Topic: How will Nintendo make it up to Wii U owners?

The news about NX's release and the Zelda U delay is quite a disappointment for me. IMHO, we're left with the worst of both worlds. NX won't be available for quite some time. But in the meantime, Wii U support will be minimal as all effort focuses on NX. For now, we can forget about big budget releases like Zelda for the Wii U. We'll still get Paper Mario and — speculatively — Animal Crossing.

But Nintendo are smart and know they shouldn't $#^@ over their loyal Wii U buyers. How should they regain our goodwill without going broke? Here are some possibilities.

• $300 in eShop credit towards 1st party games for all Wii U owners. That's just 5-6 games, but that amount effectively says "we'll pay for your Wii U so you can buy the NX". Without spending any hard cash.
• HD remakes of ancient Zelda titles. It's the 30th anniversary, after all. Farm out the work to 3rd parties: HD Ocarina of Time, Majora's Mask, A Link to the Past, Minish Cap. They can even expand on work done for the 3DS remakes. While cheaper than building new titles from scratch, a HD treatment of really old titles will be quite interesting. Going from 480p to 720p is no big deal, but going from 240p to 1080p will be.
• Seriously beef up the VC with long-requested titles. Where's my next Earthbound?

Well, we can daydream. What would you like to see?

Nintendo should've been dropping bi-monthly GameCube remasters for Wii U ages ago.

As a day-one Wii U owner, I don't feel Nintendo owes us anything. Since the NX is releasing in March 2017, the Wii U will have a 4 1/2 year lifespan, which is only half a year less than normal. If you look at the last year of any console's lifespan support is minimal, as they are preparing for the next console. I understand why Wii U owners may be mad (especially ones that have only had it for 1 or 2 years) but this isn't honestly that abnormal.

And $300 in 1st-party Eshop credit is crazy. :/

$300? I'd say $500 and a PS4!

jk

I don't think I'm owed anything as Day One purchase and 50 retail games later I'm happy with the system. Do I want to see it sunset? No but I get it. All I want is good launches for color splash and perhaps an new game announcement or two at E3. I do hope they keep putting out gba and ds VC games though.

Between retail, eShop, and Virtual Console games, I own 53 Wii U titles. There are many more that I'd like to have, and I'd be lucky if I had the time to buy — let alone finish — them before the NX comes out. Nintendo doesn't owe me anything.

Nintendo don't need to do anything, I've gotten enough out of both the Wii U and 3DS. The Wii U in particular. Do I think it needs upgrading now? Well no. I would have liked to see a few more games on it. IMO the hardware is good enough that I could've easily gone another couple of years without wanting or needing the NX. But if they're retiring it? So be it. Doesn't bother me.

With that said there are some things I'd like to see them do. I don't want to have to pay full price for VC games I've already purchased. They know which ones I've brought, they don't have to charge me again. And the same should be true for any other games they bring over. If they're going to do Wii U ports for the NX let me play those games on the NX if I've already brought them.

I do agree with this wholeheartedly.

And if Kimishima wants to come over and make me a grilled cheese or whatever, that's cool.

Nintendo doesn't owe us Wii U owners anything. A lot of us who got the Wii U knew what we were getting into: a lackluster, horrendously misunderused console/gamepad with solid exclusives. Wii U still has arguably the best exclusives of this generation for consoles...and that's STILL laughable at best with the NX on the horizon that is gonna make the Wii U software output likely look like child's play.

The rest of us (myself included in the latter) were early adopters that got the system at launch because that's just what we do as Nintendo fans. Doesn't mean were blind to the above (I 'knew' the console was going to be horrendously bad for Nintendo once I saw the price), but it didn't mean we still didn't have fun times with it.

The Wii U was and will be known as another one of Nintendo's failed experiments gone wrong, unfortunately (joining the likes of Virtual Boy, eReader, etc.). While I wouldn't necessarily call it as bad as the VB, as the Wii U is best compared to the Dreamcast in every way possible, it was still way too clunky and unnecessary for its time.

