Reggie Fils-Aime Pitches Unreal Engine Support on Nintendo Switch

Sounds good to me

First 😛

I'm glad to see this and see Nintendo trying to drum up support.

@Jacadamia you're first!

Honestly, would probably pay for an infinity blade collection which used the unreal engine if memory serves.

@BlueKnight07 woah hey! Haha i guess i am -U-

Inb4 the Negative Nancy's come in and say something like "Oh, Nintendo is doomed because they started supporting Unreal Engine far too late".

Shouldn't they have been rallying this kind of support ages ago? Like before the console launched?

Either way, cool. More games the merrier.

@Dakt give it time. At the moment devs are playing awaiting game not wanting to take a risk. Hopefully after a successful launch, we'll have a number of larger third party games announced for holiday season.

Yes, the more games, the better. Although, as far as the devs/pubs themselves are concerned, it's the profits that matter, which higher ones will potentially lead to more games for the system.

@KirbyTheVampire They'll be here shortly...I can smell the hate brewing.

Your move 3rd parties. Nintendo has invited you to the table....show up.

Is it Friday yet?

This may be the first time I have seen Nintendo go out of their way to this extent in order to acquire support for popular game engines and developers who use those popular engines.

All this negativity about negativity! It's becoming Oroboros.

I want a NS down the road, but it doesn't depend on anything Reggie says. Cannot stand him and his slap-able face.

This is why the Switch will do better than the Wii U-- it supports Unreal and Unity and has already roped in JRPG devs that were the lifeblood of the 3DS. How much better remains to be seen, but it has a lot more going for it right off the bat.

Only time will tell...

Shut up Reggie you Twit!

@Ryu_Niiyama
Almost! At least this time around Nintendo has learned from their mistakes with the Wii U. Good start so far.
The Wii U didn't have this many titles available at launch.

@NewAdvent Sorry but any mention of Reggie gets an instant thumbs down from me. He's a BS merchant. He just spins and lies about everything. Liked him at the start, now I can't stand him. He's an insult to intelligence.

@arrmixer didn't it have more

@arrmixer Hmm, I'm not going to tar an feather the wiiu. I still say it had a strong launch. There was a diverse lineup...they just had a muddled message. Not sure if it is more games than the wiiu launch. Not that I care, as I'll be playing Zelda for the next six months.

@KirbyTheVampire How late they are to the party is Unreal. (I couldn't help myself. Sorry.)

In all seriousness though, it's just nice to finally see support for a major toolset. Time will tell if translates into more games for Switch, but I think initial signs are encouraging.

@UK-Nintendo @Ryu_Niiyama
Fair point. But for me the quality just seems like an improvement. I was playing a 2D Mario remake, 2D shooter, and Trine 2 at launch because Rayman wasn't available 😡.. still haven't played the game.
While with the switch I have Zelda and a number of good Eshop games to choose from.. not bad... at least me.

We'll have to wait and see what happens with third party support

@SLIGEACH_EIRE That word you used to tell Reggie to shut up counts as profanity, so...

Nintendo is clearly going out of their way to get 3rd party support this time around. At first it was just talk and there's been a lot of talk from them so it was hard to believe what they were saying without seeing action backing it up.

Now I can see they're backing it up.

Getting Bethesda on board was more symbolic than anything else (although Skyrim on the go is a really, really big selling point in its own right). Getting the proper engines supported on Switch was the real step forward, and having it ready day one. Reaching out to 3rd parties, from AAA devs all the way down to indies, that was the next step forward. Making a system that is easy to port to (as Capcom stated they ported tools over using just 12.5% the manpower needed for Wii U/3DS), that was the final step.

This is why Switch is going to get a lot more games than Wii U or 3DS got. And if Nintendo cranks up their own internal output with more games released per year (and they're doing pretty good so far with 8 1st party retail games slated for first 9 months) and crank up the quality of said releases (Zelda speaks for itself, Mario finally returns to open design, Xenoblade 2 is everything fans wanted) this is going to be one heck of a crazy ride these next five or six years

@Joeynator3000 You know what? I wasn't sure when I wrote it. It was a legitimate word that now has a double meaning, well thanks to Urban Dictionary we both know what it is. I used to say that so long ago as a kid and nobody would bat an eyelid. It's kind of like how certain words are now politically incorrect. Twit, I know is definitely alright. Or perhaps it was always an offensive word and it's just my ignorance instead.

@k8sMum Reggie is the Don! What's wrong with you

@SLIGEACH_EIRE speaking as one of the leading lights of one of the biggest entertainment companies in history you would know right?

