Nintendo Considers WFC A Success

Eurogamer reports that at 200,000 users, Nintendo considers the WFC a success. From the article: "Nintendo has announced that more than 200,000 unique visitors have made use of its new Wi-Fi Connection service since last month's launch, logging nearly 3 million connections around the globe. Wi-Fi Connection allows Nintendo DS owners to play titles such as Mario Kart DS and Tony Hawk DS online, via either Wi-Fi hotspot, wireless router or a special USB dongle."

Comments

Re:In other news,

[tyagiUK]

Interesting that Sony predicts the touch screen of the DS to be a "gimmick", when Nintendo's product is, in my opinion, currently leading in terms of its software library. Since PSP's launch earlier this year, there has been a handful of high quality titles released for it (Wipeout, Lumines, GTA, for example). On many forums, however, it is common to read about people being stuck for choice between the flow of good titles for the DS (Osu! Tatake! Ouendan, Phoenix Wright, Animal Crossing, Mario Kart, Castlevania, Advance Wars, for example). This, coupled with a highly successful Internet gaming service that "Just Works (tm)", and Nintendo have proven that they are far from irrelevant in the handheld market. In terms of direct competition with the PSP, perhaps they are irrelevant, but that's not through inability to compete, but because they've created a new market with the DS in which they're the leader.

Experiences with Nintendo Wi-Fi

[MilenCent]

I own two of the three Wi-Fi aware games, Mario Kart DS and Animal Crossing: Wild World. Here's my impressions:

Mario Kart DS:
Although only twenty of the thirty-two included tracks are playable, and despite the fact that gameplay chances subtly while playing over Wi-Fi (you can't drag items behind you and karts can't bump each other about much regardless of weight), online Mario Kart is surprisingly playable. You can either choose to play against randomly-selected opponents in your region, around the world, "rivals" with a similar win/loss record to you, and "friends" who you've traded friend codes with.

It's important to note that, so far, no Nintendo Wi-Fi game allows for you to play with specific people you've not already traded a friend code with. There exist a good number of sites on the web that allow you to trade these codes (Zonk offered his own here a couple of weeks ago), but even if you've traded (and BOTH players must have the other's code to count), you can't be sure to get that specific friend if you choose a Friends game. I can understand they did this to take care of matters of griefing, and also because of the complete lack of a communication lobby. I'm torn on this approach: it'd sure be nice to be able to play against specific opponents sometimes, but it does make setting up a match very, very easy, as the service takes care of all matchmaking automatically.

It's worth saying that there are players who have decided on off-color or even downright obscene player handles, as well as choosing pictures of genitalia for their kart emblem. So far, it's uncertain what Nintendo plans to do about this, if anything. Once I read on their forums that the proper response to these forms of abuse was to email someone at Nintendo, but later it seems that statement was retracted. Official word so far seems to be that this is the reason for the CYA "Experience may change during online play" message below the ERSB symbol on the splash screens, an attitude that, depending on your view of the matter, is either very irresponsible or surprisingly enlightened. Nintendo is able to track all activity by each DS' MAC address, of course, so it's possible that they could outright ban players for abuses, but it's uncertain if or when they'll do that. It's worth saying that so far, the majority of players I've encountered have no such issues, implying that either fairly few gamers are doing this or those who do it are quickly, quietly sucked into the void.

A bigger issue with the service is definitely my own fault: there are some SERIOUSLY sharp drivers on the online Mario Kart circuit, and despite the essential randomness introduced by the item system, driving skill still matters a lot. Unlike in some past incarnations of Mario Kart (I'm looking at YOU, MK64!), drivers who are behind receive no artