Zelda will be Nintendo’s final game for the ‘end of life’ Wii U

Nintendo has just confirmed that The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild will be the last first-party game for the company’s soon to be replaced Wii U. It’s a bittersweet moment for die-hard fans of the console — and yes, they exist.

Nintendo of America’s Reggie Fils-Aime told Polygon after the switch event earlier this week in New York that “from a first-party standpoint, there’s no new development coming… We really are at the end of life for Wii U.”

Fortunately, the game is looking to be a hell of a swan song, and people chary of picking up a Switch at launch will be happy to learn that the two versions of the game, for Nintendo’s outgoing and incoming consoles, should be nearly identical.

The Switch version will run better and at a higher resolution, and some graphical effects will be improved, but the Wii U version won’t be missing any real features. I played an earlier version of the game on Wii U this last E3 and it controlled and looked great.

As with other fading consoles, owners can expect a handful of other games from third-party developers and the occasional update over the next few months, but Zelda is basically the fork Nintendo is sticking in it.