The decision to cancel publishing of La-Mulana was a tough call, but waiting two years for NIGORO to finish development has made it near impossible to sell sufficient units on Wii. The WiiWare market has a fraction of the players from 2008. The window for release and success of software on the platform ended in 2009 and took a very steep decline. Players have moved onto other digital download platforms.
La-Mulana was originally developed without DLC in mind and, I think being their first console project, that NIGORO got a bit ahead of themselves and spent two years agonizing on getting the DLC sort of working for Japan. Unfortunately, it never passed Nintendo’s submission process in the US or EU with DLC in place. As the publisher, we’re responsible for various things, but development (which includes programming, art, music and design) is and always has been in the hands of NIGORO.
With the Wii U in the not too distant future and WiiWare sales almost non-existent, I had to make a call today. I wish them the best. They’re good game developers and good guys - Tyrone Rodriguez, Nicalis
I can definitely understand the WiiWare perspective. Couple that with the fact that the game hit many development struggles and it seems like the perfect recipe for cancellation. With that said, I'm still going to miss having a chance to play this on my Wii.
Thanks to Tyrone Rodriguez for the comment.
La-Mulana was originally developed without DLC in mind and, I think being their first console project, that NIGORO got a bit ahead of themselves and spent two years agonizing on getting the DLC sort of working for Japan. Unfortunately, it never passed Nintendo’s submission process in the US or EU with DLC in place. As the publisher, we’re responsible for various things, but development (which includes programming, art, music and design) is and always has been in the hands of NIGORO.
With the Wii U in the not too distant future and WiiWare sales almost non-existent, I had to make a call today. I wish them the best. They’re good game developers and good guys - Tyrone Rodriguez, Nicalis
I can definitely understand the WiiWare perspective. Couple that with the fact that the game hit many development struggles and it seems like the perfect recipe for cancellation. With that said, I'm still going to miss having a chance to play this on my Wii.
Thanks to Tyrone Rodriguez for the comment.
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I guess there's still a chance on the WiiU Ware.. Shop.. whatever
Hell, why not on PSN or XBL?
i could see it getting passed on for xbla and ending up a "indie" title. those are as doomed as wiiware.
good! nobody needs games like that any more!
Maybe because Nicalis does not appear to be associated with those platforms.
Mike from Morgantown
at least the pc localization is still on
Steam. Do it.
If Wiiware would release good titles instead of garbage titles like the Carmen Sandiego games, this would never have happened. I hate it when games that have potential gets no release while garbage games somehow always get in.Besides a few good wiiware titles, Wiiware sucks!
I hope to god that's sarcasm.
I'm disappointed by this, but at least it's a legitimate reason and not the short comings of the WiiWare service. Actually, it's technically that too... I blame time for this.
Why do even WiiWare supporters make WiiWare look bad?
Wii is the thing out of steam, and thus WiiWare suffers. WiiWare isn't a failing platform because of itself.
More and more I see Wii as a little white tombstone.
Maybe that's why, if you're going to release DLC, you should wait until AFTER your game is out to make it, and not completely develop it all up front before your game's even finished and then try to fit it into the actual game download itself so you can pay to "unlock" it weeks after you buy the game.
That's like the 3rd or 4th WiiWare game to do that, (not that it doesn't happen elsewhere by any means) and as great of a game as it may be I don't really feel much sympathy for them, especially considering the game started off free.
It's also kind of immature and rude (as true as it may be) for Nicalis to point fingers and lay almost all of the blame on Nigoro. They're big boys, and they had to know the trends and the way things were headed, and if they're going to cancel the game they shouldn't wait until after Nigoro had finally finished it and sent it in to them (http://la-mulana.com/en/blog/report-2.html)
Nicalis is completely inept at handling even the simplest of localizations and port jobs.
VVVVVV 3DS being a recent example.
