Good review. I'm loving how much extra content Nintendo has packed into this one with the secret levels, challenge, boost rush and versus modes. The Miiverse implementation also adds a lot more than I had originally thought it would. Definitely a must-have game for anyone who gets the system.
@rjejr Did you actually need your sensor bar? I don't know many people who are buying a Wii U that didn't already have a Wii. I left the sensor bar that came with my U in the box and just swapped the plug on the bar I already have and I imagine most people are doing the same. My guess is they didn't intend to include the bar in any package but NOA convinced them that Americans would response more unfavorably to the exclusion of a necessary device in the box even if there's a good chance they already have it.
Remember that as well as the Wii has sold in the US, there's no question that it did even better in Japan. Most gamers over there already have a sensor bar so removing it from the box could save them some Yen. There's also nothing stopping them from picking it up separately if it's needed.
@sillygostly The Wii Remote Plus or a Motion+ accessory is required to play the Zelda minigame with more than one player in Nintendo Land. I do not know which of the other games require it (Super Mario Bros. U does not) because it doesn't inform you of this until you activate the Wiimote to play.
Personally, I'm happy that Nintendo is pushing more towards needing the Plus because that will hopefully mean 3rd parties won't be afraid to require it, thus being able to code directly for its enhanced features. I would be surprised if they added yet another accessory that just adds a few more motion sensors, but who knows? Maybe people with a classic Wiimote can plug another adapter into their Motion+ and have an 11-inch super Wiimote!
I just watched this and the Making Of video linked to it, and I have a couple questions:
1) Are these guys getting paid by Apple to show as many Apple logos as possible or is it just me?
2) If they're not selling Apples, are they selling their own animation software? The Making Of video comes across more as an extended plug for their app than anything else.
3) Most importantly, why would you spend so much time making this admittedly awesome video about a beloved game series, if you don't know the name of the main character? (Hint: It's not Zelda!)
Yeah, the Wii U will definitely die when the competing consoles come out because there's no way a unique but technically weaker console can survive against consoles with better processing power.
In totally unrelated news, I'm just going to drop this link here:
Got my external HDD repurposed as a Wii U storage drive. I was impressed that the format took about 1.5 seconds. I'm assuming this is because it was empty, though.
I did some tests running New Super Mario Bros. U through it and the only differences I notice is that the initial load screen (before the game starts) takes slightly longer and the save time is much quicker. Everything else seems to have remained the same, which means I have about 15 times the storage space now. Ready for some eShop lovin'.
He needs to pick up the Wii U controller and find 4 friends to play Mario Chase with. After the first match, you begin to understand. After the second, you're enthralled. After the 40th, you wonder why you ever wasted your life playing with anything else.
I'm going to be honest. I completed the game's story in 5 hours, though I still have around 20 combos left to find. However, what I now find myself doing most of the time is stacking 10-12 random objects in the fireplace and then setting something on fire to see how it spreads and what chaos emerges as a result. Call me a pyromaniac, I guess, but it's incredibly addicting and I can waste hours just burning different sets of items.
Still don't know if it was worth the price, but for now it is certainly holding my attention.
If the system breaks, just like with the Wii, you can send it into Nintendo and they will transfer all your licenses from the old system to the new system. If it's lost/stolen, you may have bigger issues but I like to think that at that point they could transfer your Network ID to a replacement console.
Still, this is very disappointing. I was hoping that the days of having your software locked to one console were behind Nintendo, but apparently not. I can't really think of a good alternative though. The Microsoft system works by requiring you to log in to another console and then download the games, which then become disabled when another user is logged in. Nintendo wants all games on the console to work for any user playing it. How would they prevent people from going to their friend's house, signing in, downloading, and then leaving the software on there for the friend to play whenever they want?
I don't know, it's a tricky situation but still pretty disheartening.
Whoops. It's not at all uncommon for developers working on software to code in a "back door" that lets them into some test page so that they can put dummy data into the system and quickly see what it looks like. This helps them keep that test data out of the live areas that all the consumers are going to see, but if you're not careful and forget to remove the back door, these kinds of things can happen.
I work in IT for a company with a web-based storefront and there have been a couple times where unreleased features and pages that were obviously made for testing have accidentally found their way into our customers' hands. Usually no harm is done except to the unfortunate developer's pride, but it does make for some great office banter.
@retro_player_22
Yeah! Why didn't Nintendo just finish writing their software before sending any systems to manufacturing!?! Who cares if the stores wouldn't have them in stock before December 27th!?
Oh, right.
Well, I guess they could have found a convenient wormhole through time and space and chucked the finished products back to Nov. 18th though, right? Freaking Nintendo and your not utilizing science fiction appropriately!!!
About 65% of the way through the patch, my Internet gave out and I got an error "Cannot connect to server. Please try again later." I exited out of the error, went back to the network settings, ran another test which worked fine and then it prompted me to update. I assumed I was out another 45 minutes but it picked up right where it left off and installed successfully. Sounds like I dodged a bigger bullet than I thought!
Also, are you sure the people who bricked the system did it by turning it off while downloading or while patching? Downloading doesn't really do anything but store inert data, while at any given point during a patch the system's non-volatile RAM can be wiped or partially filled in such a way that the system can't boot.
Well I officially feel like a beta tester for Nintendo.
Issue 1: Can't post to Miiverse from within either NIntendo Land or New Super Mario Bros. U (the two games I have at the moment). Any attempt at posting a message gives "Could not connect to server" after a minute-long delay. Posting directly to a community forum in Miiverse works fine, just so long as you didn't do it from the game.
