Wii News From the Beginning to Now
Nintendo has become the master of releasing news information, especially for its newest console, the Wii. Rumors abound about an October 6th launch, as Nintendo sits back and watches the Wii come to the forefront of gaming news.
I thought it'd be interesting, then, to take a step back and to remember how we got to this point. The following is a comprehensive list of all the Nintendo Wii news, dating from 2004 to today.
· May 11th, 2004: News surfaces about the Gamecube’s successor, which for now is codenamed “Revolution”. The conference, however, is focused on Nintendo’s next console, the DS, along with the latest Gamecube and Gameboy Advance games.
· December 23rd 2004: The Japanese magazine “Shuukan Diamond”, a highly revered news source since 1913, reported that the Nintendo Revolution controller will not feature a D-Pad and the A and B button combo that has marked every Nintendo controller. It also reported that we would see the Revolution in the next E3 Expo.
· March 4th, 2005: Nintendo President Iwata states that their new console will be designed to attract non gamers, much like the DS. He says that this may alienate third party developers, or actually draw them closer to the console. He also states that the console will be revealed at the 2005 E3 Expo.
· March 10th, 2005: At the Game Developers Conference (GDC), Iwata announces that their next generation console will have Wi-Fi and be backwards compatible with Gamecube games.
· May 12th, 2005: Perrin Kaplan, Nintendo’s vice president of Corporate affairs, says that the Revolution will be a very sleek system, and would be no more than the thickness of three DVD cases. The system will also play standard DVD’s, bringing the Revolution into the mainstream of video game consoles. It is also announced that the controllers will be wireless.
· E3 2005 (May 17th-May 19th 2005): The Revolution is said to be up to three times more powerful than the Gamecube, will be able to play NES, SNES, and N64 games via its online catalog, the next Smash Bros. game is confirmed for the system’s launch, and a new Anima Crossing is confirmed.
· June 2005: Nintendo confirms that the Revolution will not support HD, a move that upset many Nintendo fans. The revolutionary controller begins to really spark people’s attention, especially since Nintendo is revealing nothing about it, other than saying that it will change the way we game.
· July 2005: Nintendo’s new philosophy begins to unfold. Miyamoto explains that the Revolution will be a console that “everyone can enjoy”, and that the focus is on the quality of the games, not the graphics. It is also noted that fewer buttons and analog sticks is a certainty.
· August 2005: Metroid Prime 3 is confirmed to be the end of the Metroid trilogy, bringing closure and promising to be the best of the series, taking advantage of the Revolution’s unique controller.
· September 15th, 2005: In what has become one of the watershed moments in Nintendo history, the Revolution’s controller was revealed. It came into full view in the first few seconds of the two minute teaser trailer, and it instantly had fans both excited with fervent anticipation, and disappointed with utter rage. Some praised Nintendo’s innovative path, others marked it the end of the company as we knew it. Either way, Nintendo was coming back into the spotlight in the video gaming world.
· September 2005: Iwata states that the Revolution will be weaker in the graphics department when compared to Sony’s PS3 and Microsoft’s Xbox 360, but is nevertheless confident about the new controller and its myriad of possibilities.
· October 2005: Probably the most significant news is that the DS’s Wi-Fi service, which was debuting in November 2005, would be the testing grounds for the Revolution’s Wi-Fi service. Therefore, the online service of the DS would provide us with an idea of what to expect from the Revolution’s online service.
· November 2005: Masahiro Sakurai is confirmed as the director and game designer of the next Super Smash Bros. game. The Revolution will also feature a controlling feature, whereby parents can monitor what there children play.
· December 2005: Ubisoft reveals that it’s making an ambitious first person shooter for the Revolution. Other third party developing companies begin praising the Revolution’s controller, such as EA. Meanwhile, Nintendo continues to tour the world, letting famous people and developers play the Revolution demos.
· January 2006: Iwata hints towards a pre-Thanksgiving launch date; several third party developers, such as Ubisoft, Capcom, and SEGA, talk about what game they’re going to develop for the Revolution.
· February 2006: It’s announced that Iwata will be delivering the keynote speech at the upcoming Game Developer’s Conference (GDC) on March 23rd, 2006 in San Jose, California.
· March 23rd, 2006: While GDC disappointed many Nintendo fans, there were some noteworthy news announced, probably the most since the Tokyo Game Show of last year. TurboGraphix-16 and Sega Genesis games will be available on the Nintendo Wii’s Virtual Console, which means popular titles such as Bonk and Sonic the Hedgehog 2 will be available. Other than that, Iwata continued to talk about the state of the video game market and the company’s innovative path.
· April 2006: Just a month before E3, and the video game world is buzzing with anticipation. Developers are announcing the games they are making for the Revolution, such as Spike (Dragonball Z: Budokai Tenkaichi 2), and a Bob Ross painting game by AGFRAG. E3 is looking more and more promising every day for Nintendo fans.
· April 27th, 2006: Nintendo also made a startling move by changing the console’s name to “Wii”. Many critics called Nintendo out on the seemingly feminine name change, such as the popular web-comic Penny-Arcade. Still, Nintendo defended it’s name change, saying that the name “Wii”, which would be a universal name understood by everyone around the world, represented Nintendo’s new mission to bring gamers and non gamers alike together.
