Nintendo’s still making a Zelda and a Kirby for the Wii. Ubisoft is still seeping Just Dances the way a man produces sweat on a hot summer day. But it seems these days that most companies making games just don’t care about making Wii games anymore.
What a shock it was last week to find a young designer at an EA Christmas-in-July gaming event sitting near a TV running the game he’s leading the design on, Madden NFL 12 for the Wii. Oh, they’re still doing that? Must be a low-budget, low-effort clunker for people who don’t know better, right?
The young designer, Dan, seemed extremely grateful that I stopped by and wanted to talk to him about his game (confession: I was just dropping by to ask if there was a new 3DS Madden coming). He looked relieved, because it isn’t just game creators who’ve been losing interest in the Wii anymore. It’s not like I had to elbow anyone out of the way to check this game out.
I was talking to a game designer who was proud of his work.
He told me the game had new control schemes, including Tecmo Bowl-inspired controls. He told me about the latest graphics overhaul, a new Achievements-like system and improved television-network-style presentation. He even dropped in one of those great lines you can only make about a Wii game: we decided to add referees back. Really!
So here we are. I shot a video of it, so you all could see that people are still putting effort into Wii games in 2011. Most unexpected. And most welcome.
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