Wii U Missing Out on 15 Frostbite 3 Games

Wii U is going to miss out on 15 Frostbite 3 games, such as Mass Effect 4 and Dragon Age 3.

[Venemox]

Ouch.

[Kingdom Come]

No E3 Press Conference,
Playstation 4 and impending Next-Generation Xbox announcement,
No Frostbite 3 games.

Nintendo are going to have a very difficult 2014.

[Dj7FairyTail]

Uh they having a Software Booth before their two E3 Small Event Conference, then a Software Booth onward.

Everyone at E3 will be able to play Nintendo Wii U upcoming games before the showfloors open to public. Meaning while Microsoft and Sony have their event. Anyone can play Wii U upcoming games.

[guitarded77]

Yeah, this whole Frostbite thing really sucks for Wii U only gamers. But then again, if they only own a Wii U, they probably won't care too much. Most gamers concerned with the games built on Forstbite own multiple platforms. Ultimately it hurts Nintendo's bottom line though... that's less software sales.

[LOL_WUT]

Wow 15 games huh? And all of them being next-gen! Faithfuls exposed again!

Nintendo need to step it up they wouldn't want to get even more behind. ;)

[stragomccloud]

It's not Nintendo's fault. It's all EA trying to kill Nintendo because they are butthurt about Origin. EA is trying to kill Nintendo the same way they helped kill SEGA, the difference is, that Nintendo isn't quite as easy to take down as SEGA was when it was in the state that it was at the time.

[hollabox]

@stragomccloud

I wouldn't say its EA fault at all, EA has seen what Nintendo gamers buy and trust me it aint EA products. Games like ME3, Batman 3, Madden couldn't even break 80,000 units sold, but 2D Mario has sold almost two million.

Its well known Wii U hardware is underpowered and Nintendo has been shooting themselves in the foot regarding WiiU marketing and games. So the blame is on Nintendo and its fans, Nintendo for releasing and marketing this underperforming hardware, and fans for not accepting an broader scope of games besides Nintendo's legendary franchises.

[Braid]

Not just 15 games, Wii U will be missing out the whole next-generation as their 3rd party support will be as terrible as ever.

[thisisdallas]

Yeah, the lack of EA support and specifically Frostbite 3 support is huge. EA holds most of the major 3rd party franchises and that is what the Wii U desperately needs right now.

[NYC_Gamer]

It's hard to make that clear to loyal Nintendo fans on the web..I can't stand EA but they do publish huge franchises.

[lilbroRx]

Not really. Nintendo haters just want it to be huge.

The only time I ever see people praise EA is when they direct negativity towards Nintendo.

[Neonridr]

I am still having a hard time believing that they can get the Frostbite 3 Engine running on the 360, but they can't get it working on the Wii U. I understand it is an investment to have to learn new hardware, so I guess EA feels that it's not worth their time because they won't recoup sales back for the system at this point. It will be interesting to follow their stance on the system, should sales start to take off once the big selling first party titles start rolling in.

Regardless, it sucks no doubt for us Wii U owners. Fortunately I own a good gaming PC and I plan on purchasing a PS4 probably next year sometime, so I will just play these games on one of those two platforms.

[AKR]

It's not that they "can't" get it to work on the Wii U. EA is still angry over the whole Origin fiasco. They simply DON'T WANT TO.

[Genuine-User]

Might be the CPU pal. I heard it was slower than both the PS3 and 360.
I want to get a Wii U, probably will once it has more than 5 games I want.

[RuleofOne343]

Oh well what a shame , now on to more important matters.

[Avernus]

If I was buying a WiiU, I would have bought it expecting little third party games tbh. ESPECIALLY if I bought it recently.

It's really hard to see Nintendo being happy about this, and from a business POV, it's surely is a sour taste. Nintendo can't keep relying on Zelda and Mario to make up sales anymore.

Even CoD BO2 didn't sell on WiiU...when the worlds best selling game ever sells poorly on your console, you know something's up.

[SIANSLOW]

COD is not the best selling game ever or franchise, you'll find those records belong to nintendo developed exclusives

[kneon]

Most of which were packed in with a console so it's not really comparing apples to apples.

[InTheLab]

Inflated numbers due to bundling.

