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Unseen64 publishes the history and footage of Factor 5's cancelled Pilotwings.
- Thread starter ItWasMeantToBe19
- Start date
Really like the ideas in this game. Should've been a Nintendo 2nd party studio
For all intents and purposes, they were. They even helped develop the middleware sound engine that the Gamecube used, as well as developing the console codec for DivX. As the video points out, the lower than expected sales of Rebel Strike gave LucasArts the leverage needed to force them out of their self-imposed exclusivity with Nintendo, for all the little good that wound up doing in the end.
Shikamaru Ninja
任天å ã® å¿è
The default option is "second party studios"?
I don't think the project was ever canceled. Like i mentioned, it was retooled and constantly shopped around publishers. I saw one of the versions and posted about it years back. But you are right, I dismissed the OP a little too soon.
KojiKnight
Member
The graphics engine for Lair wasn't the problem.
Dead Man Typing
Member
Factor 5 stories are always heart breaking to read. So much to offer all console yet we only got Lair after Rebel Strike. I'd still like to play Lair one day, I didn't have a PS3 when that game came out.
This looked so cool. As did the Wii Rogue Squadron collection which I'd forgotten about. Head tracking and Weather channel integration look very smart.
I remember watching that head tracking tech demo in 2007. Shame no released game ever used it
This looked so cool. As did the Wii Rogue Squadron collection which I'd forgotten about. Head tracking and Weather channel integration look very smart.
I remember watching that head tracking tech demo in 2007. Shame no released game ever used it
ItWasMeantToBe19
Banned
Liam Robertson is friends with like every single person who worked at Factor 5.
Mass Effect
Member
Other than Madden, what other games did this?
Monkeyball
Banned
How? "I need to look to the right in my vidyagame.." -moves head to right- You are now looking at your hentai poster next to your tv.
tauroxd
Member
I can't really find any info now, but wasn't Nights: Journey of Dreams one game that did this?
Barkley's Justice
Member
Wow, I totally forgot about Lair...
alf717
Member
I saw this earlier and it seems Nintendo was almost all in expect when it came to funding. Wasn't it super hard to get a third party game on the Wii that allowed usage of Mii character? Man this game looks like it would of been great. This and the canceled Star Wars games are such a huge loss for that era of gaming.
Cow Mengde
Banned
Head tracking... HEAD TRACKING!!! That would have been amazing! The footage they showed off also looked really impressive. Such a shame Factor 5 had to go under due to bad luck. Also, the Lair footage looks... pretty low resolution. Is that a Wii port/demo of Lair running on the system?
Shit, I beat Factor 5 could have gotten DOOM to run at 60fps on the Switch, or port FFXV to the Switch without any trouble.
Shit, I beat Factor 5 could have gotten DOOM to run at 60fps on the Switch, or port FFXV to the Switch without any trouble.
efyu_lemonardo
May I have a cookie?
The sensitivity of the tracking would be increased. Just like you don't move your mouse two feet to get the pointer from one side of the screen to the other.
-shadow-
Member
Unfortunately no, LAIR was just a disaster all round. Blame the PS3 when it first launch and was a undocumented disaster for anyone who wasn't Japanese (and even Japanese devs didn't get it with the documentation).
Cow Mengde
Banned
Wow, really? I did not expect the PS3 to give even Factor 5 trouble.
efyu_lemonardo
May I have a cookie?
there were horror stories about the early days of PS3 development: supposedly devs had to go through several boxes of reference materials, each containing hundreds or thousands of pages of jumbled up japanese text, broken english text, incomplete machine code and obtuse engineering diagrams, just to get the PS3 to draw a triangle on the screen!
Still dont get it why western devs didnt abandon Sony in masses with stuff like this.
sixteen-bit
Member
Damn, this game looks cool as hell. Woulda been a Wii killer app for sure. Bummed it never released.
tauroxd
Member
PS2 was such a massive success, so they weren't going to drop the PS3 just like that.
RoadHazard
Gold Member
Man, that sounded great, wish it could have been completed.
Candescence
Member
It didn't help that Lair initially mandated the use of the Sixaxis' garbage-tier motion controls. Considering Factor 5 added dual-stick support later, I imagine that was initially a mandate from Sony - trying to make the Sixaxis a thing was one of their many disastrous mistakes with the PS3.
Games were getting too expensive to make to not support it.
Buggy Loop
Member
Nintendo was kind of a dick in this situation. Not informing Factor5 of their own intention to revive Pilotwings and letting them bleed money on this project, thinking that it'd be Pilotwings... it's just sad.
