Wii General Discussion

[mcj metroid]

1. Metroid has already been shown off properly. Granted, only to press but more recent trailers have shown gameplay and how it all works. That's pretty much all you should expect to see of it between now and release outside of a CG trailer.

 

2. With Natal and Move, Nintendo will have to take big steps to guard casual gamers and keep them with the Wii (although apart from Microsoft, I think Sony will have the hardest task getting casual gamers to adopt the PS3 as their next console even with the pull of Blu-ray) so I'd expect, if anything, there to be more surprise announcements of casual games instead of core games. And by surprise, I don't really mean a surprise just that it's the most expected route for them to take.

2:

I Don't think nintendo has anything to prove against natal and move.. they have the best selling system and a host of games that use their technology very well. Natal and move however have to show us ACTUAL games that have this technology working.

 

By the way who says move and natal are only going to go for casual gamers. I see no reason why they couln't show us a fuck load of fps games because let's face it the wii hasn't mastered motion in hardcore games yet. All the wii's best core games are ones that stick to tried and true control methods with the exception of metroid prime 3 i guess.

 

If I were sony and microsoft I'd stick to what i'm good at. The core games.

[Pookiablo]

By the way who says move and natal are only going to go for casual gamers. I see no reason why they couln't show us a fuck load of fps games because let's face it the wii hasn't mastered motion in hardcore games yet.

 

I really can't see any self-appointed "hardcore" gamer bringing themselves to play a future COD with the Move controller, lol! Eat pink Christmas tree bauble, asshole!

[mcj metroid]

I really can't see any self-appointed "hardcore" gamer bringing themselves to play a future COD with the Move controller, lol! Eat pink Christmas tree bauble, asshole!

 

ya well about 4 years ago you didn't think anyone would be playing with motion peroid.

 

Don't be so short sighted think 4 years in the future from now. Unless you think dual analogue is a perfect control method for fps then change is going to happen.

[Ashley]

No. The perfect method for FPS is keyboard and mouse :p

[mcj metroid]

No. The perfect method for FPS is keyboard and mouse :p

 

for now

[Pookiablo]

ya well about 4 years ago you didn't think anyone would be playing with motion peroid.

 

Don't be so short sighted think 4 years in the future from now. Unless you think dual analogue is a perfect control method for fps then change is going to happen.

 

I'm not being short-sighted. I'm all for it. I'm making fun of the fact that many people, for stupid reasons, will have already made up their mind against it.

[mcj metroid]

I'm not being short-sighted. I'm all for it. I'm making fun of the fact that many people, for stupid reasons, will have already made up their mind against it.

 

ah ok Misread your post so. Coolies

[STOOPIDDITTIES]

No. The perfect method for FPS is keyboard and mouse :p

 

So you haven't played much Metroid Prime: Corruption then?

[w0lf]

I don't see any reason why Nintendo should start to panic. Both Sony and Microsoft have a lot to prove first. And even then, I question wheter people are feeling the need to "upgrade" to another system. I find it also very funny how Sony is constantly ignoring the Motion Plus, stating that the Wii doesn't provide accurate motion controlling.

 

In any case I think Wii Party and the Vitality Sensor alone will keep Nintendo at least on year safe in casual land. And the 3DS is probably going to be the next big casual buzz.

[Emasher]

I honestly don't think its Sony or Microsoft that Nintendo has to compete with for the casual crowd at this point. They've even said it themselves, their new focus is on Apple.

 

The average person (and casual gamers are the same) doesn't look at games, or gaming devices the same way as you or I would. They don't see Move as anything really that different from the Wii Remote. Whenever I buy a game in a series, and my mother asks me what I bought if she sees the bag sitting on my desk or something, and when I reply something like "Super Mario Galaxy 2" (Which I haven't actually bought yet), she asks "Don't you already have Mario?" Its really the same thing with Move. People will just see it as another Wii. Not to mention the cost of buying a PS3, a PSeye, Move, and the Move nun-chuck thing. People just don't like to upgrade stuff like that. Look at all the people still using SDTVs and CRT monitors, a lot of them can afford a nice LCD display, or a cheap 720p TV, but they don't buy one because they've already got a working TV. The only people who are going to buy Move, are the hardcore Sony fans. Natal will do better, because its not quite the same, but a lot of people still aren't going to be able to understand the difference between a Wii and an Xbox 360. They're not just going to buy something because someone says its better than what they have. They're going to buy something because its new and different.

 

The iPod Touch is the main device Nintendo has to compete with. If you go into any school, you'll see people using them all over the place. And they're not just using them as music players, or mobile web browsing devices. People play games on them. The fact is, its so easy to make a game for the device, there are tons of free games available for it that to one of us would seem like something that you wouldn't even play on a flash game site, but for these casual gamers, these are just free games. Casual gamers haven't played enough games to really understand the difference in quality for the most part. To them, Vietnam stick shooter is just as good as GTA Chinatown Wars. A device that can fit in your pocket and can play games for free is something new enough to these people that its worth buying to them. And in all honesty, the iPod Touch is a much better device than the DS. Perhaps not for gaming, but it still has some decent titles, and is far more appealing to cary around.

