The Wonderful 101 stands as one of PlatinumGames’ most unique games, but sadly, it’s also among the most under-appreciated. When it came out on the Wii U, though there was quite a bit of praise for the game, it ended up being a commercial flop for the developer and for publisher Nintendo. That failure would ultimately drive Platinum to the upcoming The Wonderful 101: Remastered, which, thankfully, has been seeing lot of success with its crowdfunding campaign.
And if the game should go on to see similar success following its release as well, that might prompt Platinum to do a sequel as well. Speaking in an interview with Nintendo Everything, The Wonderful 101 creative director Hideki Kamiya said that he’s had ideas for a sequel since before the game even came out on the Wii U, but those ideas had to be put on hold when the game didn’t sell well- something that he hopes will change if the remaster proves more successful.
“Back when we were making the Wii U original, I had a lot of hopes for the game before its release,” Kamiya said. “I knew we made a really incredible game, so I felt confident that a lot of people would play it and it’d be a big hit. I was dreaming things up left and right – I had ideas like, ‘Oh, what would it be like if we did a sequel where Wonder Blue was the leader?’ All of these creative and exciting ideas were flowing, and then the game released and I saw the numbers and was like, ‘Wait, what?!’ So, I hope I get to have those aspirations again in the future.”
Studio head Atsushi Inaba also spoke about a potential follow-up, being open to the idea, but admitting that without support from fans of the property, it might not be possible.
“In regards to a sequel or something, we can’t make one if there aren’t any fans of the series in the first place,” Inaba said. “So if fans support this and things go really well for The Wonderful 101, then I’d say it’s pretty natural that we’d want to make another game in the series.”
It’s all hypothetical for now, of course, but the way the Kickstarter campaign for the upcoming remaster has been going does give plenty of hope that the game itself will see some success as well. If there does end up being a sequel, it’ll be interesting to see what it launches on. The property is co-owned by Nintendo, who only agreed to the remaster releasing on PC and PS4 because Platinum would be self-publishing that- it’d be interesting to see if the two could agree on something similar for a sequel as well.
The Wonderful 101: Remastered is out in April for the Nintendo Switch, P4, and PC. It will be playable at PAX East later this month.