Kifa

@cornishlee But SpotPass has absolutely nothing to do with 3DS in this case. It's merely a background download solution that happens to function also on the handheld. It's not, however, connection WiiU and 3DS. I think you may be mistaking it for StreetPass in this sense...

Also - standby won't rise your electricity bills. Contrary to how it functioned on Wii (where entire Hollywood chip was constantly kept powered), on WiiU the console only engages the small ARM core within it's GPU, and does this only for the duration of download and installation. It then shuts off. And even then most things remain unpowered (fan is off, so I presume CPU, GPU and RAM are all unpowered, and the console only uses eDRAM caches within GPU die to handle it's operations), which basically means that you will SAVE electricity by using standby downloads instead of Auto Power-off. :]

I've already tested this behaviour (made the console redownload/reinstall a few small things from eShop and one patch I didn't have) and it is pretty neat. Still - ti would be good for the console to also automatically check for updates on standby, not just handle downloads already queued in the Download Manager.

I guess this is where the SpotPass will come in, when it finally arrives.

@bezerker99 No, this was the one to address the loading times. The summer update will focus on additional features, not speeding up the system, which I think is not all that possible beyond the point we're in now.

Interesting, but what worries me is the total power draw of WiiU being quite high for standard 12V car socket. It's near 40W with the console alone, and charging anything via USB is bound to add a few watts to it, which in turn begs the question - will all car alternators be able to power it? Not to mention external hard drives, which will draw another few watts off USB (for thumbdrives/2,5" drives, as powering anything in the 3,5" form factor is rather out of the question)...

Also - yeah, road bumps would kill the optical drive soonner than later, as they would impact some hard drives. I don't know, I'm just sceptical about it...

Absolutely uninterested in the whole VC thing - I already have most of the games I wanted from Wii VC, and it's not going anywhere, so I can still buy those few remaining I don't have. Point being - off-TV play is not a selling point to me, so... Yeah, whatever.

Panorama View might be interesting, though I'll need to see the trial first.

@PinkSpider I suppose that's because fter exiting them the system has to basically reload whole configuration and start from scratch, even when nothing was changed. Think of it as a semi-reboot. It's designed the very same way as on 3DS I think, not sure why, but Nintendo probably can't change it.

I'm not entirely sold on the standby function. I hoped that it will automatically check for updates and download/install them, not only serve as an extension to Download Management. Or maybe I'm not seeing something? O.o

I suppose this does not bother me, as I've intended to wait for some reviews and platform comparisons before buying (Colonial Marines for PC left me psychically scarred and I'm not preordering anything for the next two years minimum).

It might not be as strange as it looks - maybe there are some trouble getting those custom optical discs made in adequate quanities? Or some logistics problem we don't know of?

I've read this letter and apart from being unable to write coherently the author seems to have real trouble naming what he or she wants. It's a general rant about everything and nothing at the same time, while some opinions about games on Nintendo platforms are puzzling, to say the least.

First of all - how come he says that "Metroid is dead to many of us" after ONE controversial (I won't dare to call MOM "bad", for various reasons) game in the series? How is it even possible to dismiss the fantastic Galaxies and complain about "not enough NSMB"? And seriosusly - I'm already fed up with Ocarina fanboys saying that this was the only good game in the series. Dude, get your poop together...

Second - as many above me have stated, WiiU is just beginning its way. It is simply irresponsible to scratch off a system so early in it's lifecycle, and history has taught us that Nintendo can go from such situation to full success, just as they did with 3DS. And developers jumping ship? It's not WiiU's fault, it's the gaming industry entering "crash phase". Major AAA titles nowadays simply have to sell millions upon millions, or they will not yield profit - look at Square Enix situation as a prime example. There are not enough WiiU's on the market for every developer to risk - we need independent and first party to build install base. Sad truth. Also - the guy says that many developers were so loyal to PS3 and X360 that they kept developing until they went bankrupt. That is, my friends, the very reason they are NOT taking risk with WiiU. It's not loyalty or lack of it, it's just basic survival insitnct in an industry that is basically broken already.

All that being said - I agree that two-year late ports are a joke, and Nintendo needs to pull some stuff out of their buttholes to revitalise the system. But that is the situation EVERY new console is facing...

In the end - some anonymous guy writes a random whine-filled email, which is not really all that insightful if I may use that word, and Nintendolife publishes it? What is this, I don't even...

