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Forums - Nintendo Discussion - Rock Band 4 not coming to Wii U because "the audience is not there"

MikeRox said:
tripenfall said:

No, due to backwards compatability the Wii U is the only current gen console where the instruments will cross straight over. New instruments won't be needed for anyone with either GH of RB from the Wii (which is a lot of people). That's going to be the biggest hurdle for people thinking of buying the game on XBone / PS4. That's why this game really should have seen a Wii U release....


This is all the more reason the Wii U version is a lower priority though.

You CAN'T play Rock Band in any form on PS4 or XB1.

Except that Harmonix are working on making the PS360 "instruments" backwards compatible for the PS4/Xbone, so it is clearly a concern.

They wouldn't even need to develop new "instruments" at all, surely the Wii U would be much cheaper than the others to develop for.



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mysteryman said:
MikeRox said:

This is all the more reason the Wii U version is a lower priority though.

You CAN'T play Rock Band in any form on PS4 or XB1.

Except that Harmonix are working on making the PS360 "instruments" backwards compatible for the PS4/Xbone, so it is clearly a concern.

They wouldn't even need to develop new "instruments" at all, surely the Wii U would be much cheaper than the others to develop for.


What I meant was, you already have access to Rock Band on a Wii U, with all your instruments. It's definitely a concern for Harmonix, hence they'll let you bring your instruments across. However my point was, if you have a PS4 or an Xbox 1, you have no way at all of playing Rock Band because there is no backwards compatibility. Whereas, if you have the games on Wii, they still work in your Wii U.



RIP Dad 25/11/51 - 13/12/13. You will be missed but never forgotten.

I wonder how many people here, that are complaining about Rock Band 4 not coming to Wii U (for the time being), are complaining because the Wii U is being left out again, or because they want to buy Rock Band 4 on the Wii U?

(Not saying there aren't people who really want the game on Wii U)

I'm asking because I'm in the camp of people who dislike it, when 3rd's skip the Wii U (or release inferior late ports and expect full price), but probably wouldn't buy Rock Band 4 for the Wii U, as I'm not interested in it.

Harmonix reasoning seems legitimate to me, the risk on the other platforms is probably lower.
Harmonix isn't a huge publisher who can take a big flop, so they have to play it safe.



Platforms: Wii U, New 3DS, PS4, PC

currently playing: 
 -Yoshi's Wooly World 
 -Pokemon X
 -Fire Emblem Fates 

Zone: Europe (Germany)

MikeRox said:
mysteryman said:
MikeRox said:

This is all the more reason the Wii U version is a lower priority though.

You CAN'T play Rock Band in any form on PS4 or XB1.

Except that Harmonix are working on making the PS360 "instruments" backwards compatible for the PS4/Xbone, so it is clearly a concern.

They wouldn't even need to develop new "instruments" at all, surely the Wii U would be much cheaper than the others to develop for.


What I meant was, you already have access to Rock Band on a Wii U, with all your instruments. It's definitely a concern for Harmonix, hence they'll let you bring your instruments across. However my point was, if you have a PS4 or an Xbox 1, you have no way at all of playing Rock Band because there is no backwards compatibility. Whereas, if you have the games on Wii, they still work in your Wii U.

The whole point of the franchise is to keep pumping out new iterations for more money.

Do you beleive the Wii Rock Band titles are currently selling better than a new Wii U title would?



MikeRox said:
Samus Aran said:

How can you be the best music game developer if you don't even make your own god damn music?

Games like these are basically one gigantic quick time event.


I see you're not familiar with what is actually involved in performing music.

Next you'll be complaining that racing games like Mario Kart are basically just going around in circles...

Neither are you if you think that's what you're doing while playing Rock Band.



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Materia-Blade said:
 

Lt's see what's wrong with your post.

The wii u isn't "dodgy" to program and never really had support at the same time ps4 and x1 were getting more support before even releasing. Those are facts.

"Sony lost exclusivity on Final Fantasy and Metal Gear Solid series; this is easily among the biggest software news in two decades."

How is that big software news? I'ts just two games going multi.

"Number two; what incentive did 3rd parties have to develop for and publish on the Wii U?"

The same incentive they have to develop and publish for ps4 and x1.

"The Wii crashed completely while the PS3 and 360 kept on going"

It took the wii what? 5 years to start selling low? that's not crashing. And ps360 kept going, but they never soared in the first place.

"the combined installed base of the PS3/360 and a decimated Wii concept made it a no-brainer for most and 3rd party games kept on selling well on these platforms"

For wii too. But games can't sell if they don't exist. Wii had plenty of third party releases up to 2010. It's hard to sell third party games after that when third party games aren't releasing.

