Nintendo explains why Wii U GamePad isn’t multi-touch

Some prospective Wii U buyers were hoping Nintendo would redesign the controller so that multi-touch functionality would be integrated. As we found out yesterday, however, nothing had changed.

You might be wondering why Nintendo went down this path. NOA Senior Director of Corporate Communications Charlie Scibetta explained the decision in an interview with GameTrailers.

Scibetta said:

“The new screen is not multi-touch. Well, with the DS certainly it’s not multi-touch and people have really enjoyed that interface and have found it sufficient for their needs for gaming. If you add something like multi-touch, you do up the cost, and so we’re trying to strike the right balance between the robust set of features and capabilities for the hardware, but also make it affordable to people.”

You can listen to Scibetta’s response in GameTrailers’ video interview here (3:50 mark).