WiiBits

I’m not exactly excited about the games THQ has coming (SpongeBob SquarePants? Yawn.) but president and CEO Brian Farrell has some interesting things to say about developing for the Wii…

“[The Wii] wasn’t a whole new programming environment,” Farrell said. “So we had a lot of tools and tech that work in that environment. So those costs — and again, I hate these broad generalizations — but they could be as little as a third of the high-end next-gen titles… Maybe the range is a quarter to a half.”

It’s certainly good news that the system is simple to develop for as it means more developers working on more games. If game development is cheap, it could also mean companies are willing to take more chances on more innovative games. Low development costs also mean you can turn a profit and just cater to a niche market, possibly meaning the US market will see more weird/interesting Japanese games. Let’s hope it doesn’t mean the Wii lacks the power to make the system as next-gen as their ideas.

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