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The developer bringing the old school fighter Retro City Rampage to the WiiWire, Brian Provinciano, says he doesn’t expect to profit from this version of game because of the costs involved with porting the title.
And he’s told Nintendo Life that he’s fine with that.
“Between the office rent, hardware, insurance, game ratings and other costs, had I not done the WiiWare version, I could’ve saved around $20,000 – not even including my salary in porting it,” he said.
“And as it stands, virtually no games hit the threshold these days, so it’s only being released as fan service. A $20,000 gift to the fans.”
Provinciano had to acquire office space to work from, despite being a solo act, before being allows access to a WiiWare development kit.
Another hurdle was the fact that developers are required to sell a particular number of units before Nintendo begins paying their share in profits.
Given the Wii U’s slow start, along with the largely low sales of WiiWare titles, Provinciano doesn’t believe he will recover his investment; but his motivation has been driven by a desire to bring the game to Nintendo console owners.
Retro City Rampage arrived on Wii U via WiiWare on February 28th. The game was released on PSN and PC last autumn, and arrived Xbox Live Arcade earlier in the year.
Provinciano revealed last week that the game has so far sold the most units on PSN.