RAIDEN1
Member
Thing is though if Nintendo REALLY did believe in the project despite the bankruptcy they would have taken it on under their own wing, or continued the work to make sure this DID see the light of day....seeing it's been more than 20 years since we got a Pilot Wings game, and the fact that the SNES Mini doesn't even include it in it's must play catalogue, this is DEFINITELY an opportunity missed...
Will be a miracle if we see an Pilot Wings on the Switch...
Will be a miracle if we see an Pilot Wings on the Switch...
capylikesgames
Banned
As a fan of Pilotwings 64, WeFly looks like an incredible successor, and it's sad the game never saw the light of day. Though it seems like the release date would've been pretty late in the Wii's life. I wonder how it would have sold at that point. Something tells me it would've been obscured at launch, and ended up a hidden gem. I personally would've loved a game like this at launch, but I stopped buying games for the Wii about halfway through its life, so I have a hunch this would've slid under my radar.
efyu_lemonardo
May I have a cookie?
that's not a dick move in the slightest - when is any developer obligated to share information about projects in development with other studios?
Dreamwriter
Member
You need better math
We got Pilotwings games in 1990, 1996, and 2011. Its been 6 years since we got an official game in that series.
RAIDEN1
Member
You need better math
My bad, ok fair enough, 2011 edition but that was for the portable system when was the last-time there was a version for the main home-consoles..
D
Deleted member 22576
Unconfirmed Member
Wow, WeFly looked incredible. So sad.
Buggy Loop
Member
You know, when you don't want developers supporting your freaking hardware to go bankrupt? Obliged legally, no they are in their rights. Obliged as to not being a dick, it's typically on a voluntary basis.
How was Nintendo supposed to know about Factor 5's non-Nintendo business dealings?
Buggy Loop
Member
-_-
Oh i don't know, they were in talk for it since Gamecube era? Factor5 bringing demos, nintendo preventing them from moving forward, jumped to Wii developement and talked to Nintendo for a revised spin on pilotwings, peripherals in talk with Nintendo for VR cockpits...
How could they know
/S
So, how would they know that they were in financial trouble at other publishers again? Someone might chip in with news otherwise, but unlike Silicon Knights, I don't think there was ever any type of stock ownership that Nintendo had in Factor 5, so there were no business ties beyond Factor 5 really liking their work with Nintendo. Why should Nintendo get the blame for Factor 5 signing bad deals on games that weren't even being made on Nintendo hardware?
Buggy Loop
Member
Pilotwings is nintendo business dealings. On Nintendo hardware... I'm not saying that Nintendo is responsible for Lair or Lucasarts franchises. I'm talking about pilotwings and pilotwings only. Factor5 made the freaking sound chip for gamecube. It's not like they were complete strangers. They talked together to bring Pilotwings. Nintendo stopped it from happening.
Same as Argonaut's Star fox 2. It's a dick move.
Nintendo encouranged Factor 5 to continue development with a different publisher because they were doing their own internal project (Wii Sports Resort). They didn't stop anything and this definitely wasn't the project that killed F5.
Star Fox 2 was internally developed, calling it Argonaut's is a huge misnomer. Argonaut's contribution was limited to the 3-4 staffers Nintendo essentially headhunted and brought to Kyoto to work with their own dev team. And development was completed on it anyway, we finally get to play it next week in fact.
goldenpp72
Member
This is like the only PW game I would care to play by looking at it, real shame
efyu_lemonardo
May I have a cookie?
Supposedly Factor 5 had to declare bankruptcy because they'd accumulated a debt large enough that big publishers were reluctant to do business with them, for fear that they'd use any payments received to cover the debt.
I don't know if this is true, but it certainly makes Nintendo's unwillingness to support, let alone purchase the studio easier to understand.
And it's also consistent with the fact that at the time Factor 5 seemed to have deals mostly with lesser known publishers who were trying to become more prominent in the industry.
Keep in mind that this happened during the height of the global financial crisis when most large companies were probably being extra frugal.
It's a shitty situation but it's not Nintendo's fault.
WeFly (or how we wanted it first, WiiFly) is just as tragic a story as Rogue Squadron Wii. Brilliant reporting by Unseen and yes, it broke everyones hearts that these two games didnt make it out. They were truly good games and the absolute pinnacle of technology for the Wii/GameCube chipset. Nothing else came even close. Good times...
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