Nintendo is aiming to broaden its range of third-party developers for the Wii U by expanding compatible coding platforms to web-enabled engines like HTML5, CEO Satoru Iwata said during the company's recent quarterly financial results report.
According to Iwata, it is important that Nintendo adapt to the steady rise in the number of indie developers and numerous web-enabled technologies and coding software in order to grow its third-party library.
"Now is the time the development of video games for dedicated platforms requires a vast investment," Iwata said. "Thinking of diversion of web services, creation of prototypes and development of independent label games, it has become more important to expand the range of software developers."
Nintendo plans to showcase its expansion efforts at the 2013 Game Developers Conference this March. The company will show the development environment for Wii Street U, a service allowing users to browse Google Streetview on the Wii U and built using HTML5. Iwata noted that several other Wii U services including Miiverse and TVii have also been developed on web-based engines like JavaScript and Unity.
"The Wii U console is powerful enough to smoothly run such applications as developed in this way without writing any specific programs," Iwata said. "We have been able to deploy various services for this console with less in-house development resources in a more timely manner than our previous platforms."
Wii Street U will launch in mid-February, delayed from its initial January release window in order for Nintendo to "spend some more time on final development work."
The 2013 Game Developers Conference will take place from March 25 to March 29 in San Francisco.