Issue 2: No Miiverse content present in games; games report that you are not connected to the Internet even though you are; games report that you have to run the one-time "initial setup" of MIiverse even though you've already done it.
Issue 3: Purchasing New Super Mario Bros. U from the eShop did not register it to my linked Club Nintendo account.
Issue 4: One of the users on my system cannot login with her Nintendo Network ID because it always says invalid password. We've attempted to reset the password 3 times, each time getting a new temporary password, but regardless of how many times we confirm we're entering it correctly the system just says the password is invalid and won't let her log in. My account works fine. (What ever happened to only needing one Nintendo Network ID per console anyway?? They released that video like 2 weeks ago but the system doesn't work the way they say it does.)
Anybody who thinks Myst sucks hasn't played RealMyst on a PC that can handle it.
When Myst came out it used an "interactive picture book" design because PCs of the time had no 3D acceleration and certainly couldn't produce scenes as rich and detailed as can be seen in the still images of Myst. They exploited the brand-new CD-ROM technology with its huge amount of storage to make a game that couldn't have been made before. However, people scoffed because even though the images looked great, they were static.
So, what did Cyan do? A few years later they set out to reproduce the same game using real-time 3D acceleration without sacrificing one ounce of detail or immersion. This was RealMyst, and unsurprisingly reviewers panned it heavily. Why? Because the computers of the time couldn't handle it. Damned if you do....
Luckily, computers now can render it the way it was intended to be seen with ease, and it looks better than many 3D games on the market today. It's amazing that in a game releasing in 2000, the water actually moves in a realistic manner. I don't mean it's flat with some ripples digitally generated using pixel shaders. That didn't exist at the time. They actually rendered multiple layers of moving water with physical geometry that moves and deforms in realtime exactly the way water should. Most games today don't bother with that level of detail.
@QyetCapri Pssh. I waited for the Wii for 14 hours. Of course after the first 2 hours, Walmart let us come inside where it was warm, but it's the thought that counts!!
1983: NES - D-pad. Present on every major home console since. 1989: Gameboy - First widely successful cartridge-based portable 1990: SNES - Shoulder buttons (I guess Sega figured no one would notice they just moved the Select button over a few inches and called it "C".) 1995: Virtual Boy - 3D portable w/ detached controller, dual directional inputs (D-pads). Predates the Dual Analog controller by 2 years. (Sorry, Sony) 1996: N64 - Analog stick, trigger button, controller expansion port, force feedback 2001: Gamecube - Analog triggers, (w/ digital click), staggered dual-analog layout. (You're welcome, Microsoft) 2001: GBA - Handheld w/ shoulder buttons 2003: GBA SP - Handheld "clamshell" design 2004: DS - Touch screen, dual-screen gaming 2006: Wii - Motion controls, infrared sensing, on-controller speaker and memory 2012: Wii U - Built-in screen, stereo speakers, camera, universal remote, proximity card-reader
Yeah, Nintendo coming up with innovative input methods is nothing new. Let's just hope they can keep it up over the next few decades.
I am OK with the thought as long as Nintendo oversees the quality and direction of the gameplay and they never, ever, ever let Team Ninja near the franchise again.
@sinalefa
Not misinformed. Heavily let down. There is so much more to a game than the story draft provided by the publisher. Even if you assume that Team Ninja had absolutely no control over the decision to make Samus into a damp washcloth unable to activate her Varia Suit without permission (extremely unlikely), there is still the terrible gameplay, awful art direction, poor pacing, long and incredibly boring cutscenes that did nothing but cause you to fall asleep, schizophrenic difficulty scale, the list goes on*. Team Ninja makes terrible games and then sells them using gore and boobs. Samus deserves better.
And OH MY GOD the Where's Waldo? intermission screens!!! ARGGGGGGGHHH*slits wrists*
I'm going to look at this in the best possible light and hope that Nintendo is planning to sell a trilogy collection w/ extra bells and whistles for the Wii U. Pleeeeeeease Nintendo??
@Starwolf_UK You seem to have Nintendo confused with Microsoft. Nintendo is not about to release utility or maintenance software and charge the user for it. The fact that they're letting you plug in essentially any external hard drive should drive that point home. Microsoft's version of external storage is expensive proprietary hard drives and SD cards, and their wireless adaptor costs $60-100 new.
@Zyph
I challenge you to fill 2TB worth of games over the Wii U's entire lifespan. Assuming an average of 20GB per game, your 2TB drive will hold about 100 Wii U games. That's full retail titles, many of which undoubtedly won't be offered on the eShop when they release. I own about 2 dozen retail games for the Wii, and about 40 digital and VC games which are vastly smaller and I consider myself an avid gamer. Good luck in your quest.
Yeah it's funny how the same people whining all over this site about the lack of storage would be whining even louder if Nintendo had announced that the basic set (32GB) would be $350 and the deluxe (256GB) would be $400 or more. You can get way more storage from a $50 USB drive than Nintendo could build into their system at a reasonable cost. They did you a favor. Now stop the complaining.
Yeah, this is hardly news and it's really not as big a deal as people are making it. Keep in mind the XBox 360 and PS3 were both well over the $300 mark at launch for models that included hard drives with just 20GB of storage. Obviously storage sizes have changed since then, but if you're seriously expecting Nintendo to release a console with a high amount of built-in storage and not charge an extra $100 for that, you're living in la-la land.
I already have an external drive I am going to repurpose for Wii U storage on day 1 and anyone serious about puchasing digital titles will want to take care of this sooner rather than later. Nintendo has packed plenty into the system to justify its price tag and have given a reasonable amount of memory for the mainstream consumers who are going to stick mainly to retail games and a handful of digital-only titles from the eShop.
