Video: Check Out These Canned Game Prototypes for Wii From Red Fly Studio

Arkham Asylum looks better in motion than I thought it would. Was also surprised to see more than four enemies on screen at one point.

Not really familiar with the other games, but holy crap I would've never imagined Arkham Asylum of all games to be running on the Wii. Looks and plays surprisingly similar to the original, given the Wii's graphical prowess. Controls look like a pain though — maybe that's why it was canned.

To be honest, this Wii version doesn't look bad at all.

That's like asking if I ever wanted to see Arkham Asylum running on a PS2... Maybe that wouldn't have been so bad; the Spiderman games on PS2 did fine. But hot damn, was the atmosphere ever improved by the boost to PS3/PC. And by God, those unfinished animations are stilted on the old tech. I can see why this version never happed- it would have looked awful.

What the hell is up with Dante's face on the Devil May Cry test version? It looks like a punched-in... "dumb" counterpart of his PS2 self. There's motion blur, and the frame rate is strangely low. (The frame rate could just be Youtube's fault, though.) That game was crisp, and running at 60 FPS on the PS2. That's a really shoddy port job, even for an early build.

That Dig Dug reboot, on the other hand, looks really good for an early build. It looks like it would impart a sense of "now where do I go," though. The main character's face really needed changing, too. It's way too scrunched and pointy. That seems to be a theme with these faces...

A Tie Fighter vs. X-Wing remake or sequel done in the style of Rogue Squadron/Leader would have been glorious. Too bad that never went through. That one is easily the most well done of the bunch here.

For being demos (that is unfinished and unpolished) are not bad! That's just proves that the Wii could have had great AAA 3d party games and not the poor excuses they gave us. And that just proves why I don't trust Third Parties when they approach Nintendo.

I really enjoyed the Wii, and well, honestly every other Nintendo system out there since the NES (well not sure about VB), but I'm really starting to wish that Nintendo would keep up with the others with power and such already. No wonder third parties have had trouble for the past two generations.

Let's put this way. The wii and the wii u was not a underpowered systems. They could run mulitplats like COD, ASSCRED, Battlefield games. Problem is that the devs have to spend more money to find other programmers to port these games on the nintendo system. Wii u could easy get metal gear solid 5, shadow of morder, battlefield 4 and 1, wwe 2k games why because they these games are also on last gen (xbox 360 and ps3.) The wii u is more powerful than PS3 and 360. And please don't tell because the 360 and ps3 have a bigger install base. Bayonetta 2 sold over a million sales. Its not the hardware its the devs.

@PlywoodStick

"It was a shoddy port" what the hell did you expect after only a few weeks' work with DMC, perfection??

This just proves that, if a console sells extremely well, they will always port.

@therealgamer Shadow of Mordor, Battlefield 1, and Metal Gear Solid 5 on the Wii? Oh hell no... Those are definitely cases of 6th gen hardware not being able to handle those games and their vision.

@mikegamer Of course not. But I certainly wouldn't expect Dante's face to look so... "derpy." You did see it, right?

Star Wars game looked pretty cool. Dig Dug was a little weak, but it still looked fun. Would have been fleshed out, I assume.

@PlywoodStick So how the hell the xbox 360 and ps3 run metal gear solid 5, battlefield 4 (even the 360 and PS3 can run battlefield 1) and shadow of mordor. Do you know why becasue these games are not NEXT GEN GAMES. THEY ARE LAST GEN GAMES. THEY USE THE SAME ENGINE AND THEY JUST CHANGE THE RESLOUTION AND SOME TEXTURES. The wii u is more powerful than xbox 360 and 360 can run metal gear solid 5 and GTA with 256 mb of ram and the wii u have 1gb of ram.

Red Fly was really good when it came to making Wii versions of HD games. Ghostbusters and TFU were highly competent. They also created Mushroom Men which was pretty good.

The mere idea of Arkham Asylum on Wii makes me weep. Not because it's too bad, but rather because it's too good. Too good to be true... that's the third-party support the Wii deserved. What the Wii got instead was a complete wagglefest of shovelware with a few exceptions thrown in.

@therealgamer Sorry, I didn't see the U after Wii when I read your post at first. My bad... The topic article is about the Wii, so that's how I made that mistake.

