Nintendo talks Wii U screen transferring, controller range, lack of controller name, more online, and much more
Nintendo of America PR director Mark Franklin on whether developers are required to use the screen transfer feature in every game…
“We’re not making any prerequisites to any of the developers to say ‘you have to do this, you have to do that.’ What we’re showing at this year’s show is just the possibilities. That’s just an example. Certainly, that’s a possibility.
Franklin on how easy it is for developers to implement the screen transfer feature…
“I’m not going to get into the technical side, but it’s certainly up to the developers to make that choices. We’ve shown what’s possible and now it’s up to the developers to come up with content.”
Franklin on the range of the controller..
“We’re not talking about range, but the vision is that the controller resides in the living room. That’s where the central entertainment is going to be anyway. You’ve got your TV and you’ve got your new controller. And just imagine the Chase Mii experience, where you’ve got four buddies on your Wii remotes and one guy on your new controller, but you’re all gathered in the same room having that experience–two different experiences but sharing in the experience. That’s the vision.”
Franklin on whether the Wii U can have multiple controller connected…
“At this year’s E3, we’re just showing this one experience and not really talking beyond that, which is just the one controller, plus up to four Wii remotes. We are showing specific experiences along those lines–you’ve got Chase Mii, Battle Mii. They all provide a different scenario. We’ve got a true, social multiplayer experience versus a single-player experience versus a multiplayer experience but two people getting two very different experiences in Battle Mii.
Again, showing off the possibilities of what the system can do, what the new controller can do, and seeing what developers can come up with.”
Franklin on whether the Wii U controller has a name…
“Right now, we’re just calling it the new controller. Don’t have another name for it yet.”
Franklin on backwards compatibility with Wii/GameCube…
“Yes, backwards compatible. Just one generation. You can have Wii software and Wii devices, so your Wii Remotes, Wii Remote Plus, Classic Controllers. […] No Wavebird. [laughs]”
Franlin on whether you could theoretically control the Wii U interface with just a Wii Remote…
“It’s so early in the process right now that, again, the thing that we’re showing right now is having the new controller, the wireless new controller interface with the system, and having the Wii Remote interface with the sensor bar. There’s also a sensor bar on the new controller, so your Wii remotes could read off of that… We haven’t talked about any examples, but the capability is there, so that the Wii Remotes could read off of your new controller. What that means [is] there could maybe be a game that is just on that new controller, but we haven’t discussed anything like that yet.
Franklin on how long third-parties have known about the hardware…
“We don’t talk about timing like that, but we did announce the system earlier than E3, and so development kits have been out there to all the major developers.”
Franklin on how the 3DS interacts with Wii U…
“Mr. Iwata announced on stage something I’m really excited about. Mr. Sakurai [is] one, making a new Smash Bros. game and two, there’s going to be cross-platform compatibility between the Nintendo 3DS and the new system. […] There’s no more details other than that, but the prospect of being able to have some experiences shared on two different devices with the same game is exciting. Smash is a huge game, so you can imagine what kind of possibilities could come up with having that on Nintendo 3DS and the new controller.”
Franklin on whether there have been conversations with Epic Games about Unreal Engine 3…
“Nothing to announce on that. We’re not really talking about the technical specifications or the behind-the-scenes engines that are running the system or anything like that. What we want to focus on, and what consumers have continued to look at, especially with Nintendo products, is they want to see what the experience is like.”
Franklin on whether this is the last we’ll hear about Wii U until next E3…
“It’s hard to say right now. We just announced it, so that’s what we’re focused on it. We want to make sure that people have time on the system, that they get a chance to experience the unique opportunity that the system offers, so that’s what we’re focused on right now. In terms of next steps, that’ll come. We’ll be figuring that out in the weeks and months ahead.”
Franklin on the Wii U disc format…
“It’s going to be a high-density disc that’s a proprietary format. It’ll be a high-density disc format, but we don’t have anything to share besides that.”
Franklin on Wii U storage…
“We’ll have SD cards, but we’ll also have USB slots. Yeah, theoretically (can use a hard drive).”
Franking on whether a developer could just use the Wii remotes and not the Wii U controller…
“It’s going to be up to the developers to make those kinds of decisions. There’s tons of possibilities. It’s going to be up to them to figure out what those possibilities are going to be.”
Franklin on whether we can expect online to be on par with Xbox Live and PlayStation Network…
“We see Wii U as a flexible system. It’s not a one-size-fits-fall. It’s not a centralized system. What John [Riccitiello, Electronic Arts] was describing [at the press conference] was his vision. We’ll work with third-parties to understand what the opportunities are, and I think what’s going to drive maybe the best examples are individual approaches, the best of class individual approaches both from third-party and from Nintendo. John was just referring to what he thought might happen.”
