Does not surprise me in the slightest.

i seem to recall hearing back then that Nintendo was trying to negotiate a deal with them but it fell through.

I think this was kind of expected. They probably decided after it launched that the system didn't have the right audience.

I think most devs at least play around with new Major hardware if its coming from the big 3.

Huh, maybe that could have helped the Wii U, even if it was just a bit. Kinda a shame if true and was scrapped.

I know there are loads of people interested in the game on Wii U, I'm not one personally, but I'm sure it would have sold fairly well.
Actually, it probably would have sold quite well since it's one of the only open world games, certainly early in its life, other than Lego city and that has sold fairly well.

As weird as it sounds, it may have saved the Wii U as far as 3rd party is concerned. It would have been the best looking version if it launched along with the 360/PS3 version. And it would have stayed that way until the PS4/X1 versions launched later.

I would gladly buy it a 3rd time if it came on Wii U. I love the game that much.

1 million at least. 2 million possible.
-Not only that. at least, 500k people bought a ps360 to play gtav on launch week, some of them could have chosen a more modern system (wii U). At that time, thirds party games were still comming to wii U, so, people who play 3rd party games would move in wii U.
-Gamepad could be very usefull in this game and a feature that differenciate from ps360 version. 1rs person view, above view(to nostalgic GTA1 players), phone features on the touch screen, people who bought a console to play would choose the wii U version. Would be better if bundled and coincident to 50$ price cut. Also, would be easy to include a pikachu car and bring also nintendo fans to the game too.
-lego city sold very well in such a low install base.
-Not only that, this game would fill the 2013 droughts. move w101, WWHD and pikmin some weeks and release GTAV on date would help to keep the game stream of this Q of the year.
-Not only that, people who play GTA probably play also CoD, AC, batman and those 3rd party games that released on wii U in 2013. The sales of these games would increase. With more sales, they would bring the 2014 games also, and wii U would keep some 3rd party games. The diversity in the library would bring more people to console.

GTAV could be a key game in wii U library, and could change the console from a fail to an above than gamecube. It could be at 13 to 15M sold right now.

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But i think there was a reason apart from sales for not releasing GTAV on wii U.
PS360 version demand a 8Gb install on the memory HDD. Half of th 3M wii Us at that time had only 8Gb, and only 3 usable...

Isnt this the third or fourth time this has been rumored?

Hopefully the next GTA is on the Wuu I or the NX.