If you want to wait for Nintendo to speak, that's fine. But it'd make for a really boring website.
Last week's revelations that Mother 3 is pretty much ready to go set off some interesting reactions. Aside from a great Nintendo voice leaving the sphere prematurely (we miss you, Emily!), a surprising reaction came from a small minority: anger that we and others were “spoiling the surprise.”
Admittedly, a Nintendo Direct reveal for something like Mother 3 or even an appearance from the reclusive Shigesato Itoi that didn't involve dog pictures would have been amazing. But with the “reimagining” of Nintendo Directs that was announced last year, we have no clue when that would have been. And given the large majority of the reaction to Mother 3 coming – ranging from “YES!” to “It's finally happening!” - we're not going to contain our excitement for an event if we have solid confirmation of it. That'd be a disservice to our readers, and personally would drive me crazy as someone who enjoys talking about Nintendo.
Also, things are out there that you’ll want to, or need to, know that Nintendo won’t publicize. Surely, they would have wanted to never talk about the various localization changes in Fire Emblem: Fates, but a variety of different outlets, including us, made sure to track down a response. The Paper Mario and Mother 3 leaks – which were all confirmed with multiple sources – is actually going to help Nintendo by proving that the Wii U isn't (as much of) a content wasteland in 2016 as it seems. And even with the buzz that the motion controls were doubled down on in Star Fox Zero, if it turns out that the delay allowed them to make the motion controls universally loved, then that may turn Zero into a surprise hit. Is Nintendo going to mention any of this? Not likely. Someone has to shine a light on these things, and the fact that so many Nintendo-focused fan sites are out in the wild serves to bring these issues to the forefront.
If it wasn't for Nintendo news coming out before its time, we wouldn't have Nintendo World Report as you know it. Or Nintendo Force*, or NintendoLife, or GoNintendo, PerfectlyNintendo... the list goes on. And more importantly, the readers of this site and others want to know. As mentioned above, the complainers about leak reporting are a minority. By reporting things that we find, it enhances the conversation about Nintendo both here in our forums and elsewhere. We write for our readers, and they want to know.
The cats are going to come back – we love them too much. It is 2016, a new... something (handheld or console) is coming soon, and we have people excited to talk to us about what they're doing even if it isn't announced. If we can confirm it, we'll shout it from the rooftops. We're not going to run every little thing that comes into the tip box, because that will kill our ability to be a reputable place for Nintendo discussion. But if we can corroborate something and we think our friends – which I consider each and every reader here – want to know, they'll get to see it.
* Disclosure: Donald is a Nintendo Force subscriber and patron, while some members of the Nintendo World Report staff are also contributors to the magazine. Some NWR staff also write for GoNintendo.