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Topic: Why not more HD versions of Wii games?

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gcunit

I've recently been building my Wii collection like nobody's business and have around 70 games now. Admittedly a few are 'casuals' (I've got 4 of the Just Dance games), but mostly they're a great mix of various types of game, and many of them are less known and were exclusive to the system at the time.

Correct me if I'm wrong but making an HD version of a game, and perhaps (but not necessarily) adding a few extra flourishes, doesn't cost a developer much (all the thinking has been done so it's just a case of re-working the graphical assets, many of which I would guess would have been designed at higher resolutions than what the Wii output anyway), but there's very few HD versions available on the Wii U (I'm thinking Zelda WW & TP, Gunman Clive, Mighty Switch Force...).

What about games like A Boy and His Blob, Little King's Story, Kororinpa, Zack & Wiki? These are all highly thought-after games that would get newcomers and double-dippers interested.

A Boy and His Blob and Little King's Story even have PC releases now/soon (presumably with improved graphics compared to the Wii original) so why haven't they come to Wii U too?

I know the install base isn't great, but it's still enough to make money from with a great game, but developers don't seem to be leveraging these great games' legacies enough.

Edited on by gcunit

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shani

gcunit wrote:

Correct me if I'm wrong but making an HD version of a game, and perhaps (but not necessarily) adding a few extra flourishes, doesn't cost a developer much (all the thinking has been done so it's just a case of re-working the graphical assets, many of which I would guess would have been designed at higher resolutions than what the Wii output anyway)

I think that's the main point many people (at least those who never saw software development from the 'inside') tend to get wrong. Doing a remake isn't that easy or cost- or effortless. It still takes a lot of time/resources if you want to get it right.
For example, all the textures for TPHD were remade, that means several graphic designers spent tons of hours creating those textures. And there are a lot of textures in every video game, let alone a Zelda game.
Also, while modifying the gameplay or correcting things the developers may stumble upon difficulties because of things they didn't think of during the original development. Or maybe after modifying, debugging may take a lot of time (and testers who find the bugs).
The same can go for changing the controls and every other kind of adjustment.

I'm not saying that doing a remaster takes as much time as creating a new game and the amount of needed resources/time surely varies depending on the game we're talking about.
But even if a remaster takes less time and people than creating a new game from scratch, it still takes time and people. So doing a lot of remasters would surely block Nintendo's development teams from working on current/new projects.

That said, I'd like to see a few more HD remasters, most and foremost of Skyward Sword. But also a few other games.
What I don't get is why Nintendo is the only developer remastering their Wii games. There were tons of good third party games on the Wii and not a single one of them gets remastered.

Edited on by shani

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Chandlero

@shani is completely right: A HD remake takes time and resources and those things are always rare. But I don't get why Nintendo don't use the power of the WiiU to render old games in 1080p. That is a thing that doesn't require changing the games or textures. Everybody who had seen Skyward Swords in 1080p just wants to play it again.

Edited on by Chandlero

Sticker

Answer: Because they can release it on Wii U Eshop for 19 dollars instead of wasting time for a HD remaster.

Edited on by Sticker

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Is Nintendo Life even that good of a fourm anyways?

"Sparks" wrote:

prolly full of 6 year olds tbh

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Ryu_Niiyama

They are only going to do remasters of games that will return decent revenue or drum up interest in a future product in that series. The Zelda remakes not only make great place holders till Zelda U comes out but they are also almost easy revenue streams (make a great game ...even with the zelda cycle...look and play better, even people that hate Nintendo take notice). No different than all the HD remakes on the Ps3/ps4...those are games that sold well in their time and if you look at when they came out they were either stopgaps or hype builders anyway. Plus the games you listed while cult classics are not good revenue streams. If they were just doing HD remakes regardless of prior sales we would have gotten FZero GX HD already. Also almost all of those games were made by smaller devs (may have had bigger publishers that won't revisit); that is the great thing about being a hardware dev/software dev/publisher all in one as they can consider taking the risk. Personally I wish companies had the guts to remake rather than remaster games (but again I understand the financial risk).

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