Developers have told Games Industry International that development costs for next generation consoles such as the Wii U have risen sharply. The developer states that development costs for Wii U are much higher than Wii titles due to the increased resolution and polygon count. The developer also states that development time takes longer due to the advanced hardware, and creating innovative ideas for the Wii U’s unique tablet controller.
which will obviously translate into more expensive games…
Am I right to assume the games will probably cost around €60-70?
after reading more into it and the use of words as “risen sharply” and “much higher than Wii titles”
it’s probably even more than that.
I hope Nintendo at least stablizes the price for their Wii u games, or these will be much too expensive otherwise
They way the quote is phrased leads me to believe he means higher dev costs relative to the Wii’s. Whether costs are higher than on PS3/360 remains to be seen.
Developer costs won’t necessarily translate to higher consumer-level costs anyways. If anything, the standard $60 will be the new price for Nintendo software. That’s about a 20% increase in price, which could easily be considered a “sharp” rise.
Same price as N64 games!! :D
Well that makes sense!
Not necissarily, take some other companies approaches. Rather than making up the increase in development cost through the disc price, they add DLC and premiums or monthy subscription based gaming. I REALLY hope nintendo doesn’t do this, lets not forget what capcoms been doing! We have to let game companies know that its not ok to lock out features on a disk that WE payed for.
Guys! The last thing this is is BAD. Why?
Because damn, the Wii and DS had dirt cheap licensing and developing costs, and look at the shovelware that ensued.
The point is, back in the day of the N64, developing costs were much higher, which is why we got mostly good games, since developers needed to know whether it was worth the investment.
I know there still was shovelware, but the point is that higher developing costs means -bing!- less evil developers in it for the buck creating dirt cheap, dirt bad shovelware, cos they might not get as much back as the little they put in.
Now I don’t know about you, but that makes me excited, especially considering the tons of shovelware the DS and Wii had to suffer.
So if it’s a simple console it’s bad, and if it’s something more elaborate it’s bad too?
Come ON, man!
^this ^^
isn’t this from the same guys who did those rumours earlier? It kinda sounds made up. Now obviously games are gonna be more expensive to make (given same level of content), but that’s not something that was not expected. Like the same issue is for the ohter consoles too.
First
Yes?
Total bullshit. You didn’t see Crytek winging that Crysis cost a boatload to make because of its high res textures. Or DICE saying the PC version of BF3 cost tons to make due to the better graphics and models. This is just to set up a price increase and pretend it’s justified.
Exactly..
I suppose nowadays game textures are made in a very high resolution anyway and Wii U will not make a lot of difference in cost in that regard… I don’t think it rises sharply in comparison to X360 and PS3. The whole Wii remote thing hasn’t increased the prices either, so I don’t think the tablet controller will by a lot more.
Gaming dies with the Wii U, X-720 and PS4
Hahaha! Good one! :D
It already died when people decided that graphics were of higher priority than the game.
Now that’s just sad.
we need sega, its your time to rise again sega D:
Too bad that Sega is losing millions of dollars in revenue.
We do need sega. Before everyone jumped ship for the ps1 because of price difference, sega was the shit. Making arcades before the NES came out… and sony brought them down? Nah, actually it was some bad decisions. Sega CD, 32x, Saturn, Dreamcast. All very good ideas and good systems, just porely supported and executed. I think it was Yu Suzuki last year that said “I would love to see dreamcast 2…” and so would I. I think sega could do it, if only they had the money…..
It’s a pity that Sega have lost 7.1 billion yen.
Yeah I agree. I truely miss sega and all they did. Come on, Sonic the hedgehog, Vectorman, Shinobi, Virtual (series), House of the Dead, Shenmue? Shenmue on the dreamcast was pulling graphics and ideas barely coming out today.
@pleasant THANK YOU!
