UPDATE: Alex Ward, who was formerly with Criterion, commented on the situation via Twitter yesterday. It seems that talks weren’t far along, "it was only an email - nothing more serious. So we had nothing to turn down." Ward also indicated that he personally isn’t interested in working on someone else’s IP.
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Nintendolife confirms that the Wii U nearly launched with an F-Zero title. Back in 2011, Nintendo of Europe asked Burnout studio Criterion to work on a pitch for a new F-Zero, which would have been shown at E3 that year alongside the official unveiling of the Wii U itself. Shigeru Miyamoto has previously stated that he's at a loss about how the revive the series, which would explain why Nintendo opened up the field to third party developers, to see what they could come up with.
The objective was to show off a playable vertical slice of the game at E3 which would give fans a taste of what the full release would entail. A quick turnaround was essential, but sadly Criterion was hard at work on bringing Need for Speed: Most Wanted to multiple platforms and therefore couldn't spare the resource at the time.
Our source on this particular piece of information wishes to remain anonymous, but we've since had it verified by Criterion founder Alex Ward. He confirmed that the conversation between Criterion and Nintendo of Europe did indeed take place, and that time was of the essence for Nintendo. Because Criterion had prior commitments, nothing came of the idea - and it joined the untold legions of game pitches which went absolutely nowhere.
