Ubisoft have been understanding of how hard it has been to convey the advantages of the Wii U, stating that it is different from the Wii “where seeing was believing.”
Such comments come from Xavier Poix, managing director of Ubisoft’s Annecy, Montpellier, and Paris studios, who discussed the challenges of developing for new hardware with GameSpot at the annual D.I.C.E. summit.
“The depth of what you can do with that console is really hard to get across unless you play with it,” Poix expressed. “It’s different from the Wii, where seeing was believing. With the Wii U, people really need to experience it.”
Over the past two years Poix has been involved with developing titles for the Wii U, which includes console exclusive launch title ZombiU. Having received a mixed reaction from critics, he believes they can easily see where they went wrong.
“The whole idea of the asymmetrical gameplay and using two screens to do two very different things is not simple to explain to people,” he began.
“ZombiU was designed to be a game for core players launching with a new Nintendo console. We should have communicated better in this respect to let people know what kind of experience to expect. It wasn’t obvious enough that there would be a new controller and new gameplay and a new skill set to develop.”
Although the Wii U has only being selling steadily, Poix doesn’t believe that this should be seen as an indication of its future success.
“We are at a new start in the industry, a moment where gaming is no longer just for geeks,” he continues. “We have consoles like the Wii to thank for that, and the rise in mobile gaming. It’s all leading towards inter-connectivity. What will you do on your phone in the future will impact what you do on your console back home, and so on. There will be different applications for different devices.”
Ubisoft: Consumers “really need to experience” Wii U to understand it