Good luck finding publishers for anything in the future, NIGORO.
to be perfectly honest I really couldn't care less about wiiware/psn/xbla games, I'd just much prefer to play those types of games on my 3DS or even iphone in some cases.
regardless of that, it's quite saddening to see developers trying so hard and nintendo refusing to cooperate or just making the platform a pain in the ass to develop for.
@motherbra1n
I'm pretty much the same way. I mean, I've bought, and still do buy, my fair share of xbla/psn/wiiware games, but almost every single one I buy I can't help but feel like I'd much rather be playing this game on a handheld.
Nintendo could not mange any online function if they was trapped in paper bag with it.
It's a tough call. Sad, but some things just happen. The PC release is still going on however, so it's not like the game is down for the count.
I refuse to buy it until they include a level editor.
Put it this way: one cancelation isn't enough to stop the flooding of new games for download in the future, and that's for both 3DS and Wii U. XD
At least it's getting released on PC. I'm really not surprised to read about its cancellation no WiiWare. I don't blame them for releasing anything on that dead service.
I call BS. That's all I'm saying. Nigoro had a finished build LAST YEAR. They shouldn't have worried about DLC, that much is true. But they submitted a finished build, and failed to past ONE ratings board in Germany last year. They said so themselves. Nicalis owes gamers who have been waiting so long to get this. A LOT of people still would have downloaded it, so they're whole "WiiWare is dead now" argument is moot. A lot of people would have "dusted off their Wiis" to get this game, because I know for a fact a lot of gamers, myself included, have been waiting a LONG time for this.
This isn't the first time Nicalis has shown their true colors. And throwing the developer under the bus, to avoid heat themselves, is pretty shady. They could have released the game in NA at least, where it had passed ratings EARLY last year. I mean where is Night Sky as well, right? Right. People being "understanding" of Nicalis' BS excuse for cancelling their publishing of the game is lame. If I were Nigoro, I'd just publish the damn thing in NA themselves, like they did in Japan.
If Nigoro had a better publisher, this game would have been released last year. End of story.
Well this stinks but they gotta do what they gotta do. Maybe this will see the light of day on the eShop.
makes perfect sense, but why not "just" move it over to the eShop?
It really doesn't make perfect sense, if you knew both sides of the story.
Here: http://la-mulana.com/en/
This is the official website/blog of the game from Nigoro. They've worked their asses off for a long time to bring this to WiiWare, and as far as they were concerned, it WAS going to release on Wii no matter what. In fact their most recent blog update, dated April 26th, they stated:
"WiiWare version:
The master data for NOA and NOE was handed to our publisher, Nicalis.
After that, we haven’t received any reports.
So, we have no idea when the release date is determined."
The subtext of that, in earlier blog entries, was that they had submitted it quite some time ago. Both Nicalis and the ratings boards to which they submitted it were terribly uncommunicative to them, leaving them in the dark about the status of their own game. They're making a version for PC, which they are publishing themselves, so they are in total control of when and if it gets released. If you ask me, they should have done that for WiiWare as well, because Nicalis is NOT a good publisher. It's a miracle they ever got Cave Story out at all. They are also the reason NightSky has never released on WiiWare.
I'm shocked more people don't know/realize these facts, and are being so understanding and supportive of Nicalis in this. Sure, there are two sides to every story, but the fact is, Nigoro's side is being ignored in these threads, even though they've been updating their fans about things as best they can over the last year+. Don't believe me? Go read the blog.
This is sad state of affairs, and if there were any justice in the gaming world, not only would devs NOT go to Nicalis as a publisher anymore, but Nigoro would somehow find a way to get La-Mulana published on WiiWare anyway. *sigh*
Nicalis sucks as a publisher. There, I said it.
Cave Story being delayed for so long on WiiWare, NightSky going missing on WiiWare, VVVVVV being released on the eShop with an entire mode being broken at launch and taking months to fix it, and now La-Mulana canceled eleven months after the Japanese version was released...terrible.
Nobody can defend Nicalis. This is their fault.
EDIT: Nevermind that this was announced almost three years ago.
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