But yeah, it still wouldn't have happened on the Wii U unless it had sold much better. Porting to the Wii U is a lot harder than porting to PS360. There's several years of experience and knowhow in developing for PS360 multiplatforms, but not so much on Wii U.

http://www.extremetech.com/gaming/137746-nintendo-tears-down-wii-u-to-show-off-single-chip-ibmamd-cpu-gpu

Meanwhile, the Wii U has the GamePad (which draws processing power from the system), a really outdated CPU (which is actually weaker than the PS3's "Cell" CPU), and no internal HDD being used (it would have been a chore for every higher end game to need some data offloaded onto the onboard flash memory or an extrernal drive, or else suffer from slow optical disc load times). The GPU and RAM in the Wii U can compete with PS360 handily, but it's CPU is based on 6th gen tech, not 7th gen tech. So that all makes porting to the Wii U more difficult than porting to PS360.

The Wii was patently an underpowered system, though. It was using updated versions of some late 90's tech in it. (You know, the stuff used in the Gamecube?) What can I say, the truth hurts...

@gizmoto It seems that functionally, it's well done for the amount of time spent on it. But looks? Nope, even a straight rip from the PS2 would have looked better. Have you played the original DMC before, as a reference?

@gizmoto The cutscene in the beginning had some really weird angling and perspective going on. The cathedral itself is way too bright, without a hint of gloominess. The original DMC used a more muted color scheme throughout the levels that didn't contrast too much with each other. In this test version, there's way too much contrast going on with the clashing shiny red and dark gold colors.

The level design seems simpler here, and it uses a typical 3D field with a fluid camera. If you remember, the original DMC used the stylized "set piece angles/perspective" with a more rigid camera, reminiscent of the classic Resident Evil series, as per Shinji Mikami.

They didn't use the sound effects of the PS2 original for some reason, they just used stock generic ones, that sounded rather bland. (I'm guessing Capcom hadn't given them the rights to the PS2 original's sound effects?)

The battle music (and the original's flow of battle, for that matter) is completely missing here. The cathedral music is not ripped from the PS2 original (again, probably didn't have the rights), and it's not mixed anywhere near as well as the original.

All told, I'd say it's barely recognizable. And DMC was released in 2001, it was old even by the time the Wii first came out. It doesn't seem like the vision of the original was being followed here at all, and that's not a matter of the amount of time spent on it.

@DarthNocturnal Lol, I'm glad to see someone else noticed that. That's always a nice litmus test, to see who actually recognizes classic PC games or not...

@PtM http://www.gamefaqs.com/wii/939633-star-wars-the-force-unleashed

http://www.gamefaqs.com/company/43652-krome-studios

Yep, @NintendoLife done goofed. Too much burning the midnight oil, I suspect?

i liked the digdug but how they did it was aweful gameplay wise it seems to tedious but i do like how the goal is no longer all them but just the big boss now.

The Wii might have been 2 GameCube's duct taped together, but I can't think of a PS3/360 game that wowed me as much as Xenoblade.

@PtM Just to show Krome Studios' other games... Such as the not-as-sharp-as-desired Blade Kitten...

There were open world games for the DS, so why not Wii. More cartoony look is always an option if the hardware can't handle realistic style.

@PlywoodStick the GameCube was higher spec than PS2 and the Wii was higher spec than the GameCube. But it still could have been technical issues that kept this from being released. Maybe there will be interviews with the developers one day which will provide more details.

I think that the Switch will remedy the challenge of multiplatform ports, because of the more modern chip architecture and API support etc.
The biggest challenges for getting ports will be (in a lesser way) the power of the system and (more so) the probable difficulty in building a large install base.

I actually feel disappointed that I'll never get that Dig Dug game. It reminds me of your average N64 platformer. I like it!

These are amazing, I wish they had batter fortune in completing these projects. I also hope the Switch will invite 3rd parties to once again venture to put everything on the system.

@PlywoodStick these prototypes represent a few weeks of work, they're not a representative of the final product if it ever happened. Can you imagine what the games would look like after a year of work with a full team?

The Arkham footage is more Origins Blackgate than Asylum, especially the stiff, stilted animation is a dead ringer. But in the end, stripped-down ports that only served to highlight the Wii's technical limitations is probably the last thing it needed.

I'm heartbroken to learn of a modern Dig Dug that never materialized!

I'm a huge fan, and it's one of the franchises I'd give my left arm to work on a revival of. D:

That Dig Dug looks horrendous.

I would've totally played that Batman when I had my Wii.

Man, that Dig Dug reboot actually looked awesome. I'm sad the video ended before he got to pop the giant dragon...

I would have bought all of these. Arkham Asylum looks glorious, and playing with the nunchuck wii remote setup.... a dream!!! Oh what a shame.

