Another indie title joins the ranks of cancelled Wii U games, preceding the Nintendo Switch's Tokyo livestream happening at the end of the week. The latest victim: The Next Penelope, a game often described as a more action-packed F-Zero that turned heads when it released on PC last year.

According to developer Aurelien Regard, the game has been effectively cancelled by the company they hired to port the game. After attempting a few different solutions, the porting company found their was no economically viable way to port the game over to Wii U's architecture without recoding the game completely.

Because this is the third porting studio that has given up on Aurelien's project, he thinks it might be time to throw in the towel for the Wii U.

On the positive end, Aurelian doesn't want to count out The Next Penelope coming to a Nintendo console completely -- according to his statement, he is looking into possible development on the upcoming Nintendo Switch. With that said, Aurelian will not confirm anything until a project has been 100% finished.

The Next Penelope is far from the only game to get cancelled on Wii U -- larger indie titles like Yooka Laylee have been making similar announcements within this past month.

The Next Penelope is currently (only) available on PC -- check out the full quote from Aurelien below:

(I'll be the most transparent I can, please read until the end if you have a bit of time. Also, please excuse my experimental English, I wish I could be more subtle with words now)

Is Penelope cancelled on WiiU?

Sadly yes (not my decision, coming from the company who proposed to port the game and invested months and money in it).

Even if the game is a very small one, being made using html5 and pushing it hard definitely makes it nearly impossible to port on consoles without recoding everything from scratch (= more expensive than the money a niche game like mine could ever bring back).

That's the 3rd very capable company to throw in the towel after investing in this project ("3.5th" if you count my own attempt during the first year using the official Nintendo html5 framework).

These news made me super s(/m)ad, but I know they're very good people and sincerely tried their best.

From here, I since have done everything I could to find other solutions, even with the WiiU now being discontinued ( < hint: this doesn't help to find new partners). In my mind, the game was made for a Nintendo console from the beginning, so... well, you get the idea. It's not pleasant. I also would like to add how people at Nintendo Europe have been supportive and helpful with me. It sounds like PR bs? It's not. Having the feeling you're talking to (good) humans is very much appreciated, rare, and they rock at this. (Guys, if you're reading this at some point, me and my clunky English are very grateful for your time!) Now, some other brave/cuckoo/masochists friends of mine are trying to port Penelope to the Switch, but nothing sure yet. It could be as technically difficult and never happen, so please don't hold your breath on this (I hold mine but shhh). This is absolutely *not* an announcement or something. I so learned my lesson here, let's not announce anything until it's 100% finished now. Speaking of lessons, the new game I'm working on for more than one year now is made using Unity, so this situation never happens again. I can't wait to show some fresh stuff in the coming months so we can share some more joyful news : )

Cheers, and thanks a lot for caring! Aurelien.