At least they have a custom storage solution ready on day 1 and aren't asking gamers to shell out top dollar for a branded storage medium like Microsoft.
Ugh. Dumb dumb dumb. I want this pad compatible with all VC and Wii games so you can play anything not made specifically for the Wii U (and its two screens) on the gamepad by itself. It just makes sense. Doesn't the thing even have a built-in sensor bar for pointing a Wii remote at it? Totally a missed opportunity if they don't rectify this soon.
I wouldn't be at all surprised if the rounded edges are part of the anti-piracy measures. If the Wii U can tell the difference between these and normal discs, it can lock itself in Wii mode when reading a normal disc, helping to prevent people from being able to run hacks or Wii U games burned onto another disc format.
Eh. How about leaving the game alone and telling your daughter that gender doesn't matter, hence in this game the hero happens to be a little boy, while in Metroid you get to play as the universe's most awesome bounty hunter who happens to be female?
Now for the sexist test; Flip the genders. What would people be saying about a parent hacking Tomb Raider to replace Lara Croft with a male character because they didn't want their son to play as a female in a strong, heroic role? I bet you wouldn't be giving them your admiration then. Double standard, indeed.
Nintendo will handle this the same way they have on the Wii, by including the updates on the retail discs, and of course subsequent runs of the console will have the latest version preloaded. It's unfortunate that they didn't have these features ready in time to have them loaded on the first-run systems, but my guess is they wanted to just get them into manufacturing quickly to maximize the supply so they hopefully won't run into shortages like with the Wii.
Also, remember the vast majority of people able to purchase a Wii U in the launch window won't be affected by this shortcoming.
@THENAMESNORM
Unfortunately, the games you mentioned are already being printed in large quantities as they're both launch titles (and one is a pack-in game in some regions). If Nintendo had the firmware ready in time for them to go onto those discs, they would just have put it on the system. My guess is you'll have to wait at least a month before firmware is available on the game discs.
@Dodger I really hope they make this feature available. It seems like a no-brainer to me given that one of the much-touted features is the ability to play games while someone else uses the TV, but Nintendo has made non-sensical (at least to me) decisions in the past, so not holding my breath until they confirm/deny it.
The name doesn't bother me, but for those of you who it does bother, you do realize there is nothing contractually forcing you to call it Wara Wara Plaza, right? You can just call it "the plaza" or "the Wii U main screen" or "a garbage pail full of brains and yogurt" if it tickles your fancy. The most used option is probably going to circulate around and be used instead of Nintendo's name no matter how hard they try to stop it, after all. Remember where "Wiimote" came from? (Actually that was the Streisand Effect, but whatevs)
The fact that this shows games you don't own that are popular and have an easy-to-reach Buy option available probably means Nintendo will be getting more of my hard-earned cash this time around. Curse you and your clever marketing schemes!
I wouldn't mind Samus, but I think Zelda is a better fit, having more experience ruling people while not being afraid to get her hands dirty and kick some butt when needed. Samus would probably just respond to crises with a power bomb, and that's just not the kind of candidate we need.
Routine maintenance doesn't usually take 7 hours. This is probably an upgrade of some kind, but it's very possible it'll just be some behind-the-scenes work and we won't see anything new yet. Obviously they need to upgrade the eShop at some point to support the new account features. The only question is how much of that upgrade we'll see after tomorrow and how much we'll see later.
It'd be cool if you could optionally view the browser just on the gamepad screen while you're playing a game. Obviously it'd still need to pause, in case the game requires the controller screen for some other use, but this way you could pause the game at a location you can't seem to get through and pull up GameFAQs on the pad without leaving the game screen, so you can easily see what the FAQ is talking about. For backwards-compatible games that don't use the screen, this could potentially even be used to let someone browse while you're playing an unrelated game on the screen! (Doubt they'll do it, but it would be quite cool)
Naturally, as I have done with my 3DS on many occassions, I will be using this multitasking feature to pull up the NintendoLife review page for a game when I see something interesting on the eShop.
EA is not one of my favorite publishers, but I gotta give credit where it's due. (Which is probably to the unnamed developer they gobbled up, but eh....)
It appears that they're certainly taking the gamepad seriously for this first outing and shoving a lot of nice features on there. It's a very real possibility that a gamer might check out a copy of the game on XBox and Wii U, read the features and ask themselves why they would want to pay the same for a lesser experience on the XBox. Times certainly are changing.
On a side-note, I read the item there about touch-screen menu navigation and it blew my mind. It's such a simple thing, but I had not considered how much easier that makes things on console games. On my PC I am used to being able to navigate complex menus easily using a mouse, but now I can do the same thing on the touchscreen without having to use clunky controller navigation. I know, menus, right? But it will just feel so much better having the options right in your lap, as it were.
On the subject of franchises I'd love to see on the Wii U, how about something in the Eternal Darkness vein? I can only imagine the creative ways they could put the gamepad to use in a horror setting. (ZombiU already demonstrates how much tension you can add just by throwing in an extra screen.)
F-Zero X was the perfect F-Zero game, IMO. It was able to utilize the power of a true 3D renderer and had a good balance between pretty visuals and simple enough graphics to support the high speed gameplay, so you could focus on staying on the track and slamming your opponents into the walls. F-Zero GX was both too flashy and much faster (seemingly, at least) which led to many cases where you couldn't really tell what the track was going to do or pay any attention at all to the other racers.
I'd love to see Nintendo release another F-Zero title, but I also agree with Miyamoto when he suggests that they've reached the pinnacle of the series and releasing another game that's basically the same thing is not Nintendo's style. If they do go for another one, I hope they simplify it a little bit and focus on the core of what made F-Zero X fun — High-speed tracks with lots of ridiculous stunts and opportunities to foul up your opponents. If they do that and keep the presentation basic enough to actually play, it'll be a great addition to the series.
