At E3 this year, Ubisoft revealed Just Dance 2020 for Switch, PS4, Xbox One, the upcoming Google Stadia, and Wii. Yes, an almost 13-year-old console is still being treated to the newest releases of one of gaming's biggest franchises.
The Wii first arrived on the scene back in 2006; the original model was discontinued in 2011, while the later, lower-priced horizontal variant lasted until 2013. The Wii Mini was available for a good while longer, but by this point, Nintendo was well and truly focused on the Wii U - which isn't getting Just Dance 2020, you'll notice.
Speaking to The Telegraph, Ubisoft EMEA executive director Alain Corre says that the company is happy to be "the last soldier standing" and to be publishing the last game for the console.
“I think we are the last soldier standing! We are the last game on the Wii and we are happy about that as there still a lot of fans wanting to play on it."
Whether or not any more games release for Wii in the future remains to be seen, of course, although we imagine that if anything else does launch for the remote-waggling wonder it'll more than likely be the inevitable Just Dance 2021.
He goes on to say that Just Dance 2020 "will be one of the best games on the Switch".
"Now we see they are going to the Switch and at the end of the year that Just Dance 2020 will be one of the best games on the Switch because there are more and more families playing on it, as it was in the Wii times.”
We'll find out if that truly is the case when the game launches this November.
[source telegraph.co.uk, via videogameschronicle.com]
Comments 49
@ReaderRagfish this game has an audience of teenage girls. I doubt they are hacking their Wii's to play homebrew and pirate games.
@ReaderRagfish Considering the audience, nah.
Anyway, it isn't like last year's version was in a different scenario, and Ubisoft still found it worthwhile to release another game.
Good for them, but I'm not gonna be buying it.
I don't want Just Dance from Ubisoft. 😒
I want Imagine series, Petz series, localized Japanese Switch games by Ubisoft. 😊
Dance Dance Revolution from Konami is far more interesting than Just Dance from Ubisoft. 😏
I'm holding out for 2021.
@ReaderRagfish this game sale a couple of hundred thousand copies every year on the Wii
It is still profitable for them
" ...that Just Dance 2020 will be one of the best games on the Switch"
Hahaha, yeah... never gonna happen. Just Dance has always been disposable crap for a limited target audience, and it always will be.
@AxeltheCorvikni @Susurrus Both of you are forgetting the parents, who have probably already hacked their family's Wii and/or several Wii's for other family members and/or friends, or who will simply ask their hacker friends/co-workers who hacked their Wii for them, for a pirated copy of that latest version of Just Dance for their precious little girl, because they're either too cheap or too lazy to go and buy it in the store...
Every year, people are surprised it's releasing on the Wii lol.
I’m glad this didn’t end up being the Wii U’s last game. The poor thing has suffered enough.
WHAT ABOUT WIIU?!
@ReaderRagfish umm Just Dance Wii was the best selling version in recent years
@manu0 I’ve also heard hospitals use it for physical therapy.
Good on them for still supporting the Wii and indirectly Wii U (backward compatibility) long after the life cycle. I sometimes have to remind myself that not everyone upgrades to the latest consoles (like 4 of my relatives) and if articles like This is anything to go by, there is still a demand for it.
@graysoncharles I do. I have modded plenty of Wii's, I know plenty of other people who also did, or who had it done by someone else.
I'm also well within the "parent" age group, so it's not like all of us are either illiterate or not able to understand or perform a simple hack, so to me, it would seem to be a bit short-sighted to simply dismiss parents as (supposedly) not being able or willing to soft-mod a console, based on the fact that the primary user of said console might be a young child, who may not have these skills.
That doesn't mean that the parents don't, and that was basically all I was saying.
Please, just put Just Dance 2021 on Wii. It would give the Wii a longer lifespan for games than the PS2, and I really want to see that.
Just Dance will release on Wii until all of Ubisoft's dev units are either destroyed or don't work anymore.
@Vicki_S I might be wrong but I think Just Dance 2019 was already the last game released on Wii U
@ReaderRagfish If they're still releasing, it's because it's still profitable.
Brought last years for the kids on the Wii so i keep the Switch dance free
@Matthew010
Ubisoft have to release Just Dance Wii Forever. 😆
Oh how I miss the blue glow of the Wii disc drawer telling me there was something exciting happening!
I also miss those lovely Channels. I used to read news from around the world on the news channel every day when I was having breakfast. I wish Nintendo would release them all as apps.
@RadioHedgeFund : I really miss those apps as well. Having headlines and current weather displayed on the home menu was so handy, and I liked how all of the news stories would load at once, so there wouldn't be any loading screens when browsing through the top stories.
For a time, and it feels like so long ago, the Wii was a little piece of magic, and was so promising that I finally caved in to console gaming (though I still prefer portable and PC). I still yearn for a Switch port of Bully with the incredibly fun motion controls intact. What a great game that was to introduce me to the Wii, and home console gaming in general (Wii Sports notwithstanding, but I had a library of four games before I had even purchased the Wii).
@Silly_G I wish Nintendo would publish a remake of Wii Sports Resort on Switch. I’d buy that in a second.
@chardir Not sure, but I hope not. Let it die with some dignity.
I still got my Wii and is planning to buy this game for it. There are still a few of my folks in the family still playing the Wii so this is good news to them.
