Minecraft: Wii U Edition Gets Its Last Ever Update, Developer 4J Reminisces Over Last Gen Consoles

Felt only right to get the good ol’ Wii U blue site theme out for this one. 💙

Actually played a decent amount of local multiplayer Minecraft on the Wii U. Was a pretty good time. One of the few good times I got out of the system.

Sort of unrelated to the topic at hand but is 4J even allowed to share that picture of the devkits? I feel that there would be an NDA covering that lol

One of the updates permanently broke one of my favorite worlds. I should see if someone could help me repair it if possible.

Wii U wasn't last gen though. It competed against PS4 and Xbone.

Nobody notices that Wii U was actually the PS4 and Xbox 1 generation, Wii was the PS3 and Xbox 360 generation, Switch is the start of the PS5 and Xbox 2 generation. We just all casually agree that Wii U is past its prime and that's that.

@Trajan ninja'd, somebody noticed. 😉

@ryancraddock
Makes me smile every time that I see it!

Oh Wii U blue, how I've missed thee. I know the site switches themes depending on the topic/tags, but I've always found the blue less jarring.

@rjejr Yeah, it's interesting because everyone acknowledges that the PS4 and XB1 have new models that are essentially new consoles in the middle of this generation. I think it is because the Wii U to Switch wasn't a backwards compatible evolution although the DNA is there (and the brand had been battered as badly as New Coke/Coke II).

Minecraft was still fun on the Wii U, even though I was disappointed that they did not allow you to access your inventory with ease on the Gamepad.

@Darknyht The DNA is absolutly not the same between Wii U and Switch. Wii U was a very hard system to work on for developpers, totally the opposite of the Switch which is very easy.

@rjejr Totally agree. And despite what was said by most people, the Wii U was way more powerful than a PS3 or X360. The ports were inferior because it was a hell of machine to optimize and third party developpers didn't want to spend much time and money on it. So we had inferior versions of Black Ops 2, Assassin's Creed or Batman.

But when you looked at the graphics on some games, you started to see what the next gen would be about : most importantly 1080p and far more better lightning. For exemple, Super Mario 3D World has some lightning effects impossible on PS3/X360 and that we would only see on PS4/X1.

Sigh. We all knew this console was dead in the water, but it still kind of hurts. I never owned one myself, but I played plenty at friends houses, wether it be smash, mario maker, or almost any game on the system (thats not mario tennis ultra smash or eshop trash) I had a good time with. It's game over guys. Game over.

I really wish they would have got their act together and released the Wii U version much, much sooner than they did.

If so...then I most likely would not have had a PS3, or at least my son would have spent much less time on the PS3 as Minecraft and LBP2 were basically the only games he played on the PS3, otherwise all Nintendo.

But we really enjoyed the Mario world the one time my son was able to play it.

@rjejr I think Nintendo has been blazing their own generations for the last few years.

Ah the end of an era.

@smashboy2000 they share DNA in that without the Wii U (Gamepad to be specific) there would be no Switch.

Thank you Wii U, old buddy, for all the great memories!

I missed the old WiiU blue...nice to see it now and again!

I love how the X360 dev kits are all newest gen retail units with custom bits attached, the PS3 dev kits are all PS3 Phat retail units (so that's what happened to them all), and the WiiU dev kits are overbuilt industrial rackmount shells that are both generic and unidentifiable while also being suitable for withstanding planetary reentry.

@rjejr How true. Then again, I think Nintendo is really on it's own generational cycle now, having launched square between two other generations, and I'm not sure PS/XBox will share a true generation anymore either with XBox pushing into "generation-less" platforms, waiting for Sony to move, and Sony hiding in their money bin until they absolutely need to announce something.

@smashboy2000 The Wii U had a better GPU than PS3/360 but was categorically inferior when it came to the CPU and memory configuration, particularly memory bandwidth which was less than half the competition at 12 GB/s. Classic case of system imbalance, pointless drawing frames if the CPU is too slow to process the instructions. Like pairing a 2080 ti with a budget i3.

