour, Bloomberg reported in 2021. Microsoft has also been rumored to want to nab Valve in the past; though, in 2018, Valve co-founder and former ‘80s Microsoft employee Gabe Newell supposedly told a fan it wasn’t selling.

In the 2020 email, Spencer tells Microsoft’s chief marketing officer Chris Capossela and executive vice president Takeshi Numoto that “Nintendo is THE prime asset for us in Gaming.”

“I’ve had numerous conversations with the [Leadership Team] of Nintendo about tighter collaboration and feel like if any US company would have a chance with Nintendo we are probably in the best position. […] Nintendo is sitting on a big pile of cash.”

The rest of the email thread between the three executives discuss Microsoft’s ultimately snubbed attempt to buy social media platform TikTok (or “Tic Tok,” as Numoto writes) in 2020 and other, potentially lucrative buys, including Warner Bros. Interactive and Elder Scrolls developer ZeniMax, which Microsoft absorbed in 2021. Despite this, Spencer acquiesces that he doesn’t see “an angle to a near term mutually agreeable merger of Nintendo and MS.”

“I don’t think a hostile action would be a good move,” he continues, “so we are playing the long game. But our [Board of Directors] has seen the full writeup on Nintendo (and Valve) and they are fully supportive on either if opportunity arises as am I.”

“At some point, getting Nintendo would be a career moment,” Spencer says. “It’s just taking a long time for Nintendo to see that their future exists off of their own hardware. A long time…. :-)”

In 2022, to sweeten its controversial, planned Activision merger, and possibly to improve relations with Spencer’s apparent crown jewels, Microsoft made a 10-year promise to release Call of Duty on Nintendo consoles, and it sweared to keep releasing the shooter on Steam. Kotaku reached out to Microsoft for comment.

Bethesda is (or was) reportedly working on remasters for Fallout 3 and The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, according to a document released as part of a massive Microsoft leak. A bevy of partially redacted/confidential emails and documents that were a part of the FTC case against the monolithic game company were posted online in the wee hours of the morning on September 19, with their contents containing info on a new Xbox Series X console, Xbox head Phil Spencer’s dreams to buy Nintendo, and a version of Bethesda’s release roadmap.

Bethesda game release plan leaks

Microsoft bought the Starfield publisher for $7.5 billion back in March 2021, spawning years of conversation and controversy, with the former facing (and eventually winning) an FTC case raised when it attempted to gobble up Activision Blizzard, too. Now, court documents related to that case have leaked, and those documents included what appears to be an older ZeniMax (Bethesda’s parent company) roadmap—it lists Starfield as releasing in 2021 when it only just dropped in September of this year. In a PDF reviewed by Kotaku, the “title release schedule” also lists Project Hibiki (which eventually became Hi-Fi Rush) as a 2021 release, but the game actually released in January 2023.

ZeniMax’s 2021 slate was also meant to include the maligned FPS Redfall (which came out this year), Fallout 76 expansion Fallout Worlds (which went live in 2021), and Ghostwire: Tokyo (which debuted in the spring of 2022). So, it appears that this entire release schedule was shifted by a year or two in either direction, with massive titles like Starfield getting pushed back.

The leaked document suggested that 2022 would include the upcoming Indiana Jones game, some Starfield DLC, and an as-yet-unannounced remaster of The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. Following the aforementioned logic, we could potentially see all three of those things by 2024, if Bethesda stays on course. According to the chart, 2023 was meant to include a new Doom game (called Doom Year Zero), an Elder Scrolls Online expansion, and two unnamed projects code-named Kestrel and Platinum.

The road map continues into 2024, which has the most titles listed out of all the years in the chart. It includes The Elder Scrolls VI, which we know isn’t coming until 2026 (and not at all for PlayStation); an expansion for Project Kestrel; DLC for Doom Year Zero; a “licensed IP game;” a Ghostwire: Tokyo sequel; Dishonored 3; and a remaster of Fallout 3. A Dishonored sequel is great news for fans of the Arkane series, as is news that Ghostwire: Tokyo appears to be getting a sequel, as well.

Though this document clearly lays out Bethesda’s plans for the future, game development changes all the time, so it’s unclear if all of these games are still planned or are in the works. Kotaku reached out to Bethesda for comment. At the time of writing, it appears that the original links to the Northern District Court of California documents have been removed, but PDFs are still circulating.

Another big Nintendo Switch exclusive has leaked way ahead of schedule. With early copies of Super Mario Bros. Wonder, the handheld hybrid console’s big holiday 2023 release, already making the rounds online, modders have taken it upon themselves to make the new talking Talking Flowers in the game curse Mario off.

Super Mario Bros. Wonder isn’t officially out until October 20, but like The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom before it, physical copies appear to have made their way into the wild late last week, at which point it was only a matter of time before the ROM got dumped online. While Nintendo is no doubt worried about piracy, fans have been trying to avoid spoilers for the first new 2D Mario platformer since 2012’s New Super Mario Bros. U.

Pre-order Super Mario Bros. Wonder: Amazon | Best Buy | GameStop

Emulation enthusiasts and modders, on the other hand, are already finding ways to improve or alter the game. DSOGaming reports that Super Mario Bros. Wonder already runs in 4K at 60fps on PC, while clips circulating on social media show the game’s serene, trippy levels defiled by foul language. As previously revealed in trailers and gameplay videos, Super Mario Bros. Wonder revolves around a new Wonder Flower power-up that turns levels into Yellow Submarine-like psychedelic sequences. It also features Talking Flowers that shout at Mario and his friends as they walk by.

Normally they say inoffensive things like, “Heya!” and, “Onward and upward!” But a recent update to the Switch toolbox mod kit has seemingly made it easier than ever to edit the onscreen text. Insert a new audio file or two and you end up with a very different version of the game than Nintendo intended.

Modder ContendoYT shared a clip on Twitter showing the Talking Flower saying “Fuck you!” as Mario ran by. User AndratVA shared another where the plant shouts, “That Goomba looks so fucking serene!” But my favorite clip doesn’t involve any F-bombs at all; it simply shows the Talking Flower gloating before dropping into a pit of lava and screaming.

“The [Talking Flowers] are scripted to talk as you approach,” AndratVA, maker of the Mario Kart 64HD texture pack, told Kotaku in a Twitter DM. “Their text and voices are all stored in the files, so changing them is easy if you have the proper tools.” Instead of just editing the text, they went the extra mile of recording their own voice-over lines. Nintendo fans are a special breed.

Of course, modded versions of Wonder can only be played on hacked Switches or PC (which also involves hacking a Switch). The overwhelming majority of actual players will only be able to experience the game as the original creators intended. Even Nintendo recognized the Talking Flowers might get annoying after a while, however: The game has options in the settings menu to mute the plants entirely.

I’d like to predict that Nintendo might eventually add official voice and script editing for the Talking Flower into an inevitable Super Mario Maker 3, but I think we all know that would be a moderation nightmare. The existing list of banned words on Switch continues to grow with every big firmware update.

Update 10/18/2023 11:22 a.m. ET: The videos of potty mouthed flowers in Mario Bros. Wonder have been removed from the internet after copyright claims by Nintendo. I’m sure they’ll be back.

Pre-order Super Mario Bros. Wonder: Amazon | Best Buy | GameStop