· May 9th, 2006: To really get people riled up for E3, Nintendo releases some information on the Wii. The Pre-E3 Nintendo Conference, which started at 9:30am on the West Coast and 12:30 pm on the East Coast (and was aired live in the Nintendostore in New York City, which I was lucky enough to attend). For the first time, actual game footage of Wii games was shown. The following games were shown in a relatively brief video, though it was enough to satisfy Nintendo fans everywhere:.. Read more
Alleged Nintendo Wii Specs And UK Pricing
I was initially willing to overlook this new piece of Wii speculation, which supposedly revealed the full list of specifications for Nintendo's next-gen gizmo. But since the story debuted on MaxConsole a couple of days ago, they updated their article with even more "facts" revealed by their trusty "anonymous Wii developer" (gotta love those guys). Now the list contains even more technical details about Wii's Broadway CPU, its Hollywood GPU and the External Main Memory, in addition to their previous general overview over the console's hardware, optical disc drive and control systems. Well, allegedly anyway.
Here's a brief extract from it:
- Nintendo Wii's 'Broadway' CPU operates at 729MHZ with a maximum bandwith of 1.9gbyte/sec.
- Nintendo Wii's 'HollyWood' GPU is clocked at 243MHZ, the internal memory of it includes 3mb of embedded graphics memory and 24megabytes of high speed main memory.
- 64megabytes of GDDR3 (MEM2) as the external main memory. Just like the internal memory, it can be accessed from the CPU and GPU with a maximum bandwidth of 4gbytes/sec and can also store programs in the MEM2.
- The GPU of the Wii is identical to the GC's but it is on average 1.5X faster.
- Opitcal Disc Drive (ODD) supports single and dual layer Wii disks, discs eject with software or button and the maximum read speed is the equivalent of DVDx6.
- Two main disc types supported the single sided 12cm single sided 4.7gb and the double sided 8.51 GB. Nintendo GC discs also supported. Some of the capacity of the discs are used by the system and games can not use full disc space.
- Internal non-removable 512MB flash memory used to storage game save data and downloadable content thus eliminating the Need for a memory card.
- The Wii controller features; Direct Pointing Device, Three axis accelerometer, Wii power button (remotely turn console on/off), buttons, wireless connectivity, indicator LED's, rumble, battery powered (two AA alkaline batteries) and ability to connect extension unit.
- The Wii controller supports three types of operations; by itself, with a nunchuk extension or with a classic controller. Classic controllers will ship to developers during August 2006.
There's plenty more where that came from, so if you're buying into that "anonymous Wii developer" thing, be sure to check out the full list.
As for the Wii's release date and pricing details, the latest rumour comes from a UK retailer who slapped a £149.99 price tag for the Nintendo Wii, and a release date set for October 15, "subject to change without notice".
And finally, Kotaku has an overcrowded Wii image of Virtual Console games. They say "it's a promotional illustration for the Nintendo Wii Virtual Console, presumably featuring characters from all the games that will be released in emulated form". Worth a look.
Source: http://www.playfuls.com/news_6440_Alleged_Nintendo_Wii_Specs_And_UK_Pricing.html
Games Wii Want to See
Games. We want them. We want to see them. We want to play them. Some of us even want to hug them. Yet there are a number of games we've been wanting for years that, for one reason or another, just haven't materialized. The following is a list of some games and franchises we'd like on store shelves. The list mingles rich speculation with key facts to highlight games we may or may never see. On Wii.
Racing with Speed
Some may recall at the 2000 Space World in Tokyo, Japan, Nintendo showcased a short video demonstration of a racing game for its then newly-unveiled GameCube console. The demo opened with a high-polygon Dodge Viper racing along at 60 frames per second. The screen began to fill with one car after another, eventually reaching a total of 12 appearing on-screen at once. It was rumored then that Martin Hollis and Nintendo Technology Development, a hardware division in Nintendo's Redmond, WA, headquarters, were responsible for the technical demonstration. When Hollis left to form his own studio Zoonami six months later, the rumor of the game followed him. Zoonami responded to these murmurings saying, "We've also seen claims that we're making a Gran Turismo clone, and that the car demo shown at Space World for the GameCube launch was done by us. False, all of them."
Now, just last week, we had Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo of America VP of Sales and Marketing, reveal during a marketing campaign at the Nintendo World Store that the Wii console would see an exciting racing game. He said, "We're going to show a racing game at E3 where you use the core controller in a very different way." Could this be the same game?
Icarus and The Wings of Time
Kid Icarus Retro Studios
A nod to LifeMeter for the artwork. Released in 1987, Kid Icarus weaved a modern mythos based loosely on ancient Greek Mythology. Medusa the Goddess of Darkness had overthrown Angel Land's peaceful ruler Parthena, the Goddess of Light, and imprisoned her. Parthena's only hope lie in the young angel Pit who was trapped in the underworld when Medusa's armies attacked. Armed with the magical bow Parthena sent him with the last of her power, Pit was faced with the daunting challenge of escaping the underworld and rescuing her from Medusa's clutches and restoring peace to Angel Land.
Using the original Metroid's game engine, Kid Icarus featured similar game play elements that ranged from shooting enemies to collecting the many items he would eventually need to defeat Medusa. With its solid game play it is now considered a classic by many, however it wasn't always held in such high esteem. Instead, it was initially over-shadowed by many of Nintendo's other now famous franchises, including its game engine's benefactor, Metroid. And aside from a few hardcore fans, Icarus has been long forgotten by Nintendo and gamers alike.
Although Pit has had many cameo appearances in games that range from Tetris to Super Smash Bros. Melee, there was only one sequel; the rare Kid Icarus: Myths and Monsters for the Game Boy. Without an appearance in almost 20 years, the sole reason for wanting a sequel to this long forgotten title is nostalgia: pure and simple nostalgia. Nevertheless, would it not be coming "full circle" if Nintendo used the Metroid Prime engine to deliver us a new Icarus? Read more...
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