 

But what everyone needs to remember is that Nintendo knows all of this. They've understood this better than I possibly could since before the DS even came out. They obviously didn't know anything about how big a threat Apple would be on what was until then, Nintendo's handheld gaming market, but I'm sure they knew that such a device would be released from somebody in the next few years. The central part of the Blue ocean strategy that Nintendo follows is to attract people with something new and different. They simply don't care about Natal and Move because they've already made their money with motion controls. While I doubt they're just going to just ditch them, I would say its at least 90% likely that motion controls will not be the focus of their next home console.

 

Its very much like the gold rushes. Someone found gold in a certain area, and found enough to get rich on it. When word got out, everyone rushed to the area to try and get rich off the gold, but very few people actually managed to find a significant amount of gold, so most people just went home empty handed. With innovations, you have to be first, or at least very quick to the party. By the time someone else is already making money off something, its too late to start trying to develop your own version of it. Everyone will have bought the original product, and nobody will care about yours.

 

So you haven't played much Metroid Prime: Corruption then?

 

Seeing as its not really an FPS, it doesn't really count. To be an FPS, the main focus of the game has to be combat. In Metroid games, the focus is on exploration. If the game did focus on combat, people wouldn't see the controls as that good anymore, as in reality, they weren't much better than those in Medal of Honour: Heros 2, or The Conduit. Its just, that particular aspect of the controls wasn't as central to the game.

 

The keyboard and mouse are good, but they only work on a desk. If you want to play the game sitting on a couch, you need some other input method. The controller worked fine for years, and it still works fine today. The Wii remote also works well, but I think we're probably going to see something even better for playing FPS games from the couch in the future.

[STOOPIDDITTIES]

Nintendo Employee Arrested For Beating Up Line Cutter

 

Police in Kyoto have arrested 37-year-old Nintendo employee Jin Nakanose for beating up a 29-year-old man at a Kyoto shopping center.

 

The incident took place on the afternoon of the 23rd at Loc Town Kumiyama in Kyoto's Kumiyama Town. Nakanose says he was waiting to enter the facility's parking lot when the victim cut in front of him, causing him to get angry. Nakanose pulled the victim from his car and punched him in the face and other areas.

 

Sankei Shimbun reports that the victim suffered "two weeks" of injuries.

[w0lf]

As a matter of fact Nintendo stated several times that Apple isn't affecting them at all. Reggie litterly said: “[it] is not having an impact on Nintendo when you look at our business, our volume, our hardware, our software.â€

 

In any case, the statement "Apple is the enemy of the future" seems to me more like a jab towards Sony and Microsoft because Apple isn't just copying Nintendo like they do, but actually try out new things.

[Emasher]

I think you missed the point of what I'm trying to say. They've been saying Apple isn't a real threat for years, but its quite obvious that they've changed their mind now. The "Apple is the enemy of the future" statement makes it quite clear that Apple is their target competitor. I don't understand why you're trying to get anything else out of that statement. If they didn't think Apple was a threat to them, they would ignore them. Admitting that Apple could be a problem for them makes stock prices drop. They wouldn't say something like that if they still only planned to compete with Sony and Microsoft, there are several better ways of taking a jab at Sony and Microsoft. The statement you quoted from Reggie was a statement he made before the whole "Apple is the enemy of the future" thing, and really, at the present moment, Apple isn't really impacting their sales or business. Nintendo is acknowledging that they WILL have an impact in the future, and that they are preparing to deal with that.

[w0lf]

Of course I'm not trying to get anything else out of the statement, but I find it just very odd how they "changed their mind" in only a month's time. Just weeks ago, they stated that both products can live alongside together without affecting eachother. This is kind of a sudden change of heart. And after all, it's hard not to interpret "the battle with Sony is already won" as a jab.

[Emasher]

The "The battle with sony is already won" statement is clearly a "jab" but the fact that they're admitting they're going up against Apple now probably has nothing to do with that, other than the fact that they're acknowledging Apple is more of a threat now.

[mcj metroid]

well this whole conversation pretty much started while talking about e3..

So do you think 3ds will have features to combat the iphone? Seems likely doesn't it?

[Emasher]

Nintendo appears to not want to do that, but really, its hard to say at this point. I expect the features to be improved in the 3DS, but I don't expect it to be any more capable than say, the PSP. Either way, I'm still going to be carrying around my iPod more often than the 3DS I'll eventually own. They're never going to have a web browser that works as well as Mobile Safari in it, and in general its not going to be as clean to use a lot of the other features, knowing Nintendo. The thing that needs to be brought up though, is that Nintendo is competing with Apple, Apple is not competing with Nintendo. Regardless of what Nintendo does, people are still going to buy iPods for other things. People don't usually buy iPods for the games, the games are just a bonus after all.