Kind of disappointed about lack of any local multiplayer aside from "Father mode", but still looking good. I enjoyed Hot Pursuit back in the day, might as well get this at some point. :]

And if we... ahem, "support" the game, EA might even consider supporting it themselves, right? ;P

Gate of Thunder. 'Nuff said. Probably one of the most underappreciated systems of all time.

Nintendo's parental control system always seemed very robust to me, so the limitation was simply dumbness on the part of USK. Real question is - will parents even utilise the tools 3DS and WiiU give them...?

@Le_Gazman NFS is a brand new game, not a late port (and the WiiU version also has better graphics than X360 and PS3). Besides - why did you buy WiiU then? Did you go through launch title list prior to purchasing and thought for a second why do you even want the system? I think not, and now you are bitching around.

That, or you are just a troll, in which case I shouldn't feed you, for everyone's sake.

As for A:CM - this game never resembled anything "decent". Even with the 4GB patch released for PC version (which I sadly and foolishly purchased on launch - my last preorder ever) it's not anywhere past 'advanced beta'. Besides - no patch will ever fix the broken story, and probably nothing can be done to reedeem the pathetic final fight and ending. So my thoughts on this? Good riddance. Sega would be dumb to release this turd on WiiU.

(Goes back to playing Nano Assault Neo, Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate, Nintendoland and Little Inferno on WiiU(seless Paperweight). ;] )

I've got the PC version and well... It stinks, quite a bit. Poor presentation, mediocre voice acting, bullpoopy fights with HUMAN ADVERSARIES (Weyland-Yutani mercs are more common than xenomorphs in the first 2 hours of campaign), weak Aliens, terribly implemented multiplayer and very poor performance even on a quite beasty PC - that's my summary. And the bugs... Oh, the bugs, and I don't mean aliens. I killed myself once with a door. Seriously...

There are some cool parts, such as the very beginning of the campaign or the Hadley's Hope part, but otherwise it is just a poor-to-mediocre shooter which might as well have been released 7 years ago.

And the rumor? Gearbox is trying to wash their hands. No Randy, you are not gatting away with this one! ;/

Well, this shows that absolutely nothing has changed in nintendo's online infrastructure, which is a shame. To have a hardware-locked purchases in 2012? And they expect digital distribution to flourish? They seriously need to wake up. On the other hand, no dev will ever about players sharing accounts and using multiple copies of a game when they bought one, like it was once widespread on PSN (don't know if still is). So either they simply don't know their way around, or they have an agenda.

Pikmin 3 is an instant purchase for me, followed by Monster Hunter Ultimate and then by Wonderful 101 and Rayman Legends. Maybe there aren't many WiiU games announced, but those that are should be pretty damn good. And it's quality, not quanity, that matters for me.

Oh, yeah... And then there's Aliens: Colonial Marines, which should happen sometime in Q2-Q3. :]

Still no Nano Assault EX? Was it silently canned or something? :/ Also no support for WiiU is a bit troubling at this point - it's not very different from what happened to 3DS...

Stream unwatchable for me - I'm only seeing random frame every few seconds, no sound. I guess I'll have to pass and wait for the summary...

If the Maps app is of the same crappy quality as youtube one, then I'm staying away from it and sticking to my Nexus 7 for route planning purposes. Seriously - Google already proved that they can't write stuff for WiiU properly...

And still - no EU release date... :/

Yeah, except the game is not coming out anywhere but the US, so that's basically -1 on my WiiU "to buy" games list... I really hope they will pull their **** together and release it in PAL region, otherwise there is going to be a lot of angry people. ;/

Wii was my first stationary console ever, not counting Pegasus - a NES clone, popular in the early 90's in the Eastern Europe. I don't even remember why exactly I chose Nintendo back then - it just feels natural now. And I'm still not through all games worth playing on Wii, and will not be for a long time. My Gamecube collection is also lacking, and I'm sure to be expanding on both for a while longer.

My Wii highlight? Well, thatnks to this system I got to know the Metroid Prime trilogy and became the series' fan I am now. As for lowlight? Well, maybe the poor availability in my country, but that's not exactly the system's fault, is it?

I will probably not get WiiU on day 0, but that's OK. Wii might be retired, but it's spending it's retirement days actively at my place, and until optical drive malfunction or flash wear take it away from me, I'll care for it duely, because that is the system that brought back the child-gamer in me.

@TheChosen - That was spot-on!

@Nintenzo This.

