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Lorne Lanning

Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath was announced for Switch last September, but then sort of disappeared. We haven’t heard anything about its status since then.

Fortunately, the port is still in the works. And on top of that, it sounds like some very big news about the series overall could be announced in the near future.

In April, Oddworld creator and Oddworld Inhabitants founder Lorne Lanning appeared on The GameOverGreggy Show. Though the show was originally recorded in April, some comments Lanning made about Nintendo made the rounds at the end of this week.

Lanning noted a few things – he personally thought Switch would likely be unsuccessful, that it might not be worthwhile for third-parties given what happened on Wii and Wii U, and several other comments.

Ultimately the biggest remark that caught on is something Lanning said about late Nintendo president Satoru Iwata. He said that “The thinking has to change,” before adding: “The biggest problem I see at Nintendo is the thinking. Personally, I think it killed Iwata – that he couldn’t move the organization into a really successful arena.”

Lanning has now apologized “for the poor choice of words concerning Satoru Iwata.” He also clarified what he was originally trying to say. We’ve rounded up everything Lanning passed along on Twitter below.

Update: The official Oddworld Inhabitants Twitter account just issued the following message on Twitter over concerns that the Wii U version has been cancelled:



The Wii U version of Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty seems to be facing a bit of trouble.

During the latest episode of the Fragments of Silicon podcast, Oddworld creator Lorne Lanning mentioned that the team is “having challenges without having a hard disk”. However, he quickly added: “we’re trying to overcome those challenges.”

Lanning went on to say that he’s “desperate to be on Nintendo” and feels that “Oddworld will resonate well” with the Nintendo audience.

Read on below for the full transcript of Lanning’s comments.

Oddworld creator Lorne Lanning is open to remaking another one of the series’ entries, Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus.

Lanning told Wired that it may very well be the next project the team takes on depending on success. If New ‘n’ Tasty sells well, we should eventually be seeing Abe’s Exoddus in HD.

Lanning said:

With success, yes. The number one thing is selling games — when they profit, we can make more games. With success, Exoddus will be the next game we make and with a LOT of success we’ll start making new IPs.

Also while speaking with Wired, Lanning discussed why it wasn’t possible for Oddworld Inhabitants to make a new IP. The studio ended up rebuilding Abe’s Oddysee since that’s what fans requested the most.

Lorne Lannning and the folks over at Oddworld Inhabitants have generally been pretty positive on the Wii U since announcing the Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty and Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath HD would be coming to the console, and today they’ve spoken with VentureBeat about Nintendo’s struggling system further, saying that despite a small install base it’s still well worth supporting:

“We’re self-publishing. With Sony that’s a breeze. With Steam it’s a breeze. With Microsoft it’s not a breeze. With Nintendo, something’s going to happen there shortly,” said Lanning. “Even on the Wii U, though, how many people did buy it? It’s kind of how we looked at Vita in the Christmas of 2012.

“We did Stranger HD on Vita, and the publishers were kind of snubbing Vita at the time, because there wasn’t enough installed base to move their dial. We said, yeah, but that small base is pretty passionate. They invested and they want good experiences that are designed to maximize that control scheme. Why don’t we spend a little more time and attention – because we’re small and we can – and a result we took number two in the US and number one in Europe that Christmas on Vita.

“So far we’ve had zero on Nintendo. We’ve had zero brand visibility on Nintendo since day one. We never built for Nintendo. Today, we’re looking at it and we say, ‘We’ll get over to Wii U.’ As a business model it might not completely make sense, but we want to get to work on Nintendo, get to self-publishing on Nintendo. Everything’s a new store. Everything’s more shelf space. We’re trying to get the brand across that as widely as possible.”

Venturebeat via IGN

Care to see a remake of Oddworld: Abe’s Exoddus? Then buy the upcoming remake of Abe’s Odyssey, otherwise known as Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty.

Lorne Lanning confirmed to Eurogamer at GDC today that selling 250,000 copies of New ‘n’ Tasty will secure funding for an Abe’s Exoddus remake. And at 500,000 copies, a brand new Oddworld game will be possible.

He said:

“I don’t think it’s anything less than a $5 million title. So to Kickstart it I think would be a little deceptive and a risk. But if we sell half a million copies [of New ‘n’ Tasty], that’s not going to be a problem.”

“If I’m doing a new Oddworld game, I’m not going to do it for $2 million. I might do it for five or six. People keep asking me, ‘Why don’t you Kickstart Oddworld? You could get at least $1 or $2 million.’ And I’m like ‘What would I do with a couple million on Kickstarter? On a new Oddworld title?’ Not much. I could redo Exoddus for a couple million. I could do that. But a new title, which means new characters doing new things and controls that are great – that’s where the real time and expenses come from.”

“If you already have the game and you’re just doing a conversion, it’s easier. From scratch, I don’t think we could do an Oddworld title for a couple million dollars.”


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