I agree with SMW about the difficulty. Yeah, there are certainly Nintendo Hard games out there, but F-Zero GX's story mode was plain ridiculous and was coupled with retry delays that made you want to quit playing quite quickly. A game can be ridiculously hard, but if it's easy to quickly retry a stage or section of a level, it doesn't become tedious to do it over and over. See also: Trackmania.
I was seriously thinking about my answer and then realized I was just playing Donkey Konga on my Wii earlier today.
So, yeah, backwards compatibility is a plus. I'm even a little sad that it won't support Gamecube discs natively, but it probably is better in the long run to just put them on the eShop.
Looks to be well-executed, but a bit too simple for my tastes. This is the kind of game I expect to see on someone's iPad, struggling in vain to end Nintendo's mobile domination. I'd rather invest more money into something with a tad more depth than "puddle in my driveway after a light rain."
This blows my mind. Console browsers are usually sad, cut-down versions of their PC-version siblings, and Nintendo hasn't exactly made having a feature-rich browser a priority.
Unfortunately, I doubt Nintendo will support all the various plugins required by sites like Youtube, so all that effort spent making it HTML5 compliant is probably not going to be enough for people to switch to using it as their preferred browsing method.
@Ren: That test score has little or nothing to do with speed. It's a rating of how compatible the browser is at handling all of the features of HTML5. Basically they load up a complex page and see if the browser renders it as intended. It's surprising how non-compliant mainstream browsers can be, though Microsoft has made a good deal of effort fixing that since IE6.
It's also worth noting that HTML5 is a new spec that hasn't yet been adopted by most web hosts, so it's perfectly reasonable that current browsers don't support all the bells and whistles yet.
@The_Other_M: MMORPGs do not cause people to throw their lives away any more than Grand Theft Auto causes a child to kill their classmate. If your friend got sucked into MMORPGs enough that he was neglecting the rest of his life, that's an issue he should work on. Don't blame WOW or Blizzard for his addiction.
As far as WOW on the Wii U, I seriously doubt it. At least not in its current form. I could see a more scaled-down MMORPG working quite well; much better than other consoles have been able to do things previously, certainly.
The problem is not just the interface, but that console gamers are usually expecting something more streamlined while MMORPGs and the more hardcore PC games tend to be more complex and deep.
Still, I would be interested in seeing an MMORPG done right on a console. The only attempt I'm aware of is Phantasy Star Online and that failed because they wanted you to hook a freaking keyboard up to your console. A proper console MMORPG would keep the massive world, lots of content and plenty of interpersonal communication and cooperative gameplay while simplifying the controls and gameplay to fit better in the console realm. With the Wii U gamepad, a whole lot of possibilities are certainly opened up. However, I have to categorically say no to the idea of Wiimote + Gamepad control. If you have to put down one controller to pick up another you have failed to provide a good experience.
To the people wanting more info on this, yeah I agree they could have made it a little clearer that they're selling a new console, but come on... A list of games? This is a minute-long TV ad, you're not going to get people to read a bunch of text and even if they did do you really think that'd make them want the system? A commercial is not a place to put a tech demo or go out of your way explaining how things work. The idea is to capture interest in the product so that the viewer will look up the details later, or see it in the store and try one out for themselves or ask questions about it.
Comments 628
Re: Iwata Explains Where The Name HAL Laboratory Came From
LOL, nice work HAL. Great reason to name a company.
Re: Review: New Super Mario Bros. U (Wii U)
Good review. I'm loving how much extra content Nintendo has packed into this one with the secret levels, challenge, boost rush and versus modes. The Miiverse implementation also adds a lot more than I had originally thought it would. Definitely a must-have game for anyone who gets the system.
Re: Feature: EU Wii U Launch Day - Live!
Grats, Europe! I've been having way too much fun with this system over the last couple weeks. Hope you guys enjoy it too.
Re: TVii Application Will Be Available In Japan At Launch
@rjejr
Did you actually need your sensor bar? I don't know many people who are buying a Wii U that didn't already have a Wii. I left the sensor bar that came with my U in the box and just swapped the plug on the bar I already have and I imagine most people are doing the same. My guess is they didn't intend to include the bar in any package but NOA convinced them that Americans would response more unfavorably to the exclusion of a necessary device in the box even if there's a good chance they already have it.
Remember that as well as the Wii has sold in the US, there's no question that it did even better in Japan. Most gamers over there already have a sensor bar so removing it from the box could save them some Yen. There's also nothing stopping them from picking it up separately if it's needed.
Re: Wii U GamePad Offers Nine-Axis Controls
@sillygostly
The Wii Remote Plus or a Motion+ accessory is required to play the Zelda minigame with more than one player in Nintendo Land. I do not know which of the other games require it (Super Mario Bros. U does not) because it doesn't inform you of this until you activate the Wiimote to play.
Personally, I'm happy that Nintendo is pushing more towards needing the Plus because that will hopefully mean 3rd parties won't be afraid to require it, thus being able to code directly for its enhanced features. I would be surprised if they added yet another accessory that just adds a few more motion sensors, but who knows? Maybe people with a classic Wiimote can plug another adapter into their Motion+ and have an 11-inch super Wiimote!
Re: This Zelda Video is Truly Epic
I just watched this and the Making Of video linked to it, and I have a couple questions:
1) Are these guys getting paid by Apple to show as many Apple logos as possible or is it just me?
2) If they're not selling Apples, are they selling their own animation software? The Making Of video comes across more as an extended plug for their app than anything else.
