The headline for this article may sound like a rhetorical question, but it actually isn’t. Ubisoft has revealed that the price of converting an already existing game to Wii U is around 1m Euro. That’s a little over $1.2 million, and around £800k in real money.
Considering that some Xbox Live Arcade and PSN games cost also around a million to develop and publish, that’s a reasonably low figure.
As such, today’s barrage of Nintendo Direct conferences have revealed an awful lot of conversions for the Wii U launch period.
We already knew that Ubisoft had a shed-load planned, but now Activision has shown their assortment. Leading the way is Call of Duty: Black Ops II, which Nintendo Gamer magazine revealed a few months ago. Then there’s Skylanders Giants, Cabela’s Dangerous Hunts 2013, Transformers Prime: The Game, James Bond 007 Legends and Wipeout 3. That last one is based on a game show, just to avoid any possible confusion with a certain futuristic racer.
Epic Mickey 2 from Disney Interactive was confirmed to be making the jump to Wii U as well.
Are the announcements of these conversions bad news? Absolutely not. Brand recognition should never be underestimated. A healthy library of games also helps to provide a console with more in-store shelf space. This is why most supermarkets only have one shelf at the very most dedicated to the PS Vita – there’s very little being released. Well, that and that the PS Vita’s game boxes are about the same size as a carton of Ribena.
A steady slew of releases – conversions or not – can only be a good thing, is what we’re saying.
Let’s not forget that original games are coming too. Bayonetta 2 is a Wii U-exclusive, project P-100 (now officially called The Wonderful 101) looks, well, wonderful while Capcom’s Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate will let players share save data between Wii U and 3DS iterations. At a push, Warriors Orochi 3 Hyper could also be considered a new game.
In case you missed the news stories on the bigger sites, the Wii U is due to launch 30th November in Europe, 18th November in the US and 8th December in Japan. The white 8GB “basic model†has been spotted for £249 on Amazon while the black 32G “premium model†which comes with extra cradles and stands has been seen to for £279.85 at Shop.To.
Buyers of the 32GB model will also become members of the Nintendo Network Premium scheme. Members are rewarded Wii eShop points and a 10% discount for digital downloads.
The full European launch day software line up consists of New Super Mario Bros U, Rayman Legends, ZombiU, Darksiders 2, FIFA 13 and Mass Effect 3. Three downloadable games will also be available at launch – Trine 2: Director’s Cut, Toki Tori 2 and Shin’en’s Nano Assault Neo.
The European premium bundle will come with Nintendo Land as a pack-in, which is a more than pleasing bonus.