@NEStalgia Sony will announce their next console is the PS6, retroactively renaming the Pro PS5, hence getting a jump on the competition for next next gen.

Worked for Windows 9, I mean 10.

@Hikingguy Yeah, those 3 years when Wii U and PS4/X1 were out at the same time were "Fake news", Wii U was really supposed to launch instead of the Wii against the PS3 and 360, they just named them wrong at the time.

Vita is also this gen, PSP was last gen, but I figured nobody on here would care as the 3DS is the never-ending generation now.

Edit: oops, reread the post and it sounded like I was being sarcastic towards you, I wasn't, I was just goofing towards Ntinedo, left out my usual string of emojis.

@ReshiramZekrom Well since they're not using them anymore I guess not lol?

@smashboy2000 "And despite what was said by most people"

Your'e making me fearful of reading the rest of my NL email replies.

I realized Wii U was better than PS3 playing Bayonetta. And XCX, despite not having as good of a story as XC, had a better open world game engine than FFXV on PS4. Wii U was certainly ahead of PS3. Id' say only by a little, nto as much as PS4 is ahead of Wii U, but Wii U was better. And I still miss my 2nd screen.

@rjejr LOL that's depressingly believable, actually. And hey, it worked for FF XV too! And on a Sony stage no less! That's it, Knack 4 and God of War 3 (not to be confused with God of War III, that's a different game) will launch on the Playstation 6 in 2020, I'm sure of it!

@rjejr all's good my internet friend

I would say I miss my 2nd screen too, but ya can't miss something that hasen't left yet. Still sitting right next to my Switch

@rjejr I have to admit that from time to time, I also miss the second screen. It would be lovely to have it for some games.

But the fact that I can take my home console in the train is just... wow. Imagine doing that with a PS4.

In fact you don't have to imagine it : https://i.redd.it/cpu294zc3vpz.jpg

@rjejr But, but... 7 ate 9.

@smashboy2000 What is that I can't even.....

@Triforce79 Haha it's just a picture from the internet, that was released a few days after the video of the Switch Reveal, back in october 2016, to mock the controller.
I wish it was a true product too !

@Triforce79 There you go. Here are all the pictures : https://www.technobuffalo.com/2016/10/29/nintendo-switch-controller-makes-for-a-cute-dog-plushie/

And I'm discovering right now thanks to you that there's a true joy-cons attachment inspired by those mock ups :
http://www.nintendolife.com/news/2017/12/the_hyperkin_pupper_switch_joy-con_grip_is_just_too_cute_for_words

😱

While I never played Minecraft on any of those consoles I have enjoyed the Switch Version quite a bit, it is always sad to see the end of an era but it has been a long time coming, well with the Wii U being the exception but there probably aren't enough players to justify supporting that version of the game.

Goodbye, my old friend....

Not quite the end since there's a Limited Run title coming, and probably more Just Dance till Ubisoft give up.

Not to mention the online servers and eShop still live....for now.

"but we're sure a lot of players will miss getting new updates on their consoles of choice"

I am not trying to hate on the Wii U here. I do have one, and did like it while it was out but... is there really anyone who likes it more than current gen systems for something like Minecraft?

I could see the argument for the Wii U Virtual console. That remains the most notable thing the Wii U has that Switch lacks.

If tomorrow Nintendo transplanted that entire selection of games to the Switch, I'd literally probably drop 500+ dollars in a crazy shopping spree. But the difference in those games on the Wii U vs on the Switch is a big one for me.

@Heavyarms55 There's plenty of kids who are lucky to even have last gen consoles. I'm sure Minecraft is a staple for many families still. I plugged my Wii U in last night for the first time in a while and played a round of Splatoon. The match filled surprisingly quick and it was all people named Johnny, Mom, Dad etc. I remembered how much I liked having the little mini game to play between matches.

@NEStalgia

@nintendork64 I have 2 teenage sons in my home and we're all pretty sure that's the real reason no Windows 9.

@Hikingguy My son's robotics team had a SSB4 tournament at school on Friday so my Gamepad is still in the bag. And w/ Christmas coming there's no rush to get it back out. They are talking about using SSBU for their next tournament in the spring.

