The Wii U is treading water, there’s no doubt about it. However, it wasn’t made to be that way. Nintendo developed it with success in mind. So why is it having such a hard time? Nintendo’s Shigeru Miyamoto has decided to share his valuable insight.
Mario, The Legend of Zelda, and Pikmin creator Miyamoto stated the following to 4Gamer:
Originally Pikmin 3 and Wii Fit U were meant to be part of the lineup that was coming out between January and March. Last year I did not mean for them to be completed around this time, but we had a lot of trouble with the shaders in HD. Now that we’re used to them, we should do better in the future.
He continued:
At the same time, hardware development was delayed. Because of that delay, the whole development environment was delayed, which also impacted the production of the games. When you produce a game, the process should not be influenced this much by the hardware, but this concurrency of problems affected the games’ progress a lot.
Sales have deflated to the point where the Wii U is combating the Vita instead of current-gen consoles. Once next-gen hardware is out, and the PS3 is only $99 more than the Wii U’s current Basic SKU, the issue could compound. Of course, by then the Wii U might have a price drop—and it better—as well as some quality games to play, but the point remains that the Wii U is in a world of its own.
The question will be if a small price drop and some first-party games will be enough.
[Via]