It’s could be the lesser of two evils. Instead of developing and spending millions on making PS4.Nextbox games and downporting them to Wii U, switch round the other way and up port games from Wii U to Ps4/nextbox! That way Wii U gets third party support too
Down-porting to Wii U? You mean to 1080p resolution and a tablet controller? The Wii/PS3/360 hardware pyramid is not going to be applicable for “next generation” consoles, considering the technology will be much closer in specs. Think about it this way: the two consoles that are the closest in hardware development, and on the market, will get the most support. The reason why third-parties ignored Wii was because it was the odd one out, and they didn’t want to spend the money to develop an exclusive. Who’s knows, if Wii U and nextbox are close, and PlayStation goes way overboard (which it won’t), they could be the odd one out, regardless of power (because, who are they going to compete with? PC?).
Doesn’t seem to bother them when they develop for the XBOX or PS3….
exactly what I’m thinking. This is something that goes without saying, so the fact it’s posted as some “revelation” form developers makes it sound fake to me, or at least made up for hits.
So we can only use one controller, have expensive as hell games, play shit to xbox games and we pay 500 for a damn console that’s not worth it! Wtf I’m getting xbox 720!! Nintendo is gonna be like sega! I was a fan just a couple minutes ago until I found this!
You’re an idiot if you’re basing your decision off rumour and speculation. Killer Freaks from Outer Space demo used two controllers (Yes Wii U ones) and no one knows the price yet, plus Nintendo always makes it affordable.
Sorry to burst your bubble, but they used one wii u controller and one classic controller :(
Stop lying, you are not a fan. You are just a troll hoping that your argument will sway people away from buying Wii U by camouflaging your bias with the word fan, and reinforcing your hopes with your negative opinion. I can’t believe how desperate the fans of the competition get these days…its kind of sad.
You ARE a nobody, get out of here
Two things bothering me here, another “dev” speaking out to the same guys who reported other dev(s) saying Wii U is less powerful, only to now somehow steer us even further away from the wii U saying cost for development will be higher ( I know they mention next gen consoles in general).
But this is the line I’m most bothered by:
“The developer also states that development time takes longer due to the advanced hardware, and creating innovative ideas for the Wii U’s unique tablet controller”. So Apparently weaker hardware then current gen is advanced (i don’t believe in this rumor at all). And it can’t be too advanced if devs were getting these games to the controller and up and running on the consoles in a small matter of time.
These latest rumors were just a waste of time, what a joke.
Fuck you, Christopher Hodgkins. Fuck you. You obviously play too much PS1 a day.
Hey, Lunar on PS1 rocked!
what the heck my line is $75 for a standard copy of a game.
See this ‘mlm’ “Zeki Boobs”, its not good but thats a middle finger right to you.
Games Industry International = Tabloid Bullshit
NOOOOOOOOO REAAAALLLLLY? YOU JUST REALIZED THAT?
Damn, but I’m sure many of us will buy them. Impress us
So the Wii U IS stronger than the current Gen boxes… Otherwise, why complain?
Adbanced hardware??? but If the wiiu is less powerful than the xbox and such it can be that advanced ;)… unless that other post was a…lie? o.o
25 cents for every 100 polygons.
So I’m guessing this counters the last article that stated Wii U is so called less powerful. Fuckin rumours, It’s already april and E3 is around the corner. I’ll wait for big N to show and tell us everything THEMSELVES
isn’t this a given? when there’s new technology of course it would be a little difficult to develope for at first. but, if you think about it have more powerful tech should make it easier for them to make games for console and pc and not have the pc version watered down. the only way i could think of that would make it way more difficult and expensive to develop games for is if they used some kind of retarded processor that is split up and very tedious to use..*cough cough* ps3 *cough cough*
“development costs for next generation consoles such as the Wii U have risen sharply”
Isn’t this the same website that interviewed developers on April 1st (lol) about the Wii U being underpowered and stuff? Mmm.
Still, I don’t think development for PS360 ports would be rise in price. If anything, exclusives and further-developed games would be more expensive. Also, were these “developers” expecting the price to stay the sames as Wii budgets? Yeah, how professionals.
It’s funny too because he still did not name the devs lol.
I thought developers said Wii U is easy to develop on which means it will cost low. I maybe wrong with that however.
