Splatoon will be the 4th retail game Wii U has had all year

When it launches on the 29th (in 4 days).

Four retail games entering the 6th month of the year.

The others:

1. Kirby and the Rainbow Curse
2. Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Tipping Stars
3. Mario Party 10
4. Splatoon

And it's not actually going to be finished until August, so that platform goes basically 8 months without a single game worth a damn in the retail space and Affordable Space Adventure (which admittedly looks cool) vs what the other gaming systems get? lol The WiiU is a joke.

last year, the Wii U had only 24 retail games all year.

Admittedly, half of those were shovelware, but more importantly....

Most of them that weren't Nintendo first party games, were games that were in development for years and were either too far along in their production cycles for it to be worth it to "give up", or they most likely had ironclad deals with Nintendo that they couldn't get out of, that predated the third party "mass exodus" of the Wii U

Looking at WatchDogs on that last one. Ubisoft was Nintendo's most vocal supporter and the last to leave. The game was most likely "canceled in spirit", but like I said, they had an ironclad deal they had to honor that they couldnt get themselves out of, so they just threw it on the backburner and finished it when they got 'round to it.

The thing with Nintendo games is that when they release, they're always quality. So you're pretty much banking on a guaranteed product. That's the beauty of Nintendo. Even Splatoon is being said that it's fantastic online. Something very unique and fun to play. Which is what is in dire need in the videogame world.

@Puckhog04: that's bullshit. No way is Kirby Triple Deluxe, Pokemon X and Y, Mario Sunshine, Paper Mario Sticker Star, etc. any indication of guaranteed quality. They're as fallible as any other developer.

Yeah, this is why I haven't played it much this year.

Welcome to 2012. When you have to support your console all by yourself, this sort of thing happens. You're not delivering any insight here.

This thing is as dead as the Wii was in 2010 and later.

Has this EVER happened this severely with any other of the major players in the modern era? (I.E. Nintendo, MS, Sony, Sega). The Dreamcast in its final years (and at this point in its lifespan) wasnt even this bad. (its also selling worse than the Dreamcast btw)

@StrongDeadlift: No, because every other Nintendo console has had some degree of third party support, compared to Wii U which literally has none. The N64 comes closest to this, I guess.

And no, it's not selling lower than Dreamcast. 18 months in, it has sold 6.2 million units worldwide and was discontinued, the final 3.8 million units of its sales coming from inventory liquidation flash sales where it was sold at $50 plus three game prices. The Wii U, for whatever it is worth, sold 7.73 million units in the same amount, making it outpace Dreamcast.

Now, it's overall lifetime sales are lower than Dreamcast still, yes.

Get real.

No thanks.

What sort of being are you then?!

But seriously, post 2010 all Wii got was Zelda, Wii U has Zelda and a lot more coming. Wii U's got a lotta problems but it's not that dead yet!

Yeah, the droughts with this thing are nuts. At least Splatoon will be here soon.

I guess Vita and Wii U are literally brothers :(

The only game in the somewhat near future I see getting for the Wii U is Fatal Frame, the trailer for SMT x FE looks like some J-pop rhythm dancing crossover kind of game, Xenoblade Chronicles X doesn't interest me anymore. Hopefully Nintendo announces at E3 (or maybe TGS) that a Metroid or something is coming. Fearfully I think NIntendo doesn't have much left after the Wii U, so I hope they go out with a bang. I fear this NX thing we know nothing about is a bust, but if it's following the latest Japanese trends I expect a transition into smartphone and PC gaming. Anyhow, there's Star Fox and Zelda coming, I'm not expecting much else from my Wii U, but I feel like I've already gotten enough out of it to warrant getting one... though it'd be better if Nintendo ever released Metroid Zero Mission on Wii U eShop before they give up on it.

Thankfully the 3DS has slightly more going for it than the Wii U, Fire Emblem If, Bravely Second, Project X Zone 2, Etrian Odyssey Untold 2 (and at this pace I'm guessing a remake of the third game). Plus they just released Devil Survivor 2 and Majora's Mask for 3DS this year. Still, I've a feeling the 3DS will be dead before I have an excuse to upgrade to a New 3DS.

