Opinion: Nintendo has finished off the Wii U with the NX and Zelda release date

Like many of you, we weren’t shocked when Nintendo announced a March 2017 release date for the Nintendo NX. Their reasoning for doing so is good, they don’t want to release another half-baked console and they can release The Legend of Zelda for it at the same time. That’s all fine, but it leaves Nintendo with a problem – one that will last for nearly the next year.

There’s no simple way to put this, the Wii U is dead. People will argue and say it was before but Nintendo went and slit the throat of the console last night and is now going to leave it to bleed out over the next 11 months.

Announcing the NX release date in March 2017, pushing The Legend of Zelda to the NX (even if it will release on Wii U) and then on top of that forgoing showing the NX at E3 means that the poor little Wii U is swinging in the breeze.

Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima might say on record to reporters that the company “could cease production of the Wii U by March 2018” but their financial projections say something else completely. Nintendo reported yesterday that it sold through 3.26 million Wii U units in the last financial year. This year it’s predicting just 800,000 will ship – Nintendo knows it’s not going to sell many more Wii U consoles, it sure as hell isn’t going to keep making them until 2018.

Let’s look at the game release schedule that Nintendo themselves also put out – there are six games in total. One of them (Star Fox Zero) is already out. So you’re left with;

The Legend of Zelda (which is coming to NX anyway), the super niche JRPG in Tokyo Mirage Sessions #FE, Mario and Sonic at the Rio Olympic Games, Paper Mario: Color Splash and Project Giant Robot. We know what you’re thinking though, there will be more games, there’s E3 coming – there could be Direct and a ton more games could come out!

We’re sure there will be, but with The Legend of Zelda being the only game playable at E3 – these games aren’t going to be coming from Nintendo themselves. If Nintendo want the NX out in March, they’re not going to be making Wii U games at this stage anymore. If there is anything left, it’s smaller projects like Paper Mario which are developed by Nintendo subsidiaries. These continued announcements from Nintendo saying ‘oh we’ll talk about that later’ is exactly how you keep the bullshit rumour mill going and completely distance anyone that isn’t dedicated to following gaming news.

So what about E3?

Nintendo has done E3 different for a number of years now, but still they’ve never done this. The Legend of Zelda will be the sole playable game at the show, this is they say to ‘provide attendees a complete immersion’. Alright cool but what about all the games you have coming out this year on the Wii U 3DS this year – do you actually have anything you want people to buy this holiday period?

Nintendo changes its approach to the show every year. This June, Nintendo will focus its attentions on the upcoming game in The Legend of Zelda franchise. The Wii U version of the game will be playable for the first time on the E3 show floor, and it will be the only playable game Nintendo presents at the show, in order to provide attendees a complete immersion. Additional information about Nintendo’s E3 plans will be announced in the future.

E3 might not be the holy grail it used to be, Nintendo does want to show off the NX at a separate event (which is fine) but to have nothing but The Legend of Zelda Wii U – in a year with so far with nothing else?

Baffling.