Slightly Mad Studios have confirmed that development of Project CARS on Wii U has been cancelled.
After revealing that the Wii U build was struggling to maintain a consistent 720p at 30fps, studio head Ian Bell had recently shared that they were waiting for the Nintendo NX announcement as it was “simply too much” to run on Wii U.
“The official line is that we’re awaiting an announcement from Nintendo on new hardware. As of now pCARS is simply too much for the Wii U,” Bell confirmed to Nintendo Life.
News that Project CARS was destined for Wii U emerged in early 2012, with the developer sharing that the Wii U GamePad “screams new innovations.”
Somewhat contradictory to today’s news, creative director Andy Tudor had once said that “the Wii U is more than capable of providing the core Project CARS experience.”
Bandai Namco Entertainment would later sign a worldwide distribution agreement, although shortly confirmed that the Wii U version was delayed into 2015.
“We’re committed to delivering an exceptional and unique experience for racing fans on Wii U and for this we kindly ask our devoted and passionate Nintendo fans for a little more time in order to ensure the game delivers on our vision of being the most authentic, beautiful, and technically-advanced racing game on any platform,” Bandai Namco had shared in a statement at the time.
Tudor later provided an update in September 2014, clarifying: “It’s not our job to disappoint those guys. So when we say the Wii U version is delayed in 2015 because we need a little more time, that’s all it is.
“We just want to make sure it’s of the same standard of all the other games. To do that, we just need a little more time. I’ve seen the Wii U version, I’ve seen it quite regularly. It’s got dynamic time of day, weather – it looks phenomenal. And the actual console itself is quite good.”
Shifting gear to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One inevitably took the build too far out of reach, so that was likely the undisclosed death knell for Project CARS on Wii U.
This is a shame, project cars isn’t going to be on the wii u. I’ve been eager, to see it come out, now finally it’s announced, its not coming out.