Wonderful 101’s Kickstarter has already beaten Wii U’s first week sales in Japan
Campaign raises over $400k in 90 minutes
The Wonderful 101 Remastered‘s Kickstarter campaign was backed by more people in its first 90 minutes than the original game’s entire week one sales in Japan.
The action-adventure game first released for Wii U in 2013, when according to industry body Media Create it sold around 5,000 copies.
Data for other territories isn’t publicly available, but it’s understood the original was a commercial disappointment for Platinum, which the studio said motivated its desire to bring the game to more platforms with 2020’s Kickstarter.
As of 9.30pm GMT / 1.30pm PT on Monday, The Wonderful 101 Remastered Kickstarter has been backed by over 6,000 people, raising in excess of $400,000.
That means the title is already confirmed for release on PC and Nintendo Switch, with a PlayStation 4 version closing in at $500,000.
The Japanese developer opened the crowdfunding project in a surprise launch on Monday, with the aim of bringing the 2013 Wii U action-adventure game to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and PC.
The campaign even features a reward tier that will see backers blocked by creator Hideki Kamiya on Twitter (the designer is well known for his strict social media policies).
In a newly-published The Wonderful 101 Remastered interview, studio head Atsushi Inaba told VGC that the crowdfunding campaign was a way for Platinum fans to help the studio become more independent and move in to self-publishing.
“If this is a big success, that allows us to confirm that we have a large fanbase and we can be confident in moving forward with projects in the future,” he said.
“We’re trying to move forward to the next stage and hopefully with everybody’s help and support that’s what we can do.”