3) Most importantly, why would you spend so much time making this admittedly awesome video about a beloved game series, if you don't know the name of the main character? (Hint: It's not Zelda!)
Re: THQ Adds Clarity To The Wii U "Horrible, Slow CPU" Comments
Yeah, the Wii U will definitely die when the competing consoles come out because there's no way a unique but technically weaker console can survive against consoles with better processing power.
In totally unrelated news, I'm just going to drop this link here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_video_game_consoles_(seventh_generation)#Sales_standings
Re: Guide: Using USB Storage with the Wii U
Got my external HDD repurposed as a Wii U storage drive. I was impressed that the format took about 1.5 seconds. I'm assuming this is because it was empty, though.
I did some tests running New Super Mario Bros. U through it and the only differences I notice is that the initial load screen (before the game starts) takes slightly longer and the save time is much quicker. Everything else seems to have remained the same, which means I have about 15 times the storage space now. Ready for some eShop lovin'.
Re: ZombiU Demo Coming To Wii U eShop
Yay! Now I can try it before deciding whether it's worth 60 bones. I still see too many mixed reviews to just drop the cash.
Re: The Godfather of Video Games Is Baffled By The Wii U
He needs to pick up the Wii U controller and find 4 friends to play Mario Chase with. After the first match, you begin to understand. After the second, you're enthralled. After the 40th, you wonder why you ever wasted your life playing with anything else.
Re: Review: Little Inferno (Wii U eShop)
I'm going to be honest. I completed the game's story in 5 hours, though I still have around 20 combos left to find. However, what I now find myself doing most of the time is stacking 10-12 random objects in the fireplace and then setting something on fire to see how it spreads and what chaos emerges as a result. Call me a pyromaniac, I guess, but it's incredibly addicting and I can waste hours just burning different sets of items.
Still don't know if it was worth the price, but for now it is certainly holding my attention.
Re: Want To Know What It's Like To Drop Your Wii U GamePad?
Absolutely no surprise. Nintendo would not make a device that would break after only a few drops.
Re: Nintendo Network IDs Are Tied To A Single Wii U Console, For Now
If the system breaks, just like with the Wii, you can send it into Nintendo and they will transfer all your licenses from the old system to the new system. If it's lost/stolen, you may have bigger issues but I like to think that at that point they could transfer your Network ID to a replacement console.
Still, this is very disappointing. I was hoping that the days of having your software locked to one console were behind Nintendo, but apparently not. I can't really think of a good alternative though. The Microsoft system works by requiring you to log in to another console and then download the games, which then become disabled when another user is logged in. Nintendo wants all games on the console to work for any user playing it. How would they prevent people from going to their friend's house, signing in, downloading, and then leaving the software on there for the friend to play whenever they want?
I don't know, it's a tricky situation but still pretty disheartening.
Re: Miiverse Hacked By Mistake, Possible Metal Gear And Yoshi Wii U Games Unearthed
Whoops. It's not at all uncommon for developers working on software to code in a "back door" that lets them into some test page so that they can put dummy data into the system and quickly see what it looks like. This helps them keep that test data out of the live areas that all the consumers are going to see, but if you're not careful and forget to remove the back door, these kinds of things can happen.
I work in IT for a company with a web-based storefront and there have been a couple times where unreleased features and pages that were obviously made for testing have accidentally found their way into our customers' hands. Usually no harm is done except to the unfortunate developer's pride, but it does make for some great office banter.
Re: Halting Wii U System Update May Brick the System
@retro_player_22
Yeah! Why didn't Nintendo just finish writing their software before sending any systems to manufacturing!?! Who cares if the stores wouldn't have them in stock before December 27th!?
Oh, right.
Well, I guess they could have found a convenient wormhole through time and space and chucked the finished products back to Nov. 18th though, right? Freaking Nintendo and your not utilizing science fiction appropriately!!!
Re: Halting Wii U System Update May Brick the System
About 65% of the way through the patch, my Internet gave out and I got an error "Cannot connect to server. Please try again later." I exited out of the error, went back to the network settings, ran another test which worked fine and then it prompted me to update. I assumed I was out another 45 minutes but it picked up right where it left off and installed successfully. Sounds like I dodged a bigger bullet than I thought!
Also, are you sure the people who bricked the system did it by turning it off while downloading or while patching? Downloading doesn't really do anything but store inert data, while at any given point during a patch the system's non-volatile RAM can be wiped or partially filled in such a way that the system can't boot.
Re: Feature: Wii U Launch Day, Live!
Well I officially feel like a beta tester for Nintendo.
Issue 1: Can't post to Miiverse from within either NIntendo Land or New Super Mario Bros. U (the two games I have at the moment). Any attempt at posting a message gives "Could not connect to server" after a minute-long delay. Posting directly to a community forum in Miiverse works fine, just so long as you didn't do it from the game.
Issue 2: No Miiverse content present in games; games report that you are not connected to the Internet even though you are; games report that you have to run the one-time "initial setup" of MIiverse even though you've already done it.
Issue 3: Purchasing New Super Mario Bros. U from the eShop did not register it to my linked Club Nintendo account.
Issue 4: One of the users on my system cannot login with her Nintendo Network ID because it always says invalid password. We've attempted to reset the password 3 times, each time getting a new temporary password, but regardless of how many times we confirm we're entering it correctly the system just says the password is invalid and won't let her log in. My account works fine. (What ever happened to only needing one Nintendo Network ID per console anyway?? They released that video like 2 weeks ago but the system doesn't work the way they say it does.)
