It’s amazing what a new piece of technology can do. Epic Games co-founder Mark Rein recently said that Unreal Engine 3 is running on the Wii U and labeled the console as being “very impressive”. And today we heard about Gabe Newell showing quite a bit of interest in the system.
In response to Newell’s quote from earlier in the day, Rein posted a comment on twitter expressing excitement about the possibility of Valve supporting Nintendo’s upcoming hardware. In fact, he’d like to see full Steam support on Wii U.
Rein said on Twitter:
“Valve likes the WiiU — the idea of having full Steam support on WiiU excites me quite a bit! Valve rocks!”
Even though the Wii U is probably over a year away from launching, we know of a few company who intend to bring launch titles to the platform. Tecmo Koei has said that they have a few things planned, for example, while Ubisoft has already confirmed that they’ll be looking to ship Killer Freaks From Outer Space.
Another company that might join in on the fun is Square Enix. Now, the really interesting thing here would be if they could ready Dragon Quest X for launch. The chances of that aren’t extremely high since it might take some extra time to prepare it for a dual release on Nintendo’s new console and the Wii. But man, that would make for one crazy launch in Japan.
Valve’s Gabe Newell seems to be on board with Wii U, saying that it “seems to be a lot more powerful than the previous generation.” The company has been around for more than a decade, but has never created a title for a Nintendo platform. Might that change with Wii U?
Newell told Joystiq:
“Wii U seems to be a lot more powerful than the previous generation. It sort of fits better into the scalability in terms of graphics performance and CPU performance, so I think it’ll be a lot easier for us to fit it into our scalability model. We’ve always loved Nintendo. Now it’s a lot easier to look at Wii U and have it fit within that framework.”
Shantae: Risky’s Revenge, a sequel to the 2002 Game Boy Color title, is available to download on the 3DS eShop. You might be wondering if the original game might be brought to the service as well since Nintendo is offering classic games as Virtual Console releases. WayForward has revealed that they are “actively pursuing” the idea, though they do not have anything to confirm at the moment.
WayForward posted the following blurb on Facebook:
“With Game Boy titles now being released on the 3DS eShop, we are frequently asked if we plan on bringing the original ‘Shantae’ to the service. We have nothing to confirm at this time, but we can say that we are actively pursuing the re-release of ‘Shantae’ on the 3DS Virtual Console. As soon as we have anything to report, we will let you know. Until then, keep an eye on our Facebook and Twitter pages for future updates.”
UFC Personal Trainer: The Ultimate Fitness System (Wii) – E
Puzzler World 2 (DS) – E
Elite Forces: Unit 77 (DSi) – T
This information comes from Project Sora’s Masahiro Sakurai…
“Right now, we’re devoting all our manpower to working on Kid Icarus. We’ve got no plans whatsoever — we’ve got two new games out in the open when there’s no extra time to work with them at all. It makes me cringe, and I’m not sure it’s the smartest thing to make gamers wait for several years, but the early announcement was made chiefly in order to attract new team members.
Project Sora had intended to make a 3DS Smash Bros. once it had finished up a game on the system and had gotten used to the hardware’s feature set. With the advent of the Wii U, though, we had a choice to make. Iwata asked us if wanted to make the next Smash Bros. on the Wii U or 3DS, and my thought was that we had to go on both platforms.
If we went solely for the Wii U, the HD graphics would really bump up the visual effects, but then we’d be stuck in another arms race. If we made this game another extension over previous one, we’d have to cut out the new things we could possibly do on the 3DS hardware and compete with ourselves again over the size of the character roster and the amount of gameplay we can put it. It wouldn’t be a fruitful competition, but doing something completely new would be difficult for many reasons, not least of which that the gamers may not be satisfied with it. That’s why we decided to think about ways to link the personal connection one has with his portable system to the gather-around-and-play aspect of console systems.
The hardest part about game development is the burdens it places upon me. With previous projects I had a game design document in place before forming a team, but with this I don’t have the time for that. I won’t be able to look at every aspect of the game and balance out all the characters by myself this time. I’m trying to think about how this is going to work out, but probably I’ll have to discuss it with my future development team. The future of this project really depends on the people I can get involved with it.”
WiiWare
Bingo Party Deluxe – Hmmm…
MDK2 – Recommended
My Little Baby – Grumble Grumble
Play with Birds – Grumble Grumble
Word Searcher Deluxe – Grumble Grumble
Virtual Console
Mega Man X – Recommended
Rival Turf! – Hmmm…
DSiWare
Airport Mania: First Flight – Recommended
Anonymous Notes Chapter 2: From the Abyss – Hmmm…
Art of Ink – Hmmm…
Dodogo! Robo – Recommended
GO Series Captain Sub – Hmmm…
Escape Trick: The Secret of Rock City Prison – Recommended
Ikibago: The Caribbean Jewel – Hmmm…
Slingo Quest – Grumble Grumble
Ubongo – Hmmm…