I was still using the Gamepad a lot for YT but now that Switch has YT I don't need it as much. I do still want to replay Bayonetta 2 on hard, but life is short so I doubt it will ever happen.

And I figured we were good, but it'd been awhile and that reply was mean so I was just making sure.

@frogopus Hey I don't mean that the Wii U doesn't deserve any love. But when I hear the phrase "console of choice" it sounds like their number 1 pick. I imagine that many kids who have a Wii U would love to have a Switch or any of the new consoles, if they had the opportunity. And consoles like 3DS, Wii, Xbox 360, PS2, SNES etc all have huge and iconic libraries that would not surprise me in the slightest as being anyone's favorite. Wii U? Splatoon is probably the most, and possibly the only, real iconic series to trace itself to the system.

And Minecraft is on basically everything at this point, which is what made me question people thinking this is some kind of loss.

@NEStalgia "while also being suitable for withstanding planetary reentry." This made me giggle. XD

@smashboy2000 That's pretty hardcore, and he probably doesn't have to worry about forgetting it on the train.

@Darknyht My son bought your avatar amiibo the other day at the $5 store. It was him or Lucas. I was supposed to go back and buy Lucas but kinda forgot until just now.

ahem

"the PS4 and XB1 have new models"

I think it's funny how so many people complained about the "new" consoles fracturing or fragmenting their base but as far as I know to this day they still play the exact same games. Nintnedo meanwhile put out a "New 3DS" that plays some games the old system can't, yet nary a peep. If PS4 Slim didn't play God of War or Spiderman the internet would have freaked. Hardly anything about XC, one of the best JRPG I've ever played. And the jump from 1S to 1X seems even greater but still no X only games I'm aware of.

Will be curious to see what happens with oft talked about "New Switch". Everybody seems to want one, but what would happen if they got one but their OG Switch doesn't play MP4?

I'm still not entirely convinced the Swtich is any more powerful than a portable Wii U but the name change was sufficient to throw people off the scent. If the Switch had been named Wii U Portable it may have bombed. 4DS may not have fared much better.

Win for Nintendo.

@smashboy2000 Wii U didn't support some common engines, and it was a bit better than the PS3 and 360, but it's not like it was some untapped powerhouse.

The Wii U hardware in 2013 was nothing short of a slap in the face. Games like Bayonetta 2, MK8 and Fast Racing Neo look as good as they do because of great developers that actually care about making good products with the knowledge of where to make cuts to use enhance performance.

Fast Racing Neo was in many ways a standard definition game. Mario Kart 8 looks amazing, especially for a 2014 game, and that's because of the fundamental design of MK using small, static race tracks.

Again, I'm not saying that these games would have been of the same quality on PS3 or 360. I don't believe that to be the case. But it seems that sometimes we underestimate how big the gap between the Wii U and consoles that launched just a year later was.

@Heavyarms55 Considering that the Wii U can play all the Wii, Wii U and especially if someone invested heavily in the VC plus all the potential eShop games, from my perspective the Wii U has the potential to have a pretty massive library of games dating pretty far back in the history of video games across quite a few consoles.

@rjejr That sounds like good times. I wish my school back in the day would have allowed us to bring my Genesis and have a NHL 94 tournament or maybe MK or SFII......
I hear you about YT, but I still find myself using the Wii U for other streaming services.

I am most likely going to be in the minority, but I have no plans on getting SSBU. SSB4 is more than fine for whenever I play it. Most likely if my son was alive, as he loved SSB4, I am 100% sure I would have a few copies under the tree. Besides playing with him, I never really got into SSB myself and the rest of the family seems just fine with what we have. Although to be honest, we never play that game anymore. It has been lots of Splatoon 2.

@Hikingguy That's a fair point. A very good point. But that is largely the Wii U leaning on content that isn't unique to the system. So it gets some of the credit for supporting that content, but not as much as it would get, if it were content specific to the Wii U.

I don't hate the Wii U. I really don't. But when the best parts of a console are largely its support for content from other consoles... It doesn't speak that well in its own favor.

