Iwata apologizes for Wii U software drought
Nintendo president says new titles will start showing up in March, extra dev time needed to meet quality standards
Recent weeks have seen Nintendo's Wii U "launch window" releases thinned out by delays, with first-party titles Pikmin 3, Wii Fit U, The Wonderful 101, and Game & Wario no longer expected to make it out before April. In a Nintendo Direct presentation today, company president Satoru Iwata apologized for the lack of releases in January and February, but said the pace should pick up starting in March.
"Nintendo takes seriously its responsibility to offer a steady stream of new titles in the very early days of a new platform to establish a good lineup of software," Iwata said. "On the other hand, we also firmly believe we have to offer quality experiences when we release new titles. Based on our software development schedules at the end of last year, we concluded we should spend a little more time to satisfy our Nintendo standard of quality. I apologize to those supporting Wii U about the lack of titles in January and February."
In October, Iwata told investors that the company was limiting the number of first-party titles at the Wii U's debut specifically to avoid a post-launch software drought.
"Nintendo tends to release too many titles at the launch of a hardware system and as a result suffers a drop in new games for quite some time after launch, and for the Wii U launch, we are being very careful not to let it happen," Iwata said at the time.
Elsewhere in the Nintendo Direct presentation, Iwata reassured fans that Nintendo had plenty of first-party efforts on the way. He confirmed that new Mario 3D and Mario Kart games would be playable on Wii U at the Electronic Entertainment Expo, and announced a new Yoshi game with a Kirby Epic Yarn visual style. He also addressed Zelda, saying that the first original Wii U installment of the series is a ways off, but adding the company will release a Wii U version of the GameCube title Wind Waker in the meantime.
It's certainly the most interesting bit, so why not?
there are so many interesting news in this presentation.
miiverse app for mobile phones!
pushing even more the social features.
youtube on posts
official miiverse accounts
vConsole 30 year anniversary offers
and so many new games coming up!
forgot to mention the exclusive Bayonetta2 footage!
it is best if you watch the video yourself.
Edited 1 times. Last edit by Yiannis Koumoutzelis on 24th January 2013 1:42am
Also oh god why does the wind waker remake look so... neon?
I'm not sure why a remake of Wind Waker would generate anywhere near the same outrage or reaction. The graphics style of Wind Waker was a complete curve ball when it was unveiled in 2001. The title has been around for nearly a decade and if anything, the general consensus on Wind Waker has improved. I'd say appreciation for the art style has generally improved, too. Nintendo were also clear that this is something to tide fans over until the 'real' Zelda comes, whereas when the original Wind Waker was announced, that was the only Zelda title fans would get.
An apology is all well and good, but for me, it becomes redundant when Iwata didn't follow it up with firm, or even vague 'month' release windows, for titles like Pikmin 3, Wonderful 101 and Game & Wario. Really, they should have dated those titles as coming in Quarter 2, adding weight to Iwata's assertion that titles are coming from March onwards. All that existing and potential Wii U owners know right now is that there are some games in March, and that some games will be coming after March--but how soon after March? That's a question Nintendo should have answered, really. They did show some fantastic content, and they mentioned content we all knew was coming at some point, but as a potential Wii U buyer, I don't feel any more inclined to buy. I prefer to know when games are actually being released, not just knowing that these games are in development.
Edited 1 times. Last edit by Daniel Hughes on 24th January 2013 10:26am
That said, Nintendo is now in HD-land, so I'd gather they're finally going to give the fans who want it the Link they "deserve"... Hmmm. now I sound like I'm in a Batman movie...