Ubisoft: Wii U Needs a Price Cut
by William D'Angelo, posted on 07 March 2013 / 5,275 Views
Ubisoft’s executive director for EMEA territories Alain Corre spoke with Edge Online about the price of the Wii U. He says that originally Ubisoft expected the Wii U to sell better and that its higher price point when compared to the Wii at launch is the big reason for the lower sales.
"We always want the hardware to be at a low price because we want as many fans as possible to afford to buy our games, so that’s for sure," said Corre. "We think that Wii U will find its public at some point. Some were expecting sales to be quicker but we are optimistic."
"I think Nintendo has said that the Wii U sales in general were below expectations originally and the software tie-in ratio is also stable, so I think that when less machines sell, less games sell," he continued.
Ubisoft had recently announced that Rayman Legends is no longer a Wii U exclusive and has delayed the game to be released at the same time as the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions of the game.
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22 Comments
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My thoughts exactly... I think many more people would buy games if they released at $20 instead of $60.
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I think having a steady stream of games releasing is more important than a price cut. The Gamecube was super cheap and pretty powerful for its time, but it still didn't sell very well.
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the GC had a steady stream of games, the GC problem was it was NOT PS2, that was its only really problem. Xbox had the same issue but at least it had online to be different than the comp
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The GameCube struggled because it was "more of the same" in a generation with 4 largely identical machines, and after a generation of gradually losing ground with the N64.
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You sell even less when you dont release your finished product idiots!
Well if the thinks it's too expensive, I wonder what he'll think of PS4/X720's prices once they release, lol.
Those systems will have actual games and better graphics, which justify the price to many people. If Wii U had more games out, this wouldn't be such a big deal.
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Price must be proportional to power. PS4 is powerful enough to justify a higher price tag, the Wii U is just a PS3 except costing more.
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The truth is that price is judged by the buyer, and traditionally Nintendo's customers haven't been friendly with traditional prices, they usually look for value pricing.
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It doesn't need a price cut, so much as some good exclusives to make the console desirable. It's doing worse then the 360 did on a weekly basis now, but 360 had Perfect Dark, PGR, Kameo, Dead or Alive 4, Amped 3, and others. Wii U really only has NSMB, and NintendoLand (talking about exclusives). I think most people would buy a WiiU for $300 (which really isn't much, only $20 more then the Wii when it released) if there was something to buy it for.
They should probably release finished games on the dates they actually promised.
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I should take a break from surfing games websites until E3, when Nintendo will ANNOUNCE the first must-have games. None of which will release before fall... what a wasted first year. Until then: 6 more months of threads / news / discussions / analyses / developer interviews stating the same thing, over and over.
The statement "We always want the hardware to be at a low price because we want as many fans as possible to afford to buy our games" is ridiculous as well. What is a "low price"? what does that even mean and how is low (meaning appropriate or less) determined? Its not about what the system costs (HD twins proved that as they have done really well sales wise), it is about what it offers and that includes games. Make a quality game and it can sell regardless of system price as long as it's reasonable.
what a short sighted, narrow minded thinking this concept is. At this early stage in the console's life, a price cut will only spur on a very short term increase in sales and then drop back to normal. Without an increase in quality software, what difference is dropping lets say 50 dollars off the system going to make? So the masses of people are suddenly going to be willing to spend 300 instead of 350 us just because it's 50 dollars cheaper and still have the same limited library of software to play? Where is the value in that...what incentive is there really? It is when there is a well rounded library of quality software available that there will be a reason for those holding back to make the purchase. Wii U doesn't need a price cut to add value and sell systems, it needs quality games. And that statement is for all devs/publishers.
Ubisoft, the company whose Wii games helped to finance the initially costly development of games for next-generation consoles (Xbox 360 and PS3). Times have changed, eh?
Ubisoft; let wait for the games are that coming soon and then we can talk price cut if the system still has bad sales.
That much is obvious. A price cut along with some Nintendo games will do the system good. Not Wii good, but good.
Nintendo turned their backs on the core for the fickle casuals. When those casuals bought idevices? The core had left the building. This is all obvious.
The hardware, while interesting, is confusing and inho partially diverging from the console world. WII rocked due to simplicity. What is WiiU's message? Complexity? There is no WAY that the people who picked up a Wii and went "woa, cute and simple" are looking at the WiiU and contemplating an upgrade at this time. Price cut imo won't up the sales much. It's missing effective advertising and games. Add on that you can buy a WII for like $99 and frig...even *I* am confused with how the hell they're going to generate sales for a WiiU!
The U is marketted currently to the same audience as the Wii with games like Lego City Stories, NintendoLand and NSMBU. The pricepoint, as it is, doesn't match the target audience.
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Haven't seen you in forever R_H, hope you're well. (It's padib)
You make a good point but I'm not sure the kinect sales compare to the Wii sales, and 360 was not a new system when Kinect released, bear in mind.
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Um... here's a pro tip: Make a 100GB Wii U that comes with the Pro Controller and not the Game Pad for $299.
That's not a pro tip. As soon as you make a controller / an accessory optional, no one is going to develop for it, cause you're getting a fragmented install base. The "100GB" remark is not very useful either - for the Wii U they use Flash memory, which is waaay more expensive than HDD's. You can plug in any USB drive, why raise the console's entry price for that?
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The problem with a price cut is Iwata will be forfeiting his profit goal for the annual year. Failure might not be an option for him. Nintendo is fooling themselves, though. If NSMBU has trouble selling the Wii U, then a 3D Mario sure as hell isn't going to do it. What Nintendo needs to do is get Nintendo Land out of the box and replace it with NSMBU, and -then- price cut the console, also at the time of a big new game release (yes, it can even be 3D Mario, so long as it happens on the side of NSMBU bundle and a price cut). They should also probably strike a bundle deal with Activision and Black Ops 2. That game needs to sell more, or Nintendo can kiss Call of Duty goodbye on Wii U.
Shut the fuck up, Ubisoft. You want "low priced systems," and all you talked about for a year was how you wanted "new consoles" so you could spam the launches with crap to take advantage of the few choices available to new consumers, and then you told Nintendo fans to fuck themselves and made a decision guaranteed to turn Rayman Legends into a failure. I was going to pick it up when it was supposed to be released two weeks ago. By the time it comes out, there will be more than enough to play on every platform, including the Wii U, that I won't even notice or care that it's out.
