THQ says its library of games "maps very, very well" to Nintendo's next-generation console dubbed Wii. During its quarterly earnings report, THQ president and CEO, Brian Farrell used the upcoming SpongeBob game as an example. "We showed in a press event recently a SpongeBob game using the Nintendo Wii and Wii controller," Farrell said, "And standing there watching very jaded game journalists hoot and holler on a SpongeBob game was actually quite relieving."
SpongeBob is one of three games THQ has in production for Wii. The others include a game based on Nickelodeon's Avatar: The Last Airebender and Pixar Animation's upcoming film Cars. With its full support behind Wii, THQ says it is most excited about the development costs. "One of the things we like about that platform is the development costs," he said. "On the Wii are nowhere near what they are on the PS3 and Xbox 360. That's something that's quite encouraging. As you probably know, our portfolio maps very, very well to what we think the Wii demographic is going to be."
Farrel believes the cost to develop a Wii title will be a third of that needed for competitor's platforms. "[The Wii] wasn't a whole new programming environment," Farrell said. "So we had a lot of tools and tech that work in that environment. So those costs--and again, I hate these broad generalizations--but they could be as little as a third of the high-end next-gen titles... Maybe the range is a quarter to a half."