Nintendo Wii U

[Angelic Cross]

Looks like Suda51 is still aiming to get No More Heroes 3 released on Wii U. Eeeexcellent.

[Kurosu]

Another interesting rumor from the industry is up: http://wii.ign.com/articles/117/1176149p1.html

Either people don't know what they're talking about or people really don't know what they're talking about. It would be neat for the system to be 50% more powerful than the PS3.

[Sides]

Devil's Third coming to Wii U? Look's like Itagaki (new) studio will try to get their first title onto all home consoles.
Read more on andriasang.com. To be fair they probably need to do this, to cover their dev costs and generate some profit.

Other news were, that Epic, Crytek and others have started to port their engines to Nintendo's 6th home console. Rumours are that the japanese garden tech demo is actually build on epic's UE3 or even created by epic themselves.

[darkchibi07]

Specs are out!

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/inte...-blu-ray-discs

[Hiroi Sekai]

Originally Posted by darkchibi07

Specs are out!

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/inte...-blu-ray-discs

Thanks for the link.

Before anyone starts pointing out the lack of a DVD/Blu-Ray player, I have to say- that's why we have DVD players. You've probably also got an XBOX 360 or PS3 that'll play it already (although I never really liked console DVD players), and all that good stuff.

If leaving it out means better hardware specs, then I'm all for it. Looks like the new controller is rechargeable, and thank goodness for that. They're still being stingy on the details though; can we have more than one? Reggie himself said that "Yes, it will have two.", but nothing is confirmed still.

1080p and HDMI! It's about time, Nintendo. It's about time. One final thing to note: it looks like this bad boy isn't backwards compatible with Gamecube games! Good thing Gamecubes nowadays are about $20-50.

[Urzu 7]

Originally Posted by papermario13689

1080p and HDMI! It's about time, Nintendo. It's about time. One final thing to note: it looks like this bad boy isn't backwards compatible with Gamecube games! Good thing Gamecubes nowadays are about $20-50.

I could keep my Wii to play GCN games. Hopefully HD versions of Wind Waker, Super Mario Sunshine, and MP Trilogy hit the Wii U, though.

[Bonta Kun]

Not bad indeed the 4 USB slots is a biggie, I'm saddened by the lack of USB on the other consoles.

Btw how big are the discs used here, same as Blu-ray(25GB)?
Can't see them using smaller sizes since you'd want to take advantage of it's supposed power and rival/best games on other systems?

[GDB]

Originally Posted by Bonta Kun

Btw how big are the discs used here, same as Blu-ray(25GB)?

20GB, I believe. And aren't Bluray like 50gb?

[Knight Hawk]

It's 25. http://kotaku.com/5809701/wii-u-disc...e-25gb-in-size
If it's like the Wii, you can enable DVD. Blu-ray for the WiiU. You know it's going to happen.

[HayashiTakara]

Originally Posted by darkchibi07

Specs are out!

http://www.animenewsnetwork.com/inte...-blu-ray-discs

Not specific enough unfortunately... we don't have raw data still.

Anyway, isn't BluRay a Sony product? Nintendo wouldn't put a BluRay player on their machine...

[Sides]

Originally Posted by HayashiTakara

Anyway, isn't BluRay a Sony product? Nintendo wouldn't put a BluRay player on their machine...

No problem at all, because Nintendo has in the past contracted Panasonic for its optical drives and media. I think a lot of people still misunderstand that blu-ray is actually developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association, made up and founded by many companies, including the biggest players panasonic and sony. It is just sony was the first one to bring out a consumer product and made a lot a noise about it.
But with Panasonic in the back, Nintendo should not have any problems including Blu-ray video playback, if they wanted to.
Reason for sony to push blu-ray so hard is not a surprise, i mean just check how many film studios they own today.
Simple answer, no, sony don't own blu-ray, yes they will get some license fees from Nintendo, if they license blu-ray for their console, but so would LG, Samsung, Pioneer and others.
Just for clarification gamecube and wii discs are DVDs, but used a minor difference in the scrambling frame layer, you can read more on it here. By doing this, the disc cannot be market or sold as DVD, because if does not conform to the DVD format. Expect Panasonic and Nintendo to pull of something similar with the Wii U discs, but we already know it is based on blu-ray this time around. So no need to guess or hope that Nintendo will be using HD-DVD, don't know who started this rumour, or holographic discs.

[Hiroi Sekai]

Originally Posted by Sides

Nintendo has in the past contracted Panasonic for its optical drives and media.

This sentence had an odd effect on me; a mixture of thinking about the new 3DS Ocarina of Time and optical disks resulted in remembering the CD-I Zelda games. >.>

"I'd give anything for an arpegos egg!"
"You DARE bring light into my lair? You must DIE!"
"Great! I can't wait to bomb some Dodongos!"
"My cakes will burn!"
"You killed me!!!!/Reply: Good!"
"Lamp oil, rope..."
"That was a wise purchase, young princess!"


Bloody hell, make the memories go away! ;_;

[Urzu 7]

What sucks is that it won't have Blu-Ray or DVD playback. If they change their minds on that, that would be great. But think about it, that would be a selling point to some people, or at least another reason to buy a Wii U. You could put your DVD or Blu-Ray in your console, and then watch it on the controller as you lay in bed. Or perhaps you want to watch a DVD or BR and someone else/some people want to use the TV for something else. Just like how you could play games on the controller, now you could get headphones and then watch your DVD or BR on the controller.

Also, Nintendo should allow for Netflix on the Wii U, and then streaming Netflix to the controller.

