Nintendo licenses Unity Engine for Wii U

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Nintendo may open its walled garden's gates a bit wider

Nintendo may be courting independent developers by licensing the Unity Engine for use in both its own Wii U games and those of affiliated developers. Unity CEO David Helgason told Eurogamer that a long-term deal to provide the relatively inexpensive 3D game engine to the console's "entire ecosystem" may be unprecedented.

Nintendo directed any questions on the announcement to Unity.

Taking an engine many independent developers are already comfortable using and integrating it with a major console could provide new creators with a solid avenue into mainstream markets, Helgason said. The open-source Ouya console has a similar goal, promising to make home console development easier by using the widespread Android operating system.

Helgason said that the engine's Wii U "deployment option," with deep technical integration from both companies, will become widely available in 2013. The console itself is set to launch on November 18 in North America, and November 30 in Europe.

Connor Sheridan
Connor Sheridan
Former GamesRadar+ News Writer

I got a BA in journalism from Central Michigan University - though the best education I received there was from CM Life, its student-run newspaper. Long before that, I started pursuing my degree in video games by bugging my older brother to let me play Zelda on the Super Nintendo. I've previously been a news intern for GameSpot, a news writer for CVG, and was formerly a staff writer at GamesRadar+.