Looks like they were rebuilding DMC from the ground up based on the video. If that is a case then not bad at all (especially if they are trying to include the Style System from 3/4) even if it looks a bit early to say the least.

I would have gotten Batman AA and xwing vs tie fighter 2 for sure!

The Wii is by far my favorite system. All the great memories this system provided makes it my favorite system.

I can't help but be impressed to see Arkham Asylum, a favourite game of mine on PS3, running on Wii. With a bit more love and care I do think it could have been a competent version of the game. I'd imagine it would be fun to use the Wii remote to aim with Batman's weapons.

That Wii Batman looks kind of terrible, which makes me wish it was actually released. I am coming to terms with my masochistic gaming tendencies.

Something seems just a little bit off about the Devil May Cry game. I know it's a port of the original, but something there isn't right and rubs me the wrong way.

LOL when those lasers just froze mid-air in the Tie Fighter one! KYLO REN CONFIRMED. I'd actually think this one would be awesome on Wii, all things considered!

OH GOD, WHAT HAVE THEY DONE TO MY BELOVED DIG DUG?! I'm SO glad that catastrophe didn't come out! I love Dig Dug, it's my absolute favorite arcade game, but this thing looks horrible! The perspective is totally wonky, the underground tunnels appear in a layer closer to the screen than the actual DIRT (which makes SOOOOOO much sense. Not.), the harpoon looks more like an eel, and it can travel SO far through the dirt. In the original, you could only travel through very thin dirt, but that one has like no limit. And those segment transitions, BLEUGH!! That game looks like trash. I'll stick with my Dig Dug Arrangement, thank you.

@Minotaurgamer the fact that your comment has 7 likes is depressing. Keep "blaming" the 3rd parties if you want to. Nintendo made the bed they are laying in, and that includes the types of games 3rd parties brought to Wii. When your whole pitch is Wii Sports and single handed motion gaming, you're not exactly setting yourself up for sustained long term success. case in point: every year since 2010.

@Azikira
Haha, I'm right with you on the tunnels appearing to be layered on top of the dirt. That makes no sense, and probably only happened because It's MUCH easier to do it that way, when what you're making is just a tech demo.

Had it been picked up, I'm sure they'd have been asked to "tighten up the graphics on level three."

@electrolite77 Not so much to take away from your point since I agree with 3rd parties not selling well on the Wii, No More Heroes was a flop on all platforms it was on arguably even more so on PS3 (and especially 360). Probably more because it was extremely niche (and gimmicky) rather than the platform choice itself. I think Muramasa (and Call of Duty as seen below) would be a better example as the Vita version outsold the Wii version by quite a bit (despite the much smaller install base).

It's unfortunate but the Wii actually did have a lot of quality 3rd party games, unfortunately very few actually sold well.

Before anyone tries to say Call of Duty, Modern Warfare Reflex edition only sold 1.51mil compared to the 9.31mil and 6.68mil for Modern Warfare on Xbox360 and PS3 respectively. This is even more telling when you realize that the Wii had a higher install base than both platforms combined.

@Ballzilla I agree for the Dig Dug reboot and the Tie Fighter vs X-Wing remake/sequel, those could have been amazing. I think Arkham Asylum would have suffered too much from the technical shortfall, though; Devil May Cry's audience is on PlayStation, and this rendition doesn't seem to follow the original vision, so that would have been a miss.

@gizmoto Ah hah, I figured that would be your response- an effective way to shut down criticism. In any case, professional design is above my pedigree, by far. However, I can point out patterns of design just looking at the two side by side. Just about anyone can do that. To be fair, one can tell that the DMC assets were likely not available for Red Fly's perusal. That Dante face is still cringeworthy, though.

They all looked pretty good i would have snapped them up if released.

@Azikira I pointed out all the things wrong with this rendition of DMC in an earlier comment- your senses aren't fooling you.

@gatorboi352 At least we did get some fairly unique third party titles on the Wii, like the Trauma Center series. And I would swear by Remote & Nunchuk over a "Peasant Pad" for FPS titles any day.

If that Arkham Asylum had come out, it would've just reminded everyone how weak the Wii specs were versus the PS3 and 360. It looks AWFUL. The W i was made for motion gaming and not HD gaming and that clip true shows its not ready for Arkham Asylum.