Nintendo has to give people more reasons to get a Wii U. Lots of people will find plenty of reasons to get one, but buy not taking advantage of DVD and BR movies/anime/tv shows, they are giving consumers less reasons to get one. Same thing with Netflix. The system will have it, but having Netflix on the controller would be nice. I hope they at least allow for that.

[Hiroi Sekai]

Originally Posted by Urzu 7

What sucks is that it won't have Blu-Ray or DVD playback. If they change their minds on that, that would be great. But think about it, that would be a selling point to some people, or at least another reason to buy a Wii U. You could put your DVD or Blu-Ray in your console, and then watch it on the controller as you lay in bed. Or perhaps you want to watch a DVD or BR and someone else/some people want to use the TV for something else. Just like how you could play games on the controller, now you could get headphones and then watch your DVD or BR on the controller.

Also, Nintendo should allow for Netflix on the Wii U, and then streaming Netflix to the controller.

Nintendo has to give people more reasons to get a Wii U. Lots of people will find plenty of reasons to get one, but buy not taking advantage of DVD and BR movies/anime/tv shows, they are giving consumers less reasons to get one. Same thing with Netflix. The system will have it, but having Netflix on the controller would be nice. I hope they at least allow for that.

Agreed for the DVD idea. Streaming would be quite nice, especially with headphones. For Netflix, they're already planning it for 3DS, so I'd be surprised if they didn't add it to Wii U as well.

It's a function that I'd happily give up for better gameplay functionality though.

[Sides]

Originally Posted by papermario13689

This sentence had an odd effect on me; a mixture of thinking about the new 3DS Ocarina of Time and optical disks resulted in remembering the CD-I Zelda games. >.>

"I'd give anything for an arpegos egg!"
"You DARE bring light into my lair? You must DIE!"
"Great! I can't wait to bomb some Dodongos!"
"My cakes will burn!"
"You killed me!!!!/Reply: Good!"
"Lamp oil, rope..."
"That was a wise purchase, young princess!"


Bloody hell, make the memories go away! ;_;

That was philips, iirc. Panasonic made the Q, which was a DVD player with a build in gamecube. I would not mind if they build something similar for the Wii-U...
I think their last attempt was the M2 (home console) and Jungle (handheld thing). If they were given the chance, i can see Panasonic wanting to take over Nintendo.

[Urzu 7]

Originally Posted by papermario13689

Agreed for the DVD idea. Streaming would be quite nice, especially with headphones. For Netflix, they're already planning it for 3DS, so I'd be surprised if they didn't add it to Wii U as well.

It's a function that I'd happily give up for better gameplay functionality though.

Oh, I'm sure it'll have Netflix. I just really hope you can stream it to the controller.

I really wish Nintendo would put a hard drive in this thing, sold with every unit. It'd be the smart thing to do. It would allow for more DLC from third parties, especially DLC for PS360 games. It would also mean more XBLA and PSN games would hit the system. XBLA and PSN games are getting bigger and bigger. Also, with HDD with every unit, they could release GCN games on Wii U as digital downloads.

Come on Nintendo, make some smarter choices! Don't misinterpret that as frustration. More like...a Nintendo fanboy cheering them on. *shakes pom poms*

[Sides]

Originally Posted by Urzu 7

Also, with HDD with every unit, they could release GCN games on Wii U as digital downloads

Expandable USB storage is better for the long term. Good thing is that since the 3DS, data and programs are actually running from the SD card directly, so no more hidden data swapping from internal flash to external media and vice versa, we had with the Wii and DSi.
To supply consoles with HDD is always a hassle, see ps3 and how many different models they had to release, because of HDD supplies.

No breaking news but for people who are interested, devkits were underclocked covered by kotaku. Considering that the specs are not finalised and most devkits are made up of pc hardware, it is hardly somekind of breaking news.

[Benoit]

Originally Posted by Urzu 7

Hopefully HD versions of Wind Waker, Super Mario Sunshine, and MP Trilogy hit the Wii U, though.

You want to give Nintendo even more money for lazy re-releases of the same games?

What sucks is that it won't have Blu-Ray or DVD playback.

No, it doesn't suck. We have players for those and other entertainment systems to play those back. Really, what's the point in putting that feature in all electronics? By now I think many people have 3/4 DVD players in their house.

You could put your DVD or Blu-Ray in your console, and then watch it on the controller as you lay in bed.

The controller's screen isn't big enough for Blu-Ray, and most consoles are in the living room. Chances are that the signal wouldn't reach your bed.

Don't they sell portable media players for this purpose already?

[Vallen Chaos Valiant]

It makes perfect sense.

Microsoft and Sony are trying to sell their consoles as multimedia devices. But Nintendo just makes games. Wii U should have everything needed to run great games, and nothing else. Every extra piece of hardware is what everyone has to pay for. Nintendo fully intends to sell their console as cheaply as they can while still make a profit, and there is nothing wrong with that. It is sensible.

(And it might also be a security measure; if you can't run DVD or Blu Ray at all, you can't mod the Wii U to run games that you burned on a disc.)

[serenade_beta]

Originally Posted by Urzu 7

I really wish Nintendo would put a hard drive in this thing, sold with every unit. It'd be the smart thing to do. It would allow for more DLC from third parties, especially DLC for PS360 games. It would also mean more XBLA and PSN games would hit the system. XBLA and PSN games are getting bigger and bigger. Also, with HDD with every unit, they could release GCN games on Wii U as digital downloads.

Few things more atrocious then DLC (the ones you have to pay money for). If putting a hard drive will result in more, then by all means, never ever put one in.
And at the same time, tell Gamefreak to never do that stupid DW Starter distribution type of thing again too.