THQ says 4A can't really focus on bringing the game to the Wii U right now

Nov 24, 2012 04:37 GMT  ·  By

Metro: Last Light developer 4A Games and publisher THQ have clarified recent statements from one of the studio’s staff that called the Wii U’s CPU “horribly slow” and mention that, with enough work, the team can get past this obstacle.

Metro: Last Light is one of the big games THQ still has in production and, hopefully, it will bring enough money to keep the company afloat in these troubled times.

The game is going to appear for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360 next year but not on the Wii U, as one of 4A’s developers called the new console’s processor horribly slow.

Now, THQ’s Global Communications executive, Huw Beynon, has clarified this statement, revealing that media outlets only focused on the criticism and not on the part where 4A mentions that it can get past this hardware hurdle.

“We could probably get Metro to run on an iPad if we wanted, or on pretty much anything,” he told Eurogamer. “Just as in the same way that between PC and current console versions there are some compromises that need to be made in certain places and we strive to get the very best performance that we can from any platform we release on.”

Beynon then highlights 4A’s situation, saying that it’s a small studio that’s under a lot of pressure to develop at the same time for the PC, PS3, and Xbox 360.

“There were 50 developers for Metro 2033, there are 80 now. With Metro 2033 most of their experience was with the PC. The Xbox 360 was their first console version. We've now added PlayStation 3 to the mix. We genuinely looked at what it would take to bring the game to Wii U. It's certainly possible, and it's something we thought we'd like to do.”

“The reality is that would mean a dedicated team, dedicated time and effort, and it would either result in a detriment to what we're trying to focus on, already adding a PlayStation 3 SKU, or we probably wouldn't be able to do the Wii U version the justice that we'd want.”

Metro: Last Light’s multiplayer was recently shelved so that the team responsible for it could help with the single-player campaign, so it certainly seems like 4A can’t afford to focus on other platforms, like the Wii U.