Ubisoft paving the way for hardcore Wii titles
For at least one game developer, the Wii is a platform that is ready and able for more hardcore titles.
In Wired.com’s recent interview between Chris Kohler and Ubisoft’s Yannis Mallat at the DICE Summit in Las Vegas, Mallat said, “there is definitely a market,” for action-adventure games on the Wii, such as Red Steel and The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.
Ubisoft, who’s Assassin’s Creed was the ninth best selling game in 2007 — selling 1.87 units for the Xbox 360 alone — is also the developer behind the Wii-exclusive No More Heroes. The stylish and well-received No More Heroes is the game that G4’s Kevin Pereira said makes owing a Wii worth it during an airing of Attack of the Show. GameRankings.com released an overall review score of 83 percent for the flashy sword-fighting title. The information that GameRankings.com used was comprised from 25 separate media outlets.
As far as the best selling Wii games of 2007, Wii Play came in at second behind Halo 3 by selling 4.12 units. Super Mario Galaxy — which most Wii owners agree is a hardcore title — was listed as the fifth highest-selling game with 2.52 million, while Mario Party 8 rounded out the top 10 by selling 1.82 million units.
Ubisoft was one of the first developers out of the gates when the Wii launched a little more than a year ago. Their third-party developer offering, Red Steel, promised to be one of the first hardcore titles for the system. It sold approximately 1.2 million units, and even though it received mixed reviews on its gameplay, Red Steel offered an engaging story with mature themes and unbridled action, which is a plus for any standout Nintendo title.
Although it hasn’t been officially announced, Red Steel’s sequel is rumored on many industry sites for release later this year.
So with the support of a developer like Ubisoft’s Yannis Mallat onboard, how long will it be before other top developers start seeing the Wii as a serious gaming machine?
While it is easier for third-party developers to focus on the Xbox 360 and the Playstation 3 — due to the similar system specs for each console, as well as the potential chance for more sales due to cross-platform releases — game designers need to see that the entire Wii nation is not made up of casual gamers. With more than 20 million consoles sold world-wide, it’s time for developers to take a look at producing games that are not based around graphics, but games that offer designers a new world of opportunities for development, said Tony Key, vice president of Ubisoft, in an interview with Kohler.
While Nintendo continues to offer hardcore titles such as The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Metroid Prime 3 and Super Smash Bros. Brawl, it should be only time before third-party developers start to see not only the ease and innovation in creating Wii titles, but the success in doing so.
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Timothy W. Young | February 14, 2008