Its cool, we dont need to be oversaturated with Epic Nintendo games. Their skills are way to great, they must preserve the well.

Shoot, i still remember in 2012 the great RPG flood for Wii, it was epic.

That's pretty sad, but still, the Wii U doesn't need to release a bunch of games (spanning a wide variety of genres) to get people to buy many games for their console. Pretty much everybody who buys a Wii U knows what they're getting into, and are all going to get similar games, resulting in very high attatch rates.

You really need to be a fan of Nintendo games to own a Wii U. For me, it's fine with the current flow of games. But I imagine for most people this is terrible.

FYI, we get Yoshi's Woolly World next month.

Quality over quantity.

So far the Wii U has given me:

New Super Mario Bros Wii U

New Luigi U

The Wonderful 101

Bayonetta 2

Super Smash Bros for Wii U

Super Mario 3D World

Mario Kart 8

Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker

And soon it'll get:

Splatoon

Xenoblade Chronicles X

Fire Emblem vs SMT

Fatal Frame: Oracle of the Sodden Raven

No other current gen console can even remotely match those exclusives at this time. For a dead system, it keeps giving the best console experience from beyond the grave.

Is it even getting Black Ops 3 this year? or did Call of Duty also abandon Nintendo?

@finalstar2007: Its not getting BO3. The closest the WiiU will get to a brogame like that is devils third.

@jg4xchamp: This is indisputable. At least a half year long drought with no retail games at all, and I STILL got the Nintendo Defense League on my case about it when I brought it up yesterday. No one was brave enough to tell me the last retail game brought out on Wii u, because we're in May and it was in February, and it was a shit Kirby game.

Nintendo told everyone this wouldn't happen this time. They admitted it had happened on wii, and told you things would be different. What do the die hards do? Get on their case? Have a rethink? Nope. Double down on the feeling of oppression and defend Nintendo even more.

Maybe to inspire some real loyalty they should slash all your car tyres or something.

Devils..third? never even heard of that :P

but wow its crazy how almost ALL 3rd party are pretty much ignoring nintendo now

@iandizion713: It got 2. Not so much a great flood as a half filled paddling pool.

@finalstar2007: Its some weird hack n slash, TPS mash up, 8 vs 8 online, voice chat... It has catchijg chickens as a mini game.

Simple answerr : No point putting resources into a console which earns you diddly squat. The last released CoD was ghosts.

No, he's right, post 2010 Wii was getting roughly the same support the WiiU is getting. A couple great games a year, + a few more good to meh ones.

Wii 2011: Zelda, Xenoblade, Mario Sports Mix, Kirby's Return To Dreamland, Fortune Street, Mario and Sonic Olympic games sequel

Wii 2012: Pandora's Tower, The Last Story, Rhythm Paradise, Mario Party 9, Project Zero 2

WiiU 2015: Xenoblade Chronicles, Star Fox, Splatoon, Kirby, Yoshi, Mario Party 10

Seems about equal to me. Though WiiU does benefit from some indie/eShop games. Pretty sure Wiiware was dead post 2010 on Wii.

That's more pathetic than I thought.

That's a shame for me as a Wii U launch owner.

But according to some people in SW, Wii U is the only console that has games

@SolidGame_basic: I'm waiting for Tekken 7 and SF5 before dipping in a PC or PS4. WIIU seriously has a small handful of games and this is coming from someone who is playing Mario Kart 8 right at this moment.

in 2015 how many releases does WiiU have? Kirby, splatoon, xeno, starfox, fatal frame, Yoshi, Mario maker, devils third.... Have i missed anything? Pretty dire choice ...

It's been very light this year, no doubt. But some of the future titles are my most anticipated games slated to be release either this year or next.

Another reason people should be supporting Nintendo, especially given the quality they've put out recently.