Re: Feature: The Making Of Myst
Anybody who thinks Myst sucks hasn't played RealMyst on a PC that can handle it.
When Myst came out it used an "interactive picture book" design because PCs of the time had no 3D acceleration and certainly couldn't produce scenes as rich and detailed as can be seen in the still images of Myst. They exploited the brand-new CD-ROM technology with its huge amount of storage to make a game that couldn't have been made before. However, people scoffed because even though the images looked great, they were static.
So, what did Cyan do? A few years later they set out to reproduce the same game using real-time 3D acceleration without sacrificing one ounce of detail or immersion. This was RealMyst, and unsurprisingly reviewers panned it heavily. Why? Because the computers of the time couldn't handle it. Damned if you do....
Luckily, computers now can render it the way it was intended to be seen with ease, and it looks better than many 3D games on the market today. It's amazing that in a game releasing in 2000, the water actually moves in a realistic manner. I don't mean it's flat with some ripples digitally generated using pixel shaders. That didn't exist at the time. They actually rendered multiple layers of moving water with physical geometry that moves and deforms in realtime exactly the way water should. Most games today don't bother with that level of detail.
Re: Feature: What Excites Us About Wii U - NA Edition
@QyetCapri Pssh. I waited for the Wii for 14 hours. Of course after the first 2 hours, Walmart let us come inside where it was warm, but it's the thought that counts!!
Re: Feature: What Excites Us About Wii U - NA Edition
@Shaan Joshi Recently? Let's take a look:
1983: NES - D-pad. Present on every major home console since.
1989: Gameboy - First widely successful cartridge-based portable
1990: SNES - Shoulder buttons (I guess Sega figured no one would notice they just moved the Select button over a few inches and called it "C".)
1995: Virtual Boy - 3D portable w/ detached controller, dual directional inputs (D-pads). Predates the Dual Analog controller by 2 years. (Sorry, Sony)
1996: N64 - Analog stick, trigger button, controller expansion port, force feedback
2001: Gamecube - Analog triggers, (w/ digital click), staggered dual-analog layout. (You're welcome, Microsoft)
2001: GBA - Handheld w/ shoulder buttons
2003: GBA SP - Handheld "clamshell" design
2004: DS - Touch screen, dual-screen gaming
2006: Wii - Motion controls, infrared sensing, on-controller speaker and memory
2012: Wii U - Built-in screen, stereo speakers, camera, universal remote, proximity card-reader
Yeah, Nintendo coming up with innovative input methods is nothing new. Let's just hope they can keep it up over the next few decades.
Re: WayForward Would Like To Make A Metroid Game
I am OK with the thought as long as Nintendo oversees the quality and direction of the gameplay and they never, ever, ever let Team Ninja near the franchise again.
@sinalefa
Not misinformed. Heavily let down. There is so much more to a game than the story draft provided by the publisher. Even if you assume that Team Ninja had absolutely no control over the decision to make Samus into a damp washcloth unable to activate her Varia Suit without permission (extremely unlikely), there is still the terrible gameplay, awful art direction, poor pacing, long and incredibly boring cutscenes that did nothing but cause you to fall asleep, schizophrenic difficulty scale, the list goes on*. Team Ninja makes terrible games and then sells them using gore and boobs. Samus deserves better.
Re: Donkey Kong Country Trilogy To Be Pulled From Wii Virtual Console
I'm going to look at this in the best possible light and hope that Nintendo is planning to sell a trilogy collection w/ extra bells and whistles for the Wii U. Pleeeeeeease Nintendo??
Re: Spin The Bottle Is A Wii U Game That Doesn't Use Your TV
Hm, this plus a few close friends and alcohol could lead to some rather... interesting situations.
Re: Wii U External Hard Drive Usage Outlined by Satoru Iwata
@Starwolf_UK
You seem to have Nintendo confused with Microsoft. Nintendo is not about to release utility or maintenance software and charge the user for it. The fact that they're letting you plug in essentially any external hard drive should drive that point home. Microsoft's version of external storage is expensive proprietary hard drives and SD cards, and their wireless adaptor costs $60-100 new.
Re: Wii U External Hard Drive Usage Outlined by Satoru Iwata
@Zyph
I challenge you to fill 2TB worth of games over the Wii U's entire lifespan. Assuming an average of 20GB per game, your 2TB drive will hold about 100 Wii U games. That's full retail titles, many of which undoubtedly won't be offered on the eShop when they release. I own about 2 dozen retail games for the Wii, and about 40 digital and VC games which are vastly smaller and I consider myself an avid gamer. Good luck in your quest.
Re: Wii U Basic Can Only Store 3GB Of Downloaded Software
Yeah it's funny how the same people whining all over this site about the lack of storage would be whining even louder if Nintendo had announced that the basic set (32GB) would be $350 and the deluxe (256GB) would be $400 or more. You can get way more storage from a $50 USB drive than Nintendo could build into their system at a reasonable cost. They did you a favor. Now stop the complaining.
Re: Talking Point: The Realities of Wii U System Memory Have Become Clear
Yeah, this is hardly news and it's really not as big a deal as people are making it. Keep in mind the XBox 360 and PS3 were both well over the $300 mark at launch for models that included hard drives with just 20GB of storage. Obviously storage sizes have changed since then, but if you're seriously expecting Nintendo to release a console with a high amount of built-in storage and not charge an extra $100 for that, you're living in la-la land.
I already have an external drive I am going to repurpose for Wii U storage on day 1 and anyone serious about puchasing digital titles will want to take care of this sooner rather than later. Nintendo has packed plenty into the system to justify its price tag and have given a reasonable amount of memory for the mainstream consumers who are going to stick mainly to retail games and a handful of digital-only titles from the eShop.