@Mk_II France migrated to DVB-T a few years ago now. SECAM is still used in some countries, but none of them is a major market for WiiU. Still - I guess SCART is popular enough and better than Composite that they decided to bundle it instead. Or - we will just get a pass-through like with the Wii.

On topic: those game prices seem hefty on a second thought. Way too hefty. I hope that this is some kind of misunderstanding or wild speculation...

A SCART cable? Well, if it's an RGB variant then it's far better than your regular Composite wiring, that's for sure, but it's still a strange choice. I'm not even sure if latest TV's still have that connector...? Anyway - seems legit enough.

I played the original for hours. What I've seen in this trailer... Well, it looks like it can either turn out pretty good or fail on all fronts. I'd welcome a good arcade shooter on my 3DS though. Not a long wait ahead of us to find out how they pulled it off. :]

Congratulations to the winners, can see that my entry was nowhere near as good as those. The winning one seems a little... brutal, though.

@pariah164 - The code might still allow you to download software that is not publicly available, much like the redownload feature allows people owning Freakyforms to download their game again even though it's not available anymore. And if the game is not yet loaded onto the servers in the US, they will send the winner's their codes when it is. I wouldn't worry.

I guess they just don't want to release too many games in WiiU's launch window. No big deal, as long as the game is polished when it finally hits the shelves.

Sold! Hydroventure is one of my favourites on WiiWare, and I'll love to put some water in my Aqua Blue 3DS. I hope that we'll be able to choose between circle pad and gyroscope control scheme, though I can't imagine this game without the feeling of actually making the water flow through movement.

@theblackdragon - Woa, thnks for the heads up, didn't know that...

@sillygostly - Still, this does not convince me to buy the game. Screenshots and videos that are supposed to demonstrate the game you are considering buying should be attractive and convince you to get the game. If they fail to demonstrate the key aspects of it as they should (and in case of this game the video clearly does fail because of the framerate, which is, as I've said, essential for games like this), it should not come as surprise that people are turned off.

And yea, Mario Kart 7 is a good example here, though in case of this game there was plenty of video material available that showed game running very smoothly. In case of SpeedX 3D - I went to Gamelion's website and fired up the video there, about which Kawka was so enthusiastic as to clap his hands. The framerate of the game is as bad as on eShop one, but the overlay text and other stuff appearing at the same time is... silky smooth. Go figure...

Yes, I judge game's framerate by it's video. What is wrong with that? If they can't even record it properly (and I doubt that 3DS has trouble displaying at least 30 FPS), I have serious doubts about the game itself. If there are no framerate issues in the game itself, that's great, but you can't expect me to buy it without checking how it moves before. And video is the only way in this case (no demo), so if it's bad, the game is considered bad automatically.

And besides - kawka, who said anything about Youtube? -_-' I used eShop, and I stated that clearly.

I've read the review and felt intrigued. Then I headed over to eShop and watched the 3D video for the game. And... Well, I can't see why it got 8/10. Aside from simplistic gameplay (which may appeal to someone, it's a matter of personal taste) the game looks terribly bad, the music made me want to murder someone after a minute, and the framerate... Oh, the framerate! This isn't even the acceptable minimum of 30 frames per second (framerate is crucial in such games), it's much worse than that, which for a game with so simple graphics is unacceptable and is the best evidence of how hastily this port was made. As for 3D - on the video it looked like absolutelny nothing special, certainly not the "one of the most effective uses of the 3DS' auto-stereoscopic screen that we've seen so far".

I'm steering clear (cough) off this one - even AIRace Tunnel seems a better "obstacle course" game than this. Plus - it's cheaper and runs at 60 frames per second (on a DSi). Duh.

@C-Olimar That is probably some new "benchmark metagame", similar to that of various 3DMark-era scoreboards (still exist, but less visible). I really see absolutely no point in posting a file's download time, because it depends on so many immeasurable factors (server load, traffic on the packet's route, hubs capacity, your own connection loaded with other tasks etc.) that it's simply ridiculous to make news from how long some game downloaded... Geez, people are surely bored...

It's simple and saves a lot of space for artwork - that's good. Also looks very similar to GameCube box art to me, with different colours of course, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Those games need to look different on the shelves to avoid customers confusing them for something compatibile with the Wii I guess... Not bad, not bad at all. But still probably not final.

