Unity Technologies and Nintendo are looking at adding
Nintendo 3DS support to cross-platform development software Unity,
Nintendo of America's licensing department senior manager Damon Baker told Siliconera.
"We've had those discussions and we are definitely looking at that,"
Baker said. "Our priority was to get the Wii U build [of Unity] up and
done and ready. Because we need a test environment for it, it's taken a
while for Unity to get finalized on Wii U, so that we can actually test
against it. So that has been made available now and that is why we've
got all of these [game] candidates waiting in the wings that are just
going through the submission process at this point."
Nintendo offers Wii U developers a free license to develop in the Unity engine. The toolkit gives developers access
to most of the console's hardware and software features, such as the
GamePad, its second screen, camera, microphone and secondary or
Wii-generation devices. Baker told Siliconera that 17 Wii U games that use Unity have been submitted and will launch "within the next two months."
"And then, we have another fifty that are waiting in the wings, that
are coming; so we've got a lot of Unity content on the way," he said.
The company can now move on to make other platforms compatible
with Unity or additional middleware providers, Baker said, adding
that Nintendo and "a lot of developers" want to take advantage of the 3DS' huge install base.
Nintendo of America's Dan Adelman and Baker told Polygon at PAX Prime
last year that the company is eager to accommodate indie developers on
its platforms. As part of the initiative to foster indie development on
its hardware, the company also plans to bring the open source MonoGame Framework to the Wii U, allowing creators to develop cross-platform games by re-using code.
It was announced in
January that Unity version 4.3 will add support for the PlayStation
Vita. It will allow licensed developers to use the engine to create
games with support for the handheld's cameras, dual analog sticks,
motions sensors and rear touchpad, along with PlayStation Network
integration.
Holy shit, Unity on 3DS?! Not even bad! And those 60+ Unity games for the Wii U almost makes you forget that Unreal Engine 4 doesn't support the Wii U. Who needs 'em, right?