That's really, really bad. I've been playing the Metroid Prime Trilogy on my Wii U for the most part. Otherwise, I've been gaming on my PC. It's sad to see the system is such terrible shape. It doesn't get any of the new 3rd party games. It doesn't get the same DLC support. It can't even get remasters of Gamecube exclusives.

Well Europe gets Legend of Kay this week.

Huh. Interesting. I love that game but just assumed it was PS4 only (or PS/Xbox).

Probably still get it for PS4 since it'll have trophies, but I'll keep an eye on reviews and see if the WiiU version has any recommendations.

I've actually never heard of the game. Apparently this is a HD Remaster of the original PS2 game.

When you have no 3rd party support at all, this is wha happens. They have good to great first party titles coming out but they have no filler in between the releases. It's ashame Nintendo has fallen like this.

Yep. It's a really fun action adventure game. Anthropomorphic animals, martial arts, baddies, exploration, combat, treasures, villages. All that good stuff. Kung Fu Panda meets Zelda would be a somewhat over the top way of describing it :P

Only bad part was the voice acting. Very amatuerish. The frogs all had Jamaican accents though which was funny :D

I almost feel bad for Nintendo. Almost. If they weren't so arrogant and willfully oblivious I may give my sympathies.

Nintendo have dropped the ball this gen in every way. Their games are just good, nothing trully special like Mario Galaxy was, or Metroid Prime before that, and think N64 and SNES lol. WiiU is the most lackluster Nintendo console of all time, based on how good Zelda U and Starfox is btw. And maybe Yoshi's Wooly World. If they turn out really great (i'm talking better games than what 3D World was), then maybe I would argue it is better than the Wii, maybe.

@MirkoS77: Nintendo deserves the fans it has. The fans of Nintendo deserve the company they have become.

This year for Wii-U might be worse than any of those Wii years, considering Zelda was delayed. We'll see if Star Fox makes it to 2015 (I'm assuming Xenoblade 2 will, and something else probably will too... but not sure it will be Star Fox) To make matters worse, it seems so far the games have been... BAD. In addition to lacking quantity.

I can't believe even sheep are defending a lineup of Kirby, Mario Party, and Splatoon. All mediocre to very poorly received games - and even if you want to argue they are "good" - these are all very low budget games more fitting of being a throwaway $9.99 downloadable indie game than something supposed to carry the flag for an entire hardware system.

Just for comparison, the Dreamcast released 55 retail games in North America in 2001 (the Dreamcast's equivalent year in its lifespan to the Wii U right now).

I just feel bad for Nintendo fans, I used to be one. I don't feel bad for the people that STILL try to defend the nonsense. They deserve what they receive LOL.

It's amazing to me Iwata still has a job, basically 2 years after he set an ultimatum about Wii-U and failed. Didn't he basically say he would resign at one point? Maybe Amiibo profits have appeased shareholders somewhat. But I don't see what it does for gamers.

@2Chalupas: Yeah I was being kind and assuming Star Fox will be a big title, high quality, and come out this year. If it's a bad game, a dinky little rail shooter, or doesn't make it out this year, then WiiU will have had a WORSE year than Wii's 2011 or 2012, when most considered it fully dead.

If Zelda had made it this year, along with Xenoblade, that would have bandaged the wound a bit more thoroughly, but since Zelda is delayed to "Unknown"? Tough to know what's going on.

I m really looking forward to this game. might not archive high rating due to content, but should be fun as hell. One thing I like about nintendo they just know how to crate fun.

bu bu bu teh Nintendo polish!!!!11

I'm still enjoying Smash like it's day one so... yeah.

Yeah, it's shit that there aren't more games. Super Smash Bros and Mario Kart 8 have been giving me a lot of playtime, both alone and with groups of friends, but I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed in the lack of releases.

At least I have the other consoles. Sure, the releases aren't quite there for the PS4 or the XB1 either but between the three of them I've got more games than I could ever dream to play through already. My current gen backlog is already getting out of hand! :P

lol, didnt know it was that bad. But then again, I'm not surprised.