Yeah! I wanted this game since 3DS came out and was really disappointed when it was skipped on any european publisher's list (and of course 3DS is region locked, so no imports, hurr-durr). Will get that as soon as it appears, my 16GB memory card is ready for it.

Won't cry about it. If I ever be bored enough to consider playing Crysis 3 (or 2, for that matter), I'll simply get the PC version. WiiU will still have plenty of games to keep me occupied.

There will be angry customers. And jobs lost. Just saying.

Finally! All those phallic shapes are now going to be rainbow-full!
EDIT: Oh wait, they won't...

I rarely get any StreetPass hits - 3DS seems not to be very popular in my region. Still, every one of them is a little moment of joy and triumph, so I won't whine about it.

@FonistofCruxis - I've meant that WiiU has better 3rd party support than Wii had within it's launch window. I thought that I've made that clear with the context, but seems I thought wrong. Yea, Wii had great 3rd party support, I agree with you on that. I also agree that those games presented for the WiiU are ports, but still there are more of them than there were on Wii for it's start. That was ALL I wanted to say.

Meh, except for the Mutant Mudds demo - I'll try the game before I finally decide to shell out my money for it. Old habit.

System's not out yet, so it's hard to expect from companies to start developing for it right away. Personally I still prefer to see more exclusive, unique titles than a mass of multiplatform ports that probably suffer from various technical reasons. Maybe there will be a 'collection' of both LoS Vanias later for the system, but as of now WiiU should have plenty of great games to get by the launch window. And as Koos already said - there is a ton of third party support out there already, far more than Wii had, so stop crying.

I won't get it unless the new version has really big amount of new content. Which is practically impossible. So I won't get it, sorry Wayforward...

@Doma Go away and touch your iPad... -_-' Unless troll, in that case - well played.

I still see absolutely no purpose for the Circle Pad to exist. All games are perfectly playable without it and I prefer touchscreen aiming over that based on any kind of analogue sticks. Never considered buing this accessory for my 3DS, won't consider it for XL if I ever get one. EOT for me. ;]

I think 3DS XL is a niche product just as DSi XL, so even if the price would be exactly the same it wouldn't put both systems on competition. Still - I expect it to be more expensive than regular model. Guess that means choosing - getting a 3DS upgrade or saving for WiiU... sigh

Thank gods, I was afraid that I'd be nagged by Twitter and Facebook banners all the time. Great thing those won't connect, at least for now, because... Well, I just hate those services... :/

Well, that's 6pm for me, excellent timing! As for new consoles from other parties - well, Microsoft kept X360 secret virtually until last moment, so it is somewhat possible, but unlikely (X360 is still very capable). Sony surely won't announce anything, knowing how they like to show their systems early and then think about how they are gonna fit the innards into the mockup they've shown.

That would look cool if not for the horribly choppy framerate! I really hope that the final game works better, because if it will run like that - sorry, I'm skipping it, I don't like getting headaches... :/ Also the graphics are a little on the bland side, so I really have no idea what is causing such poor performance.

Seems reasonable - powerful hardware capable of delivering HD visuals is much cheaper than it was when X360 and PS3 launched, and the tablet-controller is not an independent unit so it does not need much in terms of internal processing power to operate. Gyroscopes and accelerometers are not expensive either, and haptics seems unlikely (probably wouldn't fit in the specified component cost). Overall - seems to be a good launch price. :]

Like seriously - what is GAME's problem with Nintendo stuff? It sells well, sometimes even better than games for other systems, and they are just not stocking it? Really? Can someone smarter than me can explain?

I understand the financial problems, but wouldin't additional sales actually help to remedy those?

I got Kid Icarus piece, but because there is literally noone with 3DS around my place, I have no hope in completing any of the new sets with purple pieces. Oh well, I probably can live with that...

Even Nintendo states that 3D is optional for 3DS, and that it should not be forced where it does not belong. I think here the cause for disabling 3D effect is the wireless driver - for a fighting game it needs to be as close to "no lag" as possible, which means consuming additional horsepower. So perhaps it was not possible to run the game at 60fps with 3D and WiFi enabled - personally I think that removing 3D support in multi is a better choice than reducing the framerate to 30fps. That would've been unacceptable by many.

This is THE true multiplayer gaming. No headset, webcam, nothing can ever replace the joy of swapping gamepads and looking at eachother viewport, and it's a shame that not many gamers appreciate all this. Sorry for my babbling, I'm possibly slightly drunk, but my point is - I totally envy you and... Damn, I need to make a few calls right now!