@KIRO Yes, I do know. Thanks for asking though. If you've any further questions, please don't hesitate to answer.

Thanks I'll get my people to talk to your people when the occasion arises - peace .

This Oliver Twist sort of behaviour is something that concerns me deeply about third party prospects. If Nintendo indeed has a platform that is so fantastic at allowing novel development and porting, and the big name developers are so bullish, why are they airing this sort of thing in public instead of trying to foster those relationships in the background? I would argue that it's because they're trying to encourage fans to express that support to devs in a similar manner. A company that has support in the bag advertises it (like it did with that rubbish dev logo graphic during the reveal), it doesn't ask for it and certainly not in what amounts to a public plea. Yikes.

@JohnGrey Most pitches still happen behind closed doors. From what I can tell, this solicitation video was shown at the conference to address attendees during a panel. And Polygon had gotten the permission to use it in their article, that's how it got public. It costs companies/individuals hundreds to thousands of dollars just for passes to the event (http://www.gdconf.com/attend/passes.html ) so they can learn, network, pitch, etc. So the info the attendees have access to there is pretty much going to stay with those attendees. (Unless they get shared on the GDC Vault http://www.gdcvault.com) The public seeing this vid is an anomaly, not the norm.

As per the GDC filming guidelines, recording is really restricted. Here's an excerpt from the official guidelines page ( http://www.gdconf.com/media/filmingguidelines.html ):

-Individual conference session recordings (lectures and panels) can be no longer than five minutes in length, and can only consist of the FIRST FIVE MINUTES of the session.

-Recording of roundtables is completely prohibited.

-Once permission for recording is obtained from conference management or fortyseven communications, the recorder must also obtain permission from the speaker(s). Interconnecting with existing audio or video recordings is prohibited. In other words, you may not obtain a direct feed from the AV technician in the session room you are attending.

-Conference session footage taken at the event must be used as B-Roll only with replay of 5 minutes total of the entire GDC at the most.

@NoxAeturnus I agree. I wonder if their car Engine suddenly breaking on them is the reason?

We already know that the Switch is extremely weak. The Switch is not getting third party games. Nintendo had their chance to reach out to third parties but they chose not too. UE4 support is meaningless when the system can't run any games.

@LeRaposa Everyone listen to this guy. He can see the future.

The Switch looks like it is going to get the same support as the Wii U did Nintendo games and indies and the only third party support will be ubisoft's Just Dance series and Activision's Skylanders series and WB Lego Games. While ps4 and xbox will be getting all the triple A support yet again. I ain't saying that is a bad thing though.

@Moon totally agree, its always upon the door of the release date that Nintendo start saying hey look we have a new console and stuff , come take a look. I love Nintendo but they are equally infuriating they never seem to build the momentum that seems so obvious and needed.

@LeRaposa how do you know that the Switch wont get AAA 3rd party games? A lot of developers praise the Switch. And BOTW kinda blows away every open world being made till this day. And having Unreal Engine4 will make it a lot more easier for developers to work with even if they have to downgrade games.

Trend of AAA games being this blockbuster movie like thing is fading away, people just want their games now.

@beazlen1 Well that is the problem right now really.

Due to the mess with the WiiU, Nintendo have locked themselves in a Catch22 situation, where the big 3rd parties are playing a wait and see game with the Switch.

But how are you supposed to sell a New console, when there is a clear lack of incoming big game titles?
We are currently facing several months wait time between current announced big titles.
This is going to severely underminde Nintendo's sales momentum with the Switch, exactly what the WiiU was experiencing. It had a strong start with big lineup, but then sales start dropping fast due to months of drought between new big titles.
And now the Switch doesn't even have a strong launch line-up, being caried solely on Zelda alone.

Honestly, I pre-ordered the Switch for Zelda, but if you are not a Zelda fan and/or have played Mario Kart 8 and Splatoon to the death on WiiU already. There is no reason to buy the Switch until end this year when Super Mario Oddysey releases.

@Jeronan yes if this was a direct successor to WiiU then yes they'd be stuck in catch 22 and it would no doubt bomb hard. But we must remember 3DS owners are also gonna look to upgrade, so for example if Pokemon gets announced at E3 then that alone is gonna tempt people to buy. Ninty AAA titles (hopefully double the frequency of late) plus nindies plus JRPG plus some continued marketing can get a significant number of sales out there with some momentum. Hopefully sales will reach a threshold and more and more third parties will port their bigger titles. This E3 will be the most important E3 in a long time for the big N. now that the cat is out of the bag it should all be about the games games and more games.

@KirbyTheVampire Shin'en can fix it for them. I hear those guys are FAST.