A Sunday Press Release

Nintendo this Sunday June 3, 2012, held a small press conference before the official start of E3 (Electronics Entertainment Expo).  It was an interesting pre-recorded release by Satoru Iwata, who though from my understanding doesn’t speak English well, spoke English through out the entire pre-recorded video.  The release was short, only a half hour, and covered by and large the Nintendo Wii U Game Pad (try saying that 5 times fast).

There were some highlights to this presentation, please, don’t mistake me there, however for the most part the information was interesting, but overall I get less of the feeling of something that is going to change the world, and more of Nintendo’s weird type of “innovation”.  Please don’t get me wrong, its because of Nintendo that many of us play games at all, however they do have a very long history (long for the video game industry that is) of weird and (by and large) useless peripherals and concepts.  Lets go back and take a quick look of some of the “limited use” or “never released” items that Nintendo has for the US:

• NES Light Gun:  Yes it had some games (Duck Hunt, Hogan’s Alley, etc.) but still a VERY limited selection
• Power Glove:  I can’t say how many games but its notoriously in accurate, however it was the first motion controlled gaming.
• Power Pad:  A precursor to the DDR mats, again very few games, never quite worked well from everything I’ve heard.
• Disk Drive system for NES: There was a drive system that some NES games came on for in Japan, the US never saw the release of this device. (Think giant Zip Drives).
• Super Scope 6: This SNES light gun to the best of my knowledge only ever had 1 game that used it.
• The promised but never delivered CD Rom Drive for the SNES that lead to the creation of the 3DO and Sony PlayStation Game Systems.
• The N64 had a disk drive system as well, again this drive never arrived in the US.
• The GameCube had promise of online gaming, and even released modems/Ethernet adapters, again this never panned out properly
• The Wii was going to completely change the way we play games with its revolutionary game play.  It was going to change the way we looked at gaming as a family.  It changed some things, pushed Microsoft and Sony into their Kinect and Move systems respectively.
• The Wii heart monitor was going to “change the way games respond to players”  this device has completely disappeared as of late.

As you can see that’s quite a list, and is only Nintendo products… that doesn’t count all of the items made for their systems.  If you look at the bottom of any Nintendo system you can easily spot expansion ports for ideas that never came, with the exception of handhelds and the Wii.

Nintendo’s policy of "dokusou" (独創) or “creating something unique” is certainly present and is something that has made Nintendo the powerhouse it is and was.  However I will give them that they create unique products, the problem is these products aren’t always the most practical.

Now to talk a little about the controller,  I will admit I like some of the changes that we’ve seen.  The two full joysticks such as those found on the GameCube controller, instead of a pad like on the 3d is a welcome change.  The mobility factor isn’t present on the Gamepad, and so the extra heft a stick has is very welcome.  As is the thought Nintendo put into the hand grips on the back of the pad.. (look at the difference between the Classic Controller for the Wii and the Classic Controller Pro).

The NFC (Near Field Communications) reader/writer is an interesting addition and I’m looking forward to seeing how they use it, as well as being able to use the WIi U Game Pad (the large controller) as a TV Remote again is an interesting idea.  the “Asymmetrical Game Play” in which the Game Pad and TV show completely different (but relevant) information is a very interesting concept, though I fear how it may be implemented.

Since we know that the Wii-mote, Nunchuck, and balance board are compatible, this will help keep some costs down for consumers although the new Wii U Controller Pro look a bit beefier.  My hope is that they have increased the responsiveness here, and have removed the need for the Wii Mote connection, while keeping compatibility with Wii games.

Finally some features that were announced is the Miiverse… a term coined by Nintendo to describe the “Universe” that the Miis will exist in online.  It will feature social components, game data (popularity notes people leave, etc), a video telecommunications service of sorts, and a twitter like messaging service.

He actually referred to the control pad as a “social window, linking player to player, living room to living room across time and space”.  While some things we have known about like some game play being available the touchpad, the inclusion of a internet browser that can share information between the tablet and the screen is a plus.  While no price was announced, I am interested to see where, and how this goes.