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Home News Wii U Gamepad Not Being Sold Standalone... Yet

GAMING NEWS

Wii U Gamepad Not Being Sold Standalone... Yet

Posted on Friday, September 14 @ 07:48:33 Eastern by


Yesterday, Nintendo let the cat out of the bag on the Wii U launch. Full pricing details, release date, and what you actually get in the box—everything you need to know—was covered. But there was still one thing missing: How much would it cost for a second Wii U Gamepad?

Earlier in the year, Nintendo revealed that the Wii U could support up to two Wii U Gamepads in addition to a number of Wii U and Wii accessories and controller options. But since there won't be any games at launch that support two Wii U Gamepads, offering one for sale is moot, and would diminish the available Gamepads available for hardware bundles at retail, says Nintendo of America president and COO Reggie Fils-Aime.

We have deliberately not announced the availability of the GamePad as a separate, standalone accessory here in the United States. The reason for that is simple - there are no games in the launch window that take advantage of a second GamePad. And [because of that], I want all of that hardware production to be focused on driving sales at retail.

What I mean by that is that Wii U is a console and a GamePad together. If I were to take additional GamePads and make them available as an accessory, then I would have less Wii U console hardware to sell into retail. You know, probably one of your questions is whether I'm going to meet demand. The only way we're going to achieve that here in the Americas is to not have that GamePad accessory, so I can maximize my overall volume.

Sound logical to me. However, it does make you wonder how much the Gamepad—the meat and potatoes of the Wii U—will cost eventually, and how much cost it adds to the overall total cost of each Wii U hardware bundle, ranging from $299 to $349.
Tags:   Nintendo, Wii U


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Comments
  • wildmario
    wildmario
    Joined: Jan 2007
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 7:55 am
    I am betting a stand alone gamepad will be between $70 to $100
    0 0
  • Skelbon
    Skelbon
    Joined: Apr 2012
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 8:49 am
    What if it breaks?
    0 1
  • ShadeTail
    ShadeTail
    Joined: Nov 2006
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 1:39 pm
    Then you get it fixed under the warranty, of course.
    0 0
  • Skelbon
    Skelbon
    Joined: Apr 2012
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 2:31 pm
    Sure, but my point is that if for some reason I buy it on launch date (not that I will) and the gamepad falls into the toilet, gets lost or something else happens and I can't take it to warranty, what do I do? Sit and wait until they decide it's ok to sell it alone? I can easily imagine someone going through this, there are people with very bad luck.
    0 1
  • ShadeTail
    ShadeTail
    Joined: Nov 2006
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 2:58 pm
    Most likely, if you called Nintendo, they would replace it. Though probably not for free. In my experience, they're pretty good about fixing or replacing broken equipment.
    0 1
  • ShadeTail
    ShadeTail
    Joined: Nov 2006
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 3:07 pm
    By the way, *drop it in the toilet*? Why in the world would you take a game controller into the bathroom in the first place?
    0 0
  • Nick_Tan
    Nick_Tan
    Joined: Jul 2006
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 11:03 am
    Hmm... not terribly surprised here. If these launch titles won't feature a second (or third, or fourth) gamepad, though, it's dubious that future titles will as well. For a developer, it just doesn't make much sense to force a consumer to purchase another gamepad to play a game, thereby reducing the game's potential audience.
    0 1
  • ShadeTail
    ShadeTail
    Joined: Nov 2006
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 1:40 pm
    Probably true. At the very least, I doubt third-party developers will push dual-Gamepad games. Most likely, Nintendo will do that themselves, and then the third-party folks might follow.
    0 1
  • reiandcoke
    reiandcoke
    Joined: Jul 2011
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 5:51 pm
    this actually may be related to the "hardware manufacturing issues" rumoured. if they couldn't manufacture enough controllers (i can't imagine the dated console tech being the issue) then the only way they could sell additional controllers would be to do so at the expense of an entire system sale as they would need to take those to sell as standalone controllers.... and obviously couldn't sell the system without one.
    0 0
  • reiandcoke
    reiandcoke
    Joined: Jul 2011
    Posted: Sep 14th, 2012 at 3:43 pm
    the fact that the controller can essentially work as a second screen in say, black ops 2, got me to thinking..... could they use similar tech as is inside the controller to build a second "companion box" to the wiiu that you could connect to a second (nearby) tv and then use a pro controller to multi-play games? could make for some awesome fun if done correctly.
    0 0

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