Some removals likely the result of a studio closure, while others lack explanation.
http://www.nintendoworldreport.com/news/27378
Various WiiWare titles were recently removed from Wii Shop Channels all around the world.
GameArts' The Magic Obelisk has been removed from the North American Wii Shop Channel. No reasons for its absence have been given by the company or by Nintendo.
In Europe, several more games have been removed. Hudson's Shootanto and Diner Dash and Nintendo's LONPOS are among the casualties, but once again, there are no reasons given on why these games are gone. Zallag's Racers' Islands games and Gods vs Humans are also missing.
Zallag announced the studio closure in May, which may be related to the removal of their games in Europe. Talking on his personal blog, founder David Jeuvideo talks about what led them to their downfall: ''The situation was complicated. Our games came out at a time when nothing was happening on the Wii. So even being in the top of the sales charts, we didn't gain anything in terms of money. Most journalists don't even review games from the on-line store. It was difficult to know our games from WiiWare.'' Further, it was mentioned that thanks to the poor WiiWare sales, they didn't have the resources to continue development on future properties.
All of Zallag's titles are still currently available in North America, but it is not clear if they will remain there in the long term. Likewise, the majority of Hudson's games remain available, despite being absorbed by Konami in April.
Thought it would be nice if more websites other than Nintendolife.com bothered to review the Wiiware games.
it's apparently hard for the indie devs to get review codes from Nintendo
You know, what I don't quite understand is why I don't see more indie devs out there marketing their games. Is it really Nintendo's responsibility to do marketing or PR for specific wiiware titles?
Well, that sucks, but if push comes to shove and Nintendo isn't giving out review codes, isn't it in the best interest of the dev to...oh, I don't know, just gift it to a handful of reviewers? I mean, even if you just pick 30 reviewers/sites to gift it to, assuming it's got a price of let's say 1000 Wii points. That's $300. Not chump change, but still, I know Mom and Pop Pizza places that spend more than $300 in advertising in just a single month. It's not a media blitz, but it's better than nothing.That is actually what usually ends up happening. The other problem is that there's no way to send out advance copies that work on retail systems like you can with discs, so we often have to wait until the game is out. The release schedule isn't set very far in advance, so it's an unpleasant waiting game for the devs. Also, don't forget that devs get ZERO unless they sell a certain number of units, they don't get to set prices, and the marketing side of things can take a ton of time that could better go into game development, so it is a real resource drain. And then you have other inexplicable problems like the fact that DSiWare review codes don't work on the 3DS eShop. Does all that explain why very few sites review the games? Not really. It's just an explanation of why you don't see as many as you could here.
Of course, you would have to swap friend codes....:-)