How does MarioKart sell 33 million copies but Skyward Sword only sells 3 million? Packed into every $169-$200 holiday bundle for the last few years is a Mario of some sort.

And what about non traditional titles like Red Steel and Conduit? Well, Conduit/Conduit2 combined sold less than 600k copies, with both Red Steels doing similar numbers.

How about Metroid Prime 3? Barely breaks a million each game. Monster Hunter tri? 2 million.

Point is, most Nintendo casual friendly franchise get bundle after Bundle for YEARS, but the core franchises sell average to very poorly. That's not to say that other companies can't bundle. They do, but not to the extent in which Nintendo does.

[Shok]

How much did you expect BO2 to tell though?

Not really a good example. BO2 on Wii U not only launched later than all the other versions, but had no DLC support, and keep in mind that this is in a much smaller install base (3.5 million vs. 75 million+)

[dangerousbrian0]

Or also it could be that EA wanted Nintendo to use part of EAs Origin Infastructure with the Nintendo Network and Nintendo shot them down and EA does not like it.So their attitude is Wont use Origin We wont Support you with third party support.And the reasoning for Wiiu owners getting Mass Effect 3 and Need For Speed Most Wanted I dont know.Or those 2 games could have been to far in development for them to say no.

[mydyingparadiselost]

Looking at the way EA runs their business and treats its customers I can say it's not a terrible loss to me.

[DivineAssault]

Did people really think wii u was going to have many 3rd party games anyway? I bought the thing strictly for 1st party titles.. I bought it at launch because i thought rayman legends was going to be on it months ago & bayonetta 2 wouldve been closer to release but im not surprised..

It just sucks that i have this new console & nothing i wanna play on it.. I honestly havent turned it on since november last yr.. I played a few stages of NSMBU & never turned it on again.. Neat lil console but nothing like what i thought it would be having 2GB of ram & supposedly getting more support.. I wish i wouldve waited because i think there will be a price cut & a revision to the gamepad by the time a game i wanna play comes out.. The game stores only offer like $100 for the thing too! so im better off just holding on to it than to take a 75% loss on what i paid.. Oh well, i guess ill just have to wait for a while & focus on getting PS4 which will have 1st party games & 3rd party support right away

[KrisButtar]

"Did people really think wii u was going to have many 3rd party games anyway?"

I did, I was on the fence about buying one before Xmas because of the idea that some games(3rd party) would be the better version cause of the gamepad. I haven't really liked the feel of the gamepad in stores but I was willing to take a chance. Now with little to no 3rd party support I'm no longer thinking of getting one until support changes

@DivineAssault, the reason I was careful was because I felt burned over my wii purchase, I still have wii games unopened, because I just don't like motion controls but before I decided that I had already bought a few games. Nintendo has to work extra hard now because of it. Thats why I was on the fence before xmas instead of just buying it

[DivineAssault]

smart man.. I was a fool by jumping in & buying it right away believing their hollow promises of building partnerships with 3rd party.. I tell u one thing though, Ill NEVER buy a nintendo console again until i see change

[bobacdigital]

EA is still a bit salty over the Origin / Nintendo network fiasco... It is a complete utter lie that EA is saying they cant run FB2 or FB3 on the WiiU when the Cry 3 engine can run on the WiiU just fine (According to devs)... Lets not forget that the WiiU ran a quick and dirty port of blockops without it even being optimized( On two screens might I add)...

Are you telling me FB2 and FB3 can run on the 360 and ps3 on 512 megs of ram yet it the Wii U cant run it with 2 gigs? People are going to harp on the cpu speed but the fact of the matter is it was able to run all those dirty ports with limited optimization with half the raw cpu core speed..

Sony has stated that killzone will run at 30 fps .. and most developers will prolly follow suit to jack up eye candy... How freaking hard is it to run a a game of ANY engine at 30 fps???? If the 360 and ps3 can do im pretty sure we can all agree the WiiU can do it as well.

[AKR]

Bubble Up = "Well Said"

~ The fact that Wii U isn't seeing Frostbite 3, isn't because it can't run it. That's just what EA wants right now. Seriously, they're being petty and spiteful. No wonder they were voted the WORST company in America for the second year in a row.