@Hikingguy My wife banned Splatoon 2 from the house after listening to me lose it once too often - the last night my team lost like 17 matches in a row, dropping me from A- to C+ I think - and that was that. I'd still like to play the single player campaign and Octoling expansion in Spaltoon 2, but I'm not paying $80 just for that.

I'm not a fan of Smash either, nor fighting games in general, but the Spirits World of Light mode looks like a nice huge time sink. And I've never played a main line Pokemon game so I'm looking forward to giving Eevee a try. Though after playing DQXI for 150 hours - 2nd final boss now - I'm expecting to be underwhelmed. Though still haven't played XC2 or the expansion. And my family will probably play some Super Mario Party. It's a Very Nintendo Christmas.

ouch, 17 matches in a row..... that is rough!
My wife made me buy her a Switch so she could play Splatoon 2 too with me and my daugher. We all have a good time.

@Heavyarms55 I can see that you definitely do not hate the Wii U.
But for a console that was basically in trouble right out of the gate, it seems, at least to me, that its library of games fared far better than most failed consoles.
By choice I do not own any current generation of consoles besides the Switch, so from the outside looking in, it appears that most consoles, one way or another, lean on legacy content and/or just release new iterations of popular franchises. This just seems pretty standard quo.
For brand new content....well, for most consoles, they have to go back to the first few generations. I mean Nintendo has made a pretty good business out of rehashing legacy content. Sprinkling in new ones here and there over the years. Some seem to stick (Splatoon), some are still struggling to find a larger audience (ARMS). But, at least at this point in time, all of Switch's biggest sellers are either direct or enhanced ports or solid franchises already. Or some combination of both.
I mean what is on the horizon? New Super Mario Bros. U Deluxe, (Nintendo did not even bother to drop the U in that one) Metroid 4, Animal Crossing, Pikmin?
As far as new or exclusive (for the time at least) the Wii U got Super Mario Maker (that is kind of a new spin on good old Mario), Splatoon (totally new), Bayonetta 2, Wonderful 101, NES Remix is sort of a different thing, Nintendo Land, Pokkén Tournament, Lego City Undercover ...I am sure there are more, but these are some off the top of my head. I mean even Kirby and the Rainbow Curse might be a tough one to bring over 1 to 1.
I do not play CoD games but the Wii U even got a few of those. I am pretty sure Switch does not have one of those....yet. But I am sure someone over there must smell a new revenue stream.
I think the Wii U has more going for it than only content from classic consoles, but that definitely is a big bonus.
But it sure does seems like Nintendo is more than willing to wring every last drop out of the Wii U with the Switch. I am sort of particular about which games I will re-buy if I already own it on the Wii U.
The main point with video games is to waste some time and have some fun from life's daily grind.

@rjejr I just picked up the first Splatoon finally for Wii U. Should be here for my vacation days next week. I never really bothered with it because I mostly played on the gamepad, but I wanted to mess around with the single player stuff. Going to keep my eyes out for the Amiibos or some unofficial card knockoffs, so that I can possibly get the challenge modes.

This generation has been anything but typical, almost like the 16-bit era but without the Transformers: Combiner vibe to it. I still laugh when I see pictures of the Sega Genesis or TG-16 with all the many attachments to them.

@Hikingguy I get where you are coming from. I really do. All good points.

But honestly, for me, everything on Wii U that I liked, I'd rather have on Switch. The one game on Wii U that did get ported, that I had, was Scribblenaughts.

I hear you! Do not get me wrong. I enjoy my Switch and I do not live in a delusional world, the Switch is the future. Lately the eShop has had a lot of games cross over that I never got around to buying on the Wii U but I might still be interested in and if there is a sale and I have a choice between buying the game on the Wii U or Switch, I will normally buy it on the Switch.

@smashboy2000 "way more powerful" is a bit of a stretch, and the efforts spent on GamePad/second screen stuff further drew hardware resources away. There's a reason DKC Tropical Freeze would turn the GamePad screen off entirely; they wanted max resources focused on what was happening on the TV.

Also, many games ran in 720p on Wii U.