The new gravity-defying mechanics of Mario Kart 8 drew comparisons to the long-dormant F-Zero series. While this may whet fans appetite for more, aAccording to Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto, the company has hit something of a creative slump with that series.

"I certainly understand that people want a new F-Zero game," Miyamoto told IGN. "I think where I struggle is that I don't really have a good idea for what's new that we could bring to F-Zero that would really turn it into a great game again. Certainly I can see how people looking at Mario Kart 8 could see, through the anti-gravity, a connection to F-Zero. But I don't know, at this point, what direction we could go in with a new F-Zero."

Miyamoto then talked more broadly about balancing new with old, and said that the company has been growing lately to allow for more internal projects.

"We come to the show and we bring a lot of great franchises and everyone says, 'Oh, well, where’s this game that I want to play? Where's something new?' I only have so much capacity. [laughs] Obviously in the past we've tried to work with other companies, where we've let them develop games for us in franchises like Star Fox and F-Zero, but the more we think about it, the more we prefer to be able to create those games internally, on our own."

The last console game in the franchise was F-Zero GX for Gamecube, released in 2003. That game was developed by the now-defunct Amusement Vision at Sega. With Miyamoto's hesitance to outsource their games, and the original GX team long gone, the future of F-Zero doesn't look especially bright.