They actually keep releasing wii games for hospitals. Lots and lots of hospitals still use wiis
"Just Dance 2020 will be one of the best games on the Switch"
...LMAO...what? Sure, whatever. xD
@Anti-Matter I hope Ubisoft at least releases 2-3 more Just Dance games on Wii. See, I'm one of those people still buying Wii games including Just Dance as I was a late adopter of the Wii (I got mine for Christmas 2011, less than a year before the Wii U came out). So for all these years throughout the Wii U and now the Switch's lifespan I've been buying up all the Wii games I wanted to play years ago but never got to like Kirby's Return To Dreamland, Super Mario Galaxy 1 and 2, and even Wii Sports which I only got last year as it didn't come with my Wii and mine instead came with New Super Mario Bros Wii. I recently got my first Just Dance game late year as well when I got Just Dance 2018 for Wii. I've really had fun playing it so far and I'm glad Ubisoft is still supporting the series on Wii that way I know I'll still have some future Wii games to look forward to.
@graysoncharles I don't even know which hack I originally used. I do believe it was the same one, if it involves a Zelda save game, but later on, I did a fresh softmod with the Letterbomb hack, which works for all Wii's, without any issues on any game.
@RadioHedgeFund : An enhanced port/remake of Wii Sports Club with the addition of the Resorts activities would be amazing. I've been itching for a proper new instalment since the Switch was announced.
I'm also quite annoyed with Nintendo for publishing games similar to their own back catalogue without producing new instalments of their own. For example, Go Vacation instead of new Wii Sports, the rubbish Little Friends: Cats and Dogs instead of a new Nintendogs game, and Fitness Boxing instead of Wii Fit. I refuse to settle for pale imitations, and I hope that this isn't a sign that Nintendo are abandoning some of their more casual IP.
Wii is still big, care homes, certain wards at hospitals.
Those just dance games are really big with old folks and young girls.
I genuinely wouldn't be surprised if the sales surpassed 1m
It is amazing how the Wii's casual audience appeal was so strong that they managed to pump out these Just Dance games every year until 2020.
@Silly_G Personally I enjoyed Fitness Boxing more than Wii Fit and I like how Nintendo isn't just releasing the same Wii games over and over again.
Just Dance is my guilty pleasure, love playing this with my girlfriend. Neckbeards wouldn't understand
Thank you Ubisoft. No need for a Wii U version as the Wii games play perfectly on Wii U
@ReaderRagfish the original Switch has been hacked wide open so expect to see that version pirated on day one too.
Nintendo's really missing an opportunity by not reviving Wii Sports and Wii Fit on Switch.
No surprises here, the Wii represents a good portion of the sales of these games and it's on its way to surpass PS2's game support if Just dance 2021 gets released which is very likely. Crazy to think they axed Wii U support so soon but business is business
@JayJ : And I am not by any means suggesting that these games don't have their place (except Little Friends, which is rubbish), but they should not take the place of Nintendo's own IP, which is where my concern lies as Nintendo themselves have been publishing these games.
My poor little Wii probably misses me, so I'm totally buying this for it.
Wait what? Just Dance is "one of gaming's biggest franchises"?! You must be kidding me. It's a throw away title that is sold to middle age women in the checkout aisle of clothing stores and you are lumping it in with the likes of Super Mario, Call of Duty, Pokemon, Grand Theft Auto, Legend of Zelda etc?
@Silly_G I think Nintendo has been very open to developers they like since the Wii era, back then there was a lot of Wiiware titles that Nintendo published for interesting concepts and things outside of the norm for them. The DS and 3DS has seen the same type of developments. It isn't bad thing IMO so long as they maintain a high standard with the games they publish.
I still have my Wii and I would love for a new Wii game to come out that I'd actually want. No offense to Just Dance fans, but it's just not my thing. Of course this would make absolutely no sense from a business stand point, but it would be funny and cool if Nintendo made a 2D game based on the origins of Splatoon's Inkopolis. I can see it now, "Captain Cuttlefish for the Wii in 2020!" It would be worth it just to hear people flip out, "wut about muh Switch version?!"
"...Nintendo was well and truly focused on the Wii U - which isn't getting Just Dance 2020, you'll notice."
No need anyway. After all, the Wii U was backward compatible. Hell we could even get it to play GCgames (iso anyway)
@ReaderRagfish Considering how well it sells on the Wii even in the most recent iterations, it's incredibly hard to believe it's a mistake for a production with such low development expenses. Even in recent years it's still the best selling version of the title, although I wouldn't be shocked to find out that Switch now outsells it (An unreliable site for sales figures would suggest it now does, dropping the Wii sku to a still respectable 2nd place).
Most of the budget each year is for the licenses, which aren't platform specific. They have a ready-made game engine on the Wii, a formula that doesn't change each year, a large base of loyal casual customers, and the selling power to get a Wii release on to retailer shelves even in 2019.
As long as it keeps pushing a quarter of a million copies each year in North America and Europe, I suspect Ubisoft will be happy to keep refreshing the song lineup and producing a Wii version. It wouldn't shock me even to see a slight uptick in sales this year on the Wii if the added sales from Wii U owners left without a native option (Last year pushed 100,000 copies on Wii U, I believe I read) compensate for attrition on the Wii as customers tire of the formula, retire their console, or shift to buying for another platform.
@chardir Axiom Verge was released physically on Wii U this year, if that means anything.
They should Just Stop.
The only games I pirate on every installment are the Wii versions of Just Dance. I only spent money on the 2014 version, but it's great for parties, friend gatherings full of alcohol, etc., so it´s cool to have the new tracks.
Still, the Wii versions are literally the same game every year. The only change between them are the title screen and the songs. And that's the only feature. No alternate modes, no online, nothing. It's as bare-bones as it gets.
Smart move. The wii is truly one of the best ways to place Just Dance and so many corporations still have the wii console and it is amazing they can get a new updated version of Just Dance. Good on Ubisoft. And clearly a smart investment move to since: https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2019/05/mario_kart_wii_sold_five_times_as_many_copies_as_mario_kart_8_over_the_last_financial_year
Anyway good on you, Ubisoft.
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