"it is due to Nintendo being forced early into the 8th gen when the Wii crashed and a succession of really poor choices"

Again, wii didn't crash. You think 6 YEARS after the predecessor is being forced early into the next gen? that's one year later than previous nintendo consoles. The gamepad is no mistake. I would particularly make something different but how can you say a controller with extra features is a mistake? It's no different than a controller with new buttons: everything you already are used to is still there and the new stuff is optional.

What I see is a console that had no reason to be ignored by third parties but is being ignored anyway. And not only that, the third parties also insulted the console's fanbase several time and people like you agree with them. A company blaming the consumer and getting away with it is an absurd that only happens on the gaming industry.


What exactly are you doing while reading my posts? You're even answering statements I never made.

1: I never said the Wii U was dodgy to develop for; I said that "And did you miss the part where the PS3 lost a bunch of support due to slow start, being a year after the 360 and being dodgy to program for?" How on earth did you manage to turn that into "The Wii U is dodgy to develop for"?

2: Yes, the PS4 and X1 got more support from the beginning because their predecessors showed that PS and Xbox could sell 3rd party software really well, even far into their lifecycle while the Wii was completely irrelevant at this point (and long before that, even). This is a huge part of my point and you managed to miss it twice now; the Wii name had faded into obscurity and the PS3 and 360 kept on going, regardless of the reason behind the Wii's fading away, the fact still remains that it had actually faded away. Can I make that more clear? That is why the PS4 and X1 got games from the start; developers knew that they would move software, the PS4 already has 28 million sellers after only 16-17 months on the market, the One has 18 million sellers after the same amount of time and the Wii U has 9 million sellers after 28 months on the market, why do you think the PS4 and X1 got good support from the start again? I don't feel like explaining this very logical assumption on the developers' part one more time.

3: "It's just two games going multi." It was one of the defining franchises on the PS consoles and the most successful JRPG (and RPG in general) series in history with 110 million + sold, with the vast majority of that being on PS consoles and PS exclusive, that's like calling Mario Kart unimportant and MK has actually sold less than this. That's utterly ridiculous to write.

4: No, no one had the same incentive to develop/publish for the Wii U as they did on the PS4 and X1, due to; Wii becoming a non-factor and not a shred of a natural generation bridge to walk across, clinging to another chipset die and coming off of a market leader that showed a poor ability to move traditional 3rd party games in any number. It is not the same in the slightest and this is a well known fact to every single user on this forum, which includes you.

5: The Wii sold around 16.5 million in its first full CY on the market, followed by an immense 24 million the year after, 21 the year after that and 17 million in the fourth CY, and then stumbled down to 11 million in its fifth CY, this is not normal behavior for a market leader and the competition kept on growing for all of these five years, peaking in year 6 and 7 respectively (if I recall correctly), while the Wii peaked in its second CY. That is what I call a crash, especially compared to the competition. The fact that it sold quickly and sold a lot is easily trumphed by the fact that it disappeared so quickly compared to the others, and especially other market leaders and the fact that it did horribly at selling most traditional 3rd party games (which was, of course, ususally blamed on the developers themselves). I know people like to pretend that the Wii followed a completely normal sales curve for a market leader; it really, really did not.

6: PS3 and 360 didn't need to soar into 1st place; they sold mountains of 3rd party software while around 35-40% of the total software sales on the Wii was 1st party titles and practically every big multiplatform franchise and series did really poorly (Call of Duty is the very best example here) despite the advantage in installed base all along. It is a real no-brainer to see why the developers have opted the way they have all this time.

7: Even the 3rd party titles the Wii did get, sold horribly almost without exception, this is not developer incentive; this a huge red flag. Game development is not a charity and no one owes any console manufacturer anything for past deeds.

8: By the time the Wii U launched six years after the Wii, the Wii had simply vanished even from the memories of the industry and sold next to nothing, this is unheard of for a market leader. The PS2 sold over 30% of its lifetime sales after the PS3 released, for a quick comparison. And, of course they were forced, since when does market leader fade into obscurity while the competition keeps growing and then release their next console a year before the others? Again, this is not normal for a market leader; not even close.
One year later than previous Nintendo consoles, you mean the Gamecube and N64 that were all soundly beaten and nowhere near the top? Once more; the Wii was the market leader, it did not reflect this in its curious sales curve and developers took note of this very obvious and crystal clear phenomenon.