 

Back to the topic of E3, my revised predictions:

 

Cammie hints at Zelda, 3DS, Metroid other M, Vitality Censor, and Something new in her opening speech.

New game revealed. Maybe 3rd Party, Maybe Retro's new project.

Reggie talks sales.

Reggie fully reveals the vitality censor. To demonstrate it, he uses the just patented Wii Remote with built in Motion Plus. The vitality censor may be built into a new nun chuck.

 

Cammie and some guest speakers from the publishers come on stage to reveal 3rd party games.

 

Full 3DS reveal (Presented by Iwata).

 

Better Cameras

Slightly Better Media Capabilities (as stated above).

Sleeker Design

Large launch line up with at least 2 first party games. (A mario spin off and something else).

Fully backwards compatible.

DS Ware is transferable.

More non game "apps"

Bluetooth.

One single friend code. *Cheering from crowd*

 

Iwata gives a speech on the future of the Wii, and hints about the next step. HD will be mentioned in reference to the next console, but he won't actually confirm anything.

 

Metroid Other M Trailer and demonstration by someone from NOA.

 

More 3rd Party games (smaller ones this time, among smaller 1st and 2nd party titles).

 

Major 1st party game revealed. Possibly retros new project, or a teaser of project sora.

 

Guest speaker demos a 3rd party game that relies heavily on motion plus, and possibly the vitality censor.

 

Reggie reveals Pikmin 3 which uses a lot of motion plus and vitality censor.

 

Miyamoto returns to the E3 stage (after not being there last year) and epically reveals Zelda Wii. Crowd reaction is similar to the Twilight princess reveal in 2004.

 

Someone from NOA possibly comes on stage and demos the game while Miyamoto through his translator talks about it. Release is either Q4 2010, or Q2 2011.

[STOOPIDDITTIES]

I hope Cammie comes out dressed up as Link.

Edited May 24, 2010 by STOOPIDDITTIES

[Josh64]

I hope Cammie isn't depressed this year

I loved the days of her bad wrist!

[w0lf]

The DSi already has it's fair amount of iPhone-esque features (like a music player, web browser and camera), so it's likely they're gonna expand this even further with the 3DS. Heck, it even had the "i" in the name.

 

The point is that the 3DS is not a phone like the iPhone, which you carry with you all the time, so those features can never really compete to them. There are however probably going to be massive improvements in regards of the DSi shop, which should become much more convenient and open (like the Appstore is), and perhaps also some sort of 3GS. I also expect a more slick "Applish" design, like the Wii.

[Emasher]

What do you mean by 3GS? 3GS was just the name of an iPhone model, it meant 3G Speed, Speed referring to the power of the device itself. 3G is the phone standard, and to be honest, its going to be replaced soon. Not to mention how un-nintendolike it would be to include such a feature in one of their devices.

[w0lf]

Heh, of course I meant "3G".

 

It would basically be something like Wii24connect. And they are actually putting a lot of effort in it to push those aspects lately.

 

It would just be un-Nintendolike to ask money for it. Although Miyamoto recently pointed out that could change in the future.

[Emasher]

The problem is, if the company that makes the device is going to be the one that pays the carriers for the cellular network access, they have to be getting a continuous flow of income that they wouldn't be getting without it. It made sense on the kindle, because Amazon was making money from people buying books when they weren't within a Wifi network. The problem is that people don't buy the sort of content that Nintendo would offer in one of their online stores for it to be feasible. You can't really sell people large files that way anyway, because it costs too much to send them over the cellular network. Because of this, movies are out, and many games as well. People generally would be able to wait to be within a wifi network to buy a game, since people don't buy games that often.

[w0lf]

It would most certainly not be profitable within their current business structure.

 

However, there are other options. 3G that is allowed only for connecting to their Appstore could be integrated in the system price for instance. Iwata actually commented on this function from the Kindle last year:

 

"The Kindle's one-off cost would better suit Nintendo's customer base. In reality, if we did this it would increase the cost of the hardware, and customers would complain about Nintendo putting prices up, but it is one option for the future."

 

I don't think he would make such a comment, if he doesn't has anything up his sleeve.

Edited May 25, 2010 by w0lf
Made a typo.

[Emasher]

That sounds like something he would say if someone asked him about cellular network functionality in an interview, is this the case? When Nintendo employees talk to interviewers, they don't usually just say "we're not interested in that technology" they usually discuss what they think of the technology. They do things like this all the time and it very rarely amounts to anything. He also discusses why he doesn't think it would be a great business model for Nintendo.