[kneon]

Or perhaps they are just looking at Wii U sales tracking below target and the Wii having a poor track record with 3rd party game sales. It's probably not worth the investment given the high risk.

[AKR]

@Kneon

~ Well how do you fix low hardware sales on a console - Simple ~ RELEASE GAMES.

Developers who aren't willing to invest in a fledgling system are kind of acceptable, but when you forefit from developing on that system - you're not doing anything to combat the reason WHY you're not developing in the first place.

It's a spherical trap. It just goes round and round. So, someone (usually the first-party) has to break that trap in order to boost sales and then 3rd party devs will be more likely to start creating. Seeing that this is Nintendo, they have the biggest, most well-known and successful IPs in the entire gaming industry, so they'll do quite fine in terms of boosting sales with games like:

- 3D Mario U
- Mario Kart U
- Yarn Yoshi
- Wind Waker HD
- Smash Bros. 4

[kneon]

Sure releasing games can only help. By why would EA stick their neck out and risk all the cost to develop for the Wii U when the recent track record on Nintendo platforms shows the return just isn't there.

Wii had a massive install base and yet too many third party games failed on that platform.

[Ck1x]

No matter how much people put a new title or a new engine in the headline, it all still points back to EA as the definitive reason these games aren't coming to the WiiU! Has nothing to do with it not being capable of running this engine or that one... If people actually choose to believe that Frostbite 2 is more capable that CryEngine3, then something is truly wrong with real world perception.

[BigDuo]

I think this has more to do with third parties like EA having a problems with financial incentive and opportunity cost than tech performance on Wii U. It's basically the reason why Crysis 3 was cancelled despite how Crytek's CEO said the CryEngine ran "beautifully" on Wii U. Some publishers such as Ubisoft and Warner Bros are putting more faith into Wii U than others. However, it will likely come back to bite them in the ass when the sales of their upcoming titles will under-perform on the Wii U, and it doesn't help that these games are going up against a tidal wave of Nintendo's 1st party games.

[cleft5]

Developers with vision will support the WiiU and everyone else will stay the tried and true path and battle it out on the powerful next-gen consoles. When enough companies go under and it becomes incredibly hard to release a Triple A game that is profitable, ala Tomb Raider, than developers will start looking at the WiiU.

Nintendo just needs to keep reaching out to the indie developers, iOs developers, and releasing 1st party and 2nd party games. Eventually, the likes of EA will wise up and than all of a sudden all their engines will run perfectly on the WiiU.

[HexxedAvenger]

Oh well :/
only game I was feeling for is Dragon Age 3 anyways.
Nintendo will pull thru, and if/when they do I wonder if FB will magically work on the WII-U.

[cleft5]

Ultimately this is a good thing. Now that Nintendo knows that they can't count on these bigger third party developers to show up and make games for the system. They can now focus on being the major developer for the console, bringing in the indie developers, and bringing in the iOs developers.

When it's all said and done, EA and everyone else will change their tune when the WiiU is selling like crazy. The same thing happened with the 3ds. I would be more worried if EA and other major third party developers thought the system was doing well.

[BigDuo]

Nintendo isn't wasting its time just praying for better third party support. It's naive, but not dumb enough to not realize it has willingly sacrificed getting strong third party multi-platform support by the company's unwillingness to compromise its own next-gen goals and change of business model for the sake of better third-party support. There's plenty of reasons for why that is, but the main reason is Nintendo has no desire to be like Sony and Microsoft. It just wants to focus on providing a more affordable, unique console experience without getting involved in an overly expensive battle of graphics warfare. Nintendo does not have to be on the same playing field as Sony and Microsoft. Wii U won' likely be the most desirable home console for gamers, but Nintendo can make it desirable enough to be a secondary home console for gamers to own. If it can do that beyond pleasing its fan base, then its got something good going for it like what happened with the Wii and DS.

For better or worse, Nintendo will follow its own path for as long as it is profitable for them to do so. If they fail to acquire enough market share to be content with, then they'll need if rethink their strategy next time and may have to make some sacrifices even if their just temporary set-backs like how its currently selling Wii U at a loss, but not for long, and for a substantial amount.