9: I have said all along that the Gamepad was a mistake; you disagree, that doesn't make you right and me wrong. If anything; the sales figures, despite huge releases and even advertising show that I am more likely to be correct in thinking that Gamepad has made the Wii U a bipolar product that largely misses two markets rather than appeal to them. How can I say that a controller with extra features is a mistake? That's really easy; the Gamepad is perceived as a pale knock-off of tablets, sporting poor resolution, unimpressive battery life and buttons and sticks on it and they went so far as to try to make TV remote functionality an actual sales point. Not to mention the fact that even Nintendo themselves have done a poor job at making proper use of the controller even after all this time and it still isn't available for purchase and you can't even have two playing on unit each at once, which is truly strange for a company that has made their fortune on local multiplayer and even used this as a sales angle in almost all their commercials all along.

10: The reason it is being ignored by 3rd parties have been listed above and I don't want to spend any more time repeating myself. Where did I agree with developers insulting Nintendo fans? When and where did they insult Nintendo fans to begin with? Please, do show me.

11: 3rd parties are not first and foremost blaming consumers; they like the consumers, they are blaming Nintendo for not making an effort to draw in developers of any kind or trying to offer a decent developer environment for over two decades and for building hardware tailor-made to sell Nintendo games first and foremost and for, twice in a row now, forcing developers to bifurcate their programming efforts if they want to include Nintendo in the multiplat development process. Pair this with sales of games that have been released and have sold incredibly poorly; there is no huge mystery here but one cannot see what one does not want to see.
And before you use ZombiU as an example of a success for a 3rd party developer on the Wii U; read about Ubi telling how it was "not even close to being profitable", even at the relatively high sales it achieved.

Take your time and read what people actually write and if you want to start your posts by pointing out how badly flawed mine is; make sure you have actual arguments to present rather than this. If you keep responding in the same fashion; I see no point in spending any more time on this at all.



tripenfall said:

No, due to backwards compatability the Wii U is the only current gen console where the instruments will cross straight over. New instruments won't be needed for anyone with either GH of RB from the Wii (which is a lot of people). That's going to be the biggest hurdle for people thinking of buying the game on XBone / PS4. That's why this game really should have seen a Wii U release....


Who knows how many of the Wii's Rock Band owners bought a Wii U?
Could be 2 million, could be 2 thousand.

Even if it's the highly unlikely 2 million, it will still cost them more to develop the game for the Wii U than for the x86 consoles Xbox One and PS4.
Also they have to transition from the Wi-Fi Connection to the e-shop. While the process in XBox Live and the PSN are probably the same as last gen, it has changed on Nintendos platforms (how much effort that is I don't know).
I'd guess the benefit of not needing to update the Instruments, as they should already be compatible, doesn't outweigh the risks.



Platforms: Wii U, New 3DS, PS4, PC

currently playing: 
 -Yoshi's Wooly World 
 -Pokemon X
 -Fire Emblem Fates 

Zone: Europe (Germany)

shikamaru317 said:

Considering the fact that Just Dance games are only selling 500k on Wii U, I can see why they might want to skip Wii U. It's a pretty costly port since Wii U doesn't share an x86 architecture with XB1 and PS4, so the sales might not justify the porting costs in their eyes. Plus the rumors suggest that Rock Band 4 is aiming for more realistic graphics than the previous games, so they probably don't want a Wii U version holding them back graphically.

Hopefully for Wii U owners' sakes Activision will decide to put their new Guitar Hero on Wii U, Activision is one of the few western 3rd party publishers still supporting Wii U in some capacity.

This "only" 500k (and rising each year) is more than the ps4/x1 versions are doing.



mysteryman said:
MikeRox said:

What I meant was, you already have access to Rock Band on a Wii U, with all your instruments. It's definitely a concern for Harmonix, hence they'll let you bring your instruments across. However my point was, if you have a PS4 or an Xbox 1, you have no way at all of playing Rock Band because there is no backwards compatibility. Whereas, if you have the games on Wii, they still work in your Wii U.

The whole point of the franchise is to keep pumping out new iterations for more money.

Do you beleive the Wii Rock Band titles are currently selling better than a new Wii U title would?


Not at all. However I do think that they will shift more units on PS4 and XB1 than on Wii U, hence for a small studio like Harmonix that makes more sense. Just like how Guitar Hero originally started as a PS2 exclusive.



RIP Dad 25/11/51 - 13/12/13. You will be missed but never forgotten.

Samus Aran said:
MikeRox said:


I see you're not familiar with what is actually involved in performing music.

Next you'll be complaining that racing games like Mario Kart are basically just going around in circles...

Neither are you if you think that's what you're doing while playing Rock Band.


I'm actually a semi professional musician, however I play Trombone rather than any instruments used in Rock music. However, you follow a conductor (giving your beat/time) and you follow set patterns on a sheet of music. What's that if it's not practically a QTE?



RIP Dad 25/11/51 - 13/12/13. You will be missed but never forgotten.