"There's a cost issue," Nintendo president Satoru Iwata told Japanese business site Diamond Online. According to Iwata, Nintendo aims to have the console and games support one Wii U Controller.

"Technically, it is possible for the Wii U to support multiple Wii U Controllers," Iwata said. However, this will result in a "considerable" price increase.

According to Iwata, "We're not planning on asking our customers to buy multiple Wii U Controllers."

Source - http://kotaku.com/5812512/multiple-wii-u-controllers-are-a-cost-issue

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Now let's see what some pressure from 3rd party developers does...

Price increase in components, or the fact that the standalone controller would be very prohibitive? I wouldn't see the core controller running more than $80, as its bigger than a DS but lacks its own processing capabilities aside from the display technology, and is otherwise a DS at heart.

Unless there's more under the hood than is apparent, like its own chip like Microsoft planned on putting in Kinect initially

The way I understand what he is saying, the cost of extra controllers would be so much that if Nintendo made it an option, it might turn people off - e.g. assume the Wii U costs $300, but each extra controller costs $100 (or more?), then Nintendo making games that support 4 players with the controller would mean they need to shell out $600 (if a controller costs $100) or more if it costs more?

Given all his talk here and in other interviews, I believe the controller could cost even more than $100.

Now I don't exactly agree with his logic, I believe the option should exists, but I believe that is his argument.

Probably talking about the cost of the controllers. But I agree that they could at least give users the option, at least for 2 controllers.

I think they should allow for 2 players to use the tablet controller, but they shouldn't sell it without a console. Meaning, if you have a friend who owns a Wii U and they want to come over and play multiplayer games, then they can bring their controller with them. Otherwise, most families that game together should be content with one tablet controller and multiple Wiimotes. Furthermore, as the technology becomes cheaper and the console develops, we can probably see a second controller sold. I'm not sure how well this option would work in terms of sales though, but I'd definitely like it as a customer.