Third party games have been an achilles heel for many Nintendo consoles since the N64, until the successful Wii launch made Nintendo the golden goose of the videogame industry. Now, however, it looks like the Wii U may be joining the likes of the N64 and the GameCube, as two big third party publishers, EA and Ubisoft, look to have started to retract their support of the Nintendo console.
In a BBC interview with EA’s president of labels Frank Gibeau, he described the delicate situation with Nintendo. EA will continue to monitor the console, but has not started to develop any games for it as of yet.
“We didn’t make it easy for the market to figure out our stance on the Wii U, that’s for sure. We’re not announcing any new Wii U titles at E3, but that doesn’t preclude us making games for it going forward. Do we have developers inside Electronic Arts that are watching the Wii U and understanding how it’s developing? Yes, we’re absolutely doing that. Do we have active development of Wii U titles that we’re ready to publicly announce right now. No we do not.”
While the situation with EA sounds shaky, it looks like Ubisoft has initiated a more straight forward plan concerning the Wii U. During a recent investment meeting, the French publisher has signaled its plans to withdraw support for the Nintendo console. In a tweet by Senior Research Analyst David Gibson, he confirmed Ubisoft’s plans and their expectations for a Wii U price drop.
Ubisoft at investor meeting said it has reduced plans for WiiU following soft launch and expects price cuts given sales and weaker yen
— David Gibson (@gibbogame) June 12, 2013
This doesn’t sound very good for Nintendo, as third party support is already very lax following the Wii U launch. Stay tuned for additional details as more information on the EA and Ubisoft situations comes in.