At least they have a custom storage solution ready on day 1 and aren't asking gamers to shell out top dollar for a branded storage medium like Microsoft.
Re: Wii U GamePad Will Not Have Backward Compatibility
Ugh. Dumb dumb dumb. I want this pad compatible with all VC and Wii games so you can play anything not made specifically for the Wii U (and its two screens) on the gamepad by itself. It just makes sense. Doesn't the thing even have a built-in sensor bar for pointing a Wii remote at it? Totally a missed opportunity if they don't rectify this soon.
Re: Guess What? Wii U Discs Have A Rounded Edge
I wouldn't be at all surprised if the rounded edges are part of the anti-piracy measures. If the Wii U can tell the difference between these and normal discs, it can lock itself in Wii mode when reading a normal disc, helping to prevent people from being able to run hacks or Wii U games burned onto another disc format.
Re: Guess What? Wii U Discs Have A Rounded Edge
I am planning on having one game that will never leave the system. If I have my way, all others will be digital.
Re: Review: Johnny Hotshot (3DS eShop)
It sounds like 2 is a generous score for this pile of garbage.
Honestly I'd like to go back to the days when Nintendo demanded more from a game they let onto their systems.
Re: Capcom Hopes To Bring Entire NES Mega Man Series To 3DS Virtual Console
These games would be automatic buys for me. They really need to get them out here in the states.
Re: Father Gender-Bends Link For The Benefit of His Zelda-Loving Daughter
Eh. How about leaving the game alone and telling your daughter that gender doesn't matter, hence in this game the hero happens to be a little boy, while in Metroid you get to play as the universe's most awesome bounty hunter who happens to be female?
Now for the sexist test; Flip the genders. What would people be saying about a parent hacking Tomb Raider to replace Lara Croft with a male character because they didn't want their son to play as a female in a strong, heroic role? I bet you wouldn't be giving them your admiration then. Double standard, indeed.
Re: You'll Need To Update Your Wii U To Play Wii Games
Nintendo will handle this the same way they have on the Wii, by including the updates on the retail discs, and of course subsequent runs of the console will have the latest version preloaded. It's unfortunate that they didn't have these features ready in time to have them loaded on the first-run systems, but my guess is they wanted to just get them into manufacturing quickly to maximize the supply so they hopefully won't run into shortages like with the Wii.
Also, remember the vast majority of people able to purchase a Wii U in the launch window won't be affected by this shortcoming.
@THENAMESNORM
Unfortunately, the games you mentioned are already being printed in large quantities as they're both launch titles (and one is a pack-in game in some regions). If Nintendo had the firmware ready in time for them to go onto those discs, they would just have put it on the system. My guess is you'll have to wait at least a month before firmware is available on the game discs.
Re: Wii to Wii U Data Transfer Details Emerge
@Dodger
I really hope they make this feature available. It seems like a no-brainer to me given that one of the much-touted features is the ability to play games while someone else uses the TV, but Nintendo has made non-sensical (at least to me) decisions in the past, so not holding my breath until they confirm/deny it.
Re: Nintendo Direct Wii U Summary Released by NoA
The name doesn't bother me, but for those of you who it does bother, you do realize there is nothing contractually forcing you to call it Wara Wara Plaza, right? You can just call it "the plaza" or "the Wii U main screen" or "a garbage pail full of brains and yogurt" if it tickles your fancy. The most used option is probably going to circulate around and be used instead of Nintendo's name no matter how hard they try to stop it, after all. Remember where "Wiimote" came from? (Actually that was the Streisand Effect, but whatevs)
The fact that this shows games you don't own that are popular and have an easy-to-reach Buy option available probably means Nintendo will be getting more of my hard-earned cash this time around. Curse you and your clever marketing schemes!
Re: Ubisoft: Wii U Stock Apparently Being Focused on US
Can't really read much into a comment where the appropriate response should be, "No sugar, Sherlock."
Re: Nintendo Teams Up With Disney For "Wii U Showdown"
Well... thanks for your contribution, Disney. I guess.
Hey, at least this will reach the kiddie audience and hopefully lead to system sales, right?
Re: Feature: Nintendo's Presidential Candidates
I wouldn't mind Samus, but I think Zelda is a better fit, having more experience ruling people while not being afraid to get her hands dirty and kick some butt when needed. Samus would probably just respond to crises with a power bomb, and that's just not the kind of candidate we need.
Re: Nintendo Download Shops Offline For Maintenance This Tuesday
Routine maintenance doesn't usually take 7 hours. This is probably an upgrade of some kind, but it's very possible it'll just be some behind-the-scenes work and we won't see anything new yet. Obviously they need to upgrade the eShop at some point to support the new account features. The only question is how much of that upgrade we'll see after tomorrow and how much we'll see later.
Re: Wii U Web Browser Software Specifications Revealed
It'd be cool if you could optionally view the browser just on the gamepad screen while you're playing a game. Obviously it'd still need to pause, in case the game requires the controller screen for some other use, but this way you could pause the game at a location you can't seem to get through and pull up GameFAQs on the pad without leaving the game screen, so you can easily see what the FAQ is talking about. For backwards-compatible games that don't use the screen, this could potentially even be used to let someone browse while you're playing an unrelated game on the screen! (Doubt they'll do it, but it would be quite cool)
Naturally, as I have done with my 3DS on many occassions, I will be using this multitasking feature to pull up the NintendoLife review page for a game when I see something interesting on the eShop.
Re: EA Releases Full Details On FIFA 13's Wii U GamePad Features
EA is not one of my favorite publishers, but I gotta give credit where it's due. (Which is probably to the unnamed developer they gobbled up, but eh....)