A $150 GamePad? $300-350 Console at launch that was only made that expensive because of a underutilized GamePad? The writing was there on the walls before the console came out, and Nintendo knew that long before any of us did.

As a Wii U owner I don't feel that I'm owed anything. I bought the system knowing it was dead last among the big 3 and had little to no 3rd party support. I don't regret my purchase because the system has games that I love to play and there are still Wii U games that will hold me over. Not to mention I still have a crap load of games I gotta play from other consoles that I own, so the news wasn't as crushing for me anyways.

Backwards Compatibility, that is all I want as a day 1 Wii U owner. Not restarting VC and having digital Wii games still work and become VC titles would be nice. Mostly I just want backwards compatibility.

@DefHalan: It's gonna be a forward-thinking console, so I have many doubts Nintendo will be too concerned with backwards-compatibility if it will be too expensive for them to do. They did mention after all that it won't be a "simple replacement for Wii U and 3DS" too multiple times.

I can't see Nintendo bothering to maintain BC because the NX looks like something we haven't ever seen before at all. I'm going to guess that is why they're making it so easy to port and make games on it: so we don't see anymore noticeable software droughts.

They can still maintain VC in some form (i.e. Subscription service for an entire back catalog of games from NES to Wii U), but I don't think that would be there from launch, honestly.

@Aethradon: I know it sounds weird, but Backwards Compatibility is Forward Thinking.

I think Nintendo has been more than supporting of the Wii U. Dreamcast sold more per month than Wii U ever did, and they still canned it early. 4 1/2 is super long in todays world. Our dish washer broke recently, after 6 years. When we talked to the vendor he said they are built to last 4-5 years. And we bought one of the better on the market at the time. Why are we expecting a hobby gadget to last longer than appliances?

If anything, get used to even shorter cycles. A console might have an expected life of 5 years in the future, but they will probably get more revisions during a single cycle. I think this is part of the "multiple form factors" and "apple like eco-system" (paraphrasing) Nintendo has talked about.

Maybe you shouldn't have bought a Wii U if you feel that you're owed something. This is why I don't buy any consoles on day 1, and instead I wait until it has enough games that I want to play.

@Therad:
Well, shorter cycles doesn't necessarily mean we should get "used" to what's happening to the Wii U. My guess is that the Wii U will be the last home console to end in this way. And therefore the NX will be the last home console launch.

In 2020 your 2013 model PS4? Well it'll still play Uncharted 5 but it won't be the best experience. If you want the higher resolution textures and better framerates? You better be running a 2016 model PS4 or newer. Does this idea scare the hell out of console gamers? Well sure.... but everyone else has done it for ages and, quite frankly, it's a better model

Here's a graphic about first party games released on Nintendo systems over the years: https://twitter.com/ZhugeEX/status/725469891948634113/photo/1

Looking at it you can see that the situation this fiscal year is far better than what it was in 2008 and the number of Wii U first-party titles looks to be the same this year as it was for the Wii on 2010 which is two years before Nintendo dropped first party support for the console. So yeah, I don't think Nintendo ows us nothing when it comes to first-party titles at least.

I was a day one buyer too and don't feel as though I'm owed anything! The quality of games I've enjoyed on this console take me back to my misspent youth, playing the GameCube! Yeah, it's had its issues (who remembers the original OS?) and 3rd party support had been embarrassing, but I've had a LOT of fun playing some truly magical titles, Super Mario 3D world, MK8, DKTF, Pikmin 3, Captain Toad, Yoshis Wooly World, Hyrule Warriors, and now Star Fox! I'm certainly missing some! Also, 2x Zelda remakes. In the last 2 years, I've played every cannon Zelda game! What's not to love

If I could have an older (=cheaper) model of one of the consoles, it would mean I at least theoretically would spend more money on software for that machine.

@Nego:
I love that spike in 2004 for the GBA. That was the year that they released a whole bunch of NES ports to the GBA. If you included the VC and other downloadable titles on later platforms it's a bit more lopsided. Nintendo's output has actually increased over the years.

The issue is the third party support....