I was one of the few who tried to reward third parties for making more 'hardcore' games on the Wii. Resident Evil 4 (which I had previously bought and completed on Gamecube around the time it originally released), No More Heroes 1 and 2, Sin & Punishment, Klonoa, MadWorld, Medal of Honor: Heroes 2, Ghost Squad, House of the Dead, the Resident Evil Chronicle games, Goldeneye, The Last Story... I like to try and reward developers who make an effort. Probably wouldn't have bought any of these ports though. Batman: Arkham Asylum is awesome and one of my favorite games last gen. I went with the PS3 version and given that there was a superior option I wouldn't have seen any point in going with the dumbed-down version unless it was the only choice I had. Still, Arkham Asylum does look better on Wii than I would've expected and it was a system that had a very underrated library. If these games had received a better fate, it's possible two or maybe all of them, would've turned out pretty good and helped expand the Wii's catalog giving it a better reputation. I can see the argument from the other side too though. When compared to Dead Rising 1 on 360, the Wii port was an absolute joke, so if things weren't going great in the development cycle it probably wouldn't have served Nintendo or the third parties any purpose to push forward with these releases.

@Pod I could see the Dig Dug game BECOMING good, but what was there is not good. I'm not even kidding when I say I can't express my love enough for Dig Dug, and this tech demo just hurts me so badly because I CAN see an idea there. The above-ground sections looked really bad, like a shovelware Wii title cough Anubis II cough and just make no sense to me, and the transitions from above to underground were just so jagged and weird. I did love that super fat Fygar, and the cannon that shoots enemies at you, but it could be handled so much better.
THAT'S IT, TIME TO MAKE MY OWN DIG DUG GAME.

@PlywoodStick Well that's impressive, since I haven't actually PLAYED that one since 2001 (15 years ago, wow). It's good to see my gaming senses are as sharp as ever!

I remember this game scared the crap out of me, especially with that whole "Bloody Puppets" intro sequence.

i wouldn't be surprised if the reason these games weren't brought over to the wii was the insistence that they use motion controls. a hack & slasher like dmc would be great with actual hacking & slashing.

The Batman Arkham and Star Wars ones looked very good running on Wii hardware. The Arkham play style looks like it was adjusted for Wii fairly well. The use of pointer controls looked easy to wield. I enjoyed both Force Unleashed Wii ports so I'm sure RFS would've done these franchises good.

Its a shame they never came to be... Wii was a fantastic console!

The DIG DUG reboot looked fun, but the others looked horrible (even though they weren't completely complete and could've went through more stages before release). Batman looked kind of like a bad PS2 title...seriously, Batman looked better on Gamecube. The Devil May Cry looked just plain 'bad'. Dante looked horrible and very blurry and even the creatures looked horrible...it was better as the HD remaster on PS3, but seriously, the game still looked better on PS2, so I'm kind of glad it didn't come to Wii...granted that if it did, I still would have bought it just to play a Devil May Cry game on a nintendo system, but I could only imagine how tiresome it would have been waiving your arms around at the dozen of creatures coming at you. Other than that, I would have liked to see the Star Wars game, it would have been a little fun, granted I hate the Star Wars franchise all together and even hate the movies, but I enjoyed the Force Unleashed on PS3. Still, Dig Dug looked fun, but just like all and almost all games that came out on Wii by 3rd parties...it probably would have failed. So many great 3rd party titles came out on the Wii that failed...Klonoa, A Boy And His Blob, The Munchables, Smarty Pants, Summer Sports 1 and 2 and quite a few others to name the least. Hopefully, the Switch doesn't get that much shovel ware...but still, why hasn't the Dig Dug game even attempted to be completed for other consoles? It could even be completed for the PS4's store or even the upcoming Switch's store!

@Jamotello Would've gotten tiresome after a while though. I would have bought the game too, but after looking at the trailer, it looked even worse than what it would on PS2...actually, kind of glad for the remaster on PS3.

Sorry, but I think that Wii Arkham Asylum is ugly. Not as in "not great but still charming." I mean UGLY. As for Dig Dug, I had no idea!

@Azikira
Snap to it!
I'm a big fan myself, even of the radically different DigDig II, with the sinking islands. In my head a combination of the two, with both an overworld and the shafts, should not only be possible, but also a lot of fun.

@PlywoodStick Right, because all of that has really benefitted Nintendo long term, for sure. Just look at all the cool unique 3rd party games they're still getting. Oh wait, they aren't.

@electrolite77
"I" what? Finish the sentence!
Jokes aside, though, I know that's how things went; none of that reasoning makes it any easier to accept, anyway.

Would definitely have bought Arkham asylum

What in the world? There was a X-Wing vs. Tie Fighter sequel in development? Now that is a crime that it never was finished!

Shame EA will never realize this kind of games and will only make Battlefront.