Wii U Indie Support!

[Chiraku]

Kay... Dunno if this is in the wrong place or this was already mentioned, but here I go.

At a a recent press conference called GDC (whatever that means), Nintendo revealed its new plans for the Nintendo eShop by allowing indie developers to publish their games on the WiiU (possibly 3DS) online. All they have to do is buy their dev package (which I hear may be like $5,000!!) which is compatible with Unity, Java, and HTML, make a playable Demo for your project, and send it to the Big N for approval. If they agree, you can finish the game and have it put up on the eShop. Whether you get to keep most of your control over the project or how approvals will work, I don't know. But still, you gotta admit this is neat! As an aspiring programmer, I can't help but daydream about this! Of course I couldn't afford the dev kit if the rumored price is true. What I'm most hyped about is the possibility of familiar indie games like Minecraft getting on!
Source: Gonintendo.com

 

[Dan]

Yes I'll also be dreaming about this, there have been plenty of great indie games this generation more than my uncles bean closet.

 

[JuicieJ]

That's awesome. It's great to see Nintendo branching out to the indie department. Some of the most fun and thought-provoking games have come from indie developers, such as Fez, Super Meat Boy, and Journey. They deserve way more attention than they get, so Nintendo doing this warms my heart.

 

[Ventus]

The question is, who would want to develop for the Wii U, at least as of now? Hopefully Nintendo will not pull any mistakes here. The thing needs to be easy to develop for and Nintendo needs to not supercop everything that comes their way, or else developers will shy away from them. Remember their tight hold back in the NES days? Don't repeat that, even if you're confident they won't.

GoNintendo • View topic - The new "indie dev-friendly" Nintendo
Nintendo's new, relaxed restrictions for eShop indies | Joystiq

 

[JuicieJ]

The question is, who would want to develop for the Wii U, at least as of now? Hopefully Nintendo will not pull any mistakes here. The thing needs to be easy to develop for and Nintendo needs to not supercop everything that comes their way, or else developers will shy away from them. Remember their tight hold back in the NES days? Don't repeat that, even if you're confident they won't.

Literally every company out there has said the Wii U is easy to develop for, and these are companies that make the games that cost the big bucks. I don't think there's any need to worry about indie developers having trouble.