It appears that they're certainly taking the gamepad seriously for this first outing and shoving a lot of nice features on there. It's a very real possibility that a gamer might check out a copy of the game on XBox and Wii U, read the features and ask themselves why they would want to pay the same for a lesser experience on the XBox. Times certainly are changing.
On a side-note, I read the item there about touch-screen menu navigation and it blew my mind. It's such a simple thing, but I had not considered how much easier that makes things on console games. On my PC I am used to being able to navigate complex menus easily using a mouse, but now I can do the same thing on the touchscreen without having to use clunky controller navigation. I know, menus, right? But it will just feel so much better having the options right in your lap, as it were.
Re: Miyamoto Puzzled As To Why Anyone Would Want A New F-Zero
On the subject of franchises I'd love to see on the Wii U, how about something in the Eternal Darkness vein? I can only imagine the creative ways they could put the gamepad to use in a horror setting. (ZombiU already demonstrates how much tension you can add just by throwing in an extra screen.)
Re: Miyamoto Puzzled As To Why Anyone Would Want A New F-Zero
F-Zero X was the perfect F-Zero game, IMO. It was able to utilize the power of a true 3D renderer and had a good balance between pretty visuals and simple enough graphics to support the high speed gameplay, so you could focus on staying on the track and slamming your opponents into the walls. F-Zero GX was both too flashy and much faster (seemingly, at least) which led to many cases where you couldn't really tell what the track was going to do or pay any attention at all to the other racers.
I'd love to see Nintendo release another F-Zero title, but I also agree with Miyamoto when he suggests that they've reached the pinnacle of the series and releasing another game that's basically the same thing is not Nintendo's style. If they do go for another one, I hope they simplify it a little bit and focus on the core of what made F-Zero X fun — High-speed tracks with lots of ridiculous stunts and opportunities to foul up your opponents. If they do that and keep the presentation basic enough to actually play, it'll be a great addition to the series.
I agree with SMW about the difficulty. Yeah, there are certainly Nintendo Hard games out there, but F-Zero GX's story mode was plain ridiculous and was coupled with retry delays that made you want to quit playing quite quickly. A game can be ridiculously hard, but if it's easy to quickly retry a stage or section of a level, it doesn't become tedious to do it over and over. See also: Trackmania.
Re: Talking Point: Wii U and the Importance of Backward Compatibility
I was seriously thinking about my answer and then realized I was just playing Donkey Konga on my Wii earlier today.
So, yeah, backwards compatibility is a plus. I'm even a little sad that it won't support Gamecube discs natively, but it probably is better in the long run to just put them on the eShop.
Re: Review: Spot It! Mean Machines (DSiWare)
Looks to be well-executed, but a bit too simple for my tastes. This is the kind of game I expect to see on someone's iPad, struggling in vain to end Nintendo's mobile domination. I'd rather invest more money into something with a tad more depth than "puddle in my driveway after a light rain."
Re: Wii U Web Browser Posts Impressive Benchmark Results
This blows my mind. Console browsers are usually sad, cut-down versions of their PC-version siblings, and Nintendo hasn't exactly made having a feature-rich browser a priority.
Unfortunately, I doubt Nintendo will support all the various plugins required by sites like Youtube, so all that effort spent making it HTML5 compliant is probably not going to be enough for people to switch to using it as their preferred browsing method.
@Ren: That test score has little or nothing to do with speed. It's a rating of how compatible the browser is at handling all of the features of HTML5. Basically they load up a complex page and see if the browser renders it as intended. It's surprising how non-compliant mainstream browsers can be, though Microsoft has made a good deal of effort fixing that since IE6.
It's also worth noting that HTML5 is a new spec that hasn't yet been adopted by most web hosts, so it's perfectly reasonable that current browsers don't support all the bells and whistles yet.
Re: Talking Point: Games That Need Wii U - World of Warcraft
@The_Other_M: MMORPGs do not cause people to throw their lives away any more than Grand Theft Auto causes a child to kill their classmate. If your friend got sucked into MMORPGs enough that he was neglecting the rest of his life, that's an issue he should work on. Don't blame WOW or Blizzard for his addiction.
As far as WOW on the Wii U, I seriously doubt it. At least not in its current form. I could see a more scaled-down MMORPG working quite well; much better than other consoles have been able to do things previously, certainly.
The problem is not just the interface, but that console gamers are usually expecting something more streamlined while MMORPGs and the more hardcore PC games tend to be more complex and deep.
Still, I would be interested in seeing an MMORPG done right on a console. The only attempt I'm aware of is Phantasy Star Online and that failed because they wanted you to hook a freaking keyboard up to your console. A proper console MMORPG would keep the massive world, lots of content and plenty of interpersonal communication and cooperative gameplay while simplifying the controls and gameplay to fit better in the console realm. With the Wii U gamepad, a whole lot of possibilities are certainly opened up. However, I have to categorically say no to the idea of Wiimote + Gamepad control. If you have to put down one controller to pick up another you have failed to provide a good experience.
Re: Talking Point: Games That Need Wii U - World of Warcraft
OK, Minecraft is in no way an MMO. Just sayin'.
Re: Watch: First US Wii U Advert Appears
To the people wanting more info on this, yeah I agree they could have made it a little clearer that they're selling a new console, but come on... A list of games? This is a minute-long TV ad, you're not going to get people to read a bunch of text and even if they did do you really think that'd make them want the system? A commercial is not a place to put a tech demo or go out of your way explaining how things work. The idea is to capture interest in the product so that the viewer will look up the details later, or see it in the store and try one out for themselves or ask questions about it.