As some of you know, Iwata has mentioned numerous times that Nintendo has invested a lot of resources into securing more second-party titles for Wii U as well as doing more collaboration projects. In addition, it is also providing enticing offers to help third parties put their games on Wii U by finding ways to reduce their development costs significantly. Lastly, Nintendo has also been working on getting more indie developers to support Wii U through efforts like Nintendo webframework and Unity. Nintendo aware of how it will be the one to carry the weight of its platform which is why those key 1st party games need to come out soon and why Nintendo's first priority is to satisfy its fanbase in order to drive hardware sales, so it rapidly grow the install base later this year.

[silkylove]

Well that sucks. They clearly could make Frostbite 3 work on Wii U because it's designed to be scalable and it's up and running on the 360. They just won't do it. But EA won't make or break the Wii U. They're not that powerful.

[jameson12345]

This sucks, and I know there are more stuff going on behind scenes (If the PS3 and 360 can run these games, then something is up because the Wii U could run Crysis 3 well). But I haven't bought many games that run on this engine, so it probably won't affect me much. I'm just hoping that by the end of next year, the Wii U's fortunes are better.

[themanaround]

when nintendo's sales get up to speed and ea decide they wanna make games for wii u again nintendo should ban them and not allow them to make any profits off their system due to all the crap they been pulling try to hurt their business.

[GiantFriendlyCrab]

This isn't just an EA thing. Its an Industry thing.

The Wii U is irrelevant for business.

• Far Cry 3
• No Bethesda
• Saints Row IV
• Metal Gear Rising
• The Witcher 3
• Bioshock Infinite
• Resident Evil 6
• Dead Space 3
• Crysis 3
• Dark Souls 2
• Battlefield 4
• Borderlands 2
• Tomb Raider
• Thief IV
• Grid 2
• DMC
• Thief IV
• Metro Last Light
• Dead Island Riptide
• Destiny
• Grand Theft Auto V

any more games to come

[themanaround]

if wii u is irrelevant then ea shouldnt have a problem with being exile from the console in the future if nintendo so choose.if they turn things around without their support then they definitely wont need it then. give'em da boot lol

[Slowbrosef]

EA pretty much ruined the video game industry single handedly. I want nothing to do with a company that puts out unfinished games to charge you for endings, puts our games that don't let you play local or private multiplayer, Severely destroys established franchises by limiting their scope AND with launches plagued with problems, punishes you for buying used games, Ignores gamers opinions because of their "who cares you'll still buy it" attitude. I remember when EA won the golden turd from the worst company in America competition the first time and responded by saying that there are worse companies like BP out there.(when BP had won the award a year or two before).

If EA wants to be a jealous ex girlfriend, fine. I already don't support them and I wont be supporting them even when and if I buy the PS4. Battlefield turned to crap when EA gave control of the servers to Narcissistic gamers who make up ridiculous rules and gave you limited control on what you get into next.

EA's lack of support is a crushing blow to Wii U overall but as Long as Ubisoft is still on board we still have stuff to look foward to.

[LAWSON72]

Command and Conquer is PC exclusive anyway. I honestly do not care for any recent game published by ea except bf3 which bf is superior on pc anyway. The rpgs on that list will be action games and nfs is terrible.

[kagamer79]

EA has earned a reputation for being a shady company even before the origin fall out. I don't see the big deal if certain games skip the wii u. I mean all of the best nintendo titles always are exclusive. Maybe its just me but I plan on owning a ps4 and a wii u. That way I have the best of both worlds because if a game skips wii u it will most likely be on ps4. People often forget real gamers don't care what system they play a gameo long as its a great game. Nintendo may be weaker than ps4 and 720 but they will deliver some games that will impress. If the eternal darkness sequal becomes a reality that's a start. I think there will be some very attractive black Friday deals for wii u and if they have some heavy hitting games by then I think they will sell well this holiday season.

[DonFreezer]

Why the hell do you even care ps fanboys?According to you Wii U is doomed so why comment on such a butthurt company like EA.I Have seen the Wii U is motion for the first time some days ago and It destroyed the ps3 in graphics and image clarity.Let's not forget the screens Nintendo demonstrates the Wii U witch destroy Bravias.