Now you’re playing with power.
Well, apparently the system is easy to program for, and you can find the resources of the system easily. However, more detailed world with higher resolutions do require bigger budgets overall. I don’t think the controller adds a whole bunch to it though, budgetwise.
AKA $60 like other consoles.
Anything compared to making for the Wii would of course be expensive.
Yep… because simply copy & pasting a game from ps360 port to Wii U and adding 1 line of code to enable each of nintendos useable features is soooo going to drive up R&D cost… They have to pay their employees 200,000 more dollars per employee to perform suuuuch a daunting task…
those mofos better remember what happens when they start overpricing games. I don’t want to have to mod my wiiu so don’t be selling games for higher than $50 or else the pirate inside me will awaken with vengeance.
Games will be $59.99
“Oh, it’s so hard to develop for Wii U. Why didn’t Nintendo make a console that’s a clone of the other 2, so I don’t have to get up off my fat ass and use my slowly fading brain power.” Stop your bitching and make an effort, you lazy fuck. Stop trying to lay the groundwork for you charging more for games, when you have no right.
Leave luck to heaven.
Agreed.
If anything, I like to think of this as implying that Wii U will definitely be significantly more powerful than current gen HD consoles (Xbox 360 and the PS3). One thing about Nintendo is that they are full of surprises and, from the looks of it, find ways to innovate in amazing ways like Apple…
Well, E3 2012 will hold our answers. Let’s all hope for a first party Wii U launch title (Pikman 3 or a new Mario game :o )
Why are these “developers” still talkng about the WiiU if they hate it so much? I’m surprised Nintendo would tell them anything about it.
“Developers have told Games Industry International that development costs for next generation consoles such as the Wii U have risen sharply.”
Which developers? I’m tired of just hearing “developers.” That’s simply not credible or informative enough.
“The developer states that development costs for Wii U are much higher than Wii titles due to the increased resolution and polygon count.”
The Wii U is more powerful than PS3 and 360, but it’s not that much more powerful. I don’t know the technical specifications of the Wii U yet (in fact, they’ve failed to actually supply some here, which would better give some indication as to what we might be looking at here, supposedly), but I sincerely doubt the Wii U is going to me significantly higher resolution and polygon count. Funny, because this publication is the same publication to confidently report the rumor that the Wii U will underperform the PS3 and 360. Which are you going to confidently report, Game Industry International?
“The developer also states that development time takes longer due to the advanced hardware, and creating innovative ideas for the Wii U’s unique tablet controller.”
First of all, this directly contradict Nintendo’s mission statement that the Wii U would specifically address the issue of rising next-generation console gaming costs. Second of all, Nintendo also addressed that they wanted game development to be easier for developers. if the Wii U is built ANYWHERE near the way the Wii is, development would actually be EASIER than before, and even made deals with Havok and Autodesk to provide free licensed middleware just for that very purpose. And the argument that creating innovative ideas with the Wii U’s controller will make game development longer is asinine–it depends on the developer and the idea.
Some ideas, actually, would be EASIER to develop with Wii U’s controller–for instance, the controller immediately eliminates the problem of addressing menu layouts, leaving developers more of the HDTV dedicated to the game instead of trying to balance out the visuals with menu systems (ESPECIALLY useful with rather complicated menu systems, such as Mass Effect). Having the menu system on a secondary screen that is both dedicated on the controller directly and being a touchscreen not only keeps the menu system off the HDTV screen entirely, but makes using the menu system more direct and even fun to use. And the controller screen can also carry some of the load of the GUI (and even all of the load, if it works best for the game). Since the controller screen is about 480p, they’ll only have to develop enough to cater to its graphical capability instead of trying to cram a 1080p HDTV with both the game screen, GUI and menu system. THAT’s going to make games both MUCH easier and faster to develop, not harder and longer.
This entire article is a load of hot air.
Addendum:
“The developer states that development costs for Wii U are much higher than Wii titles due to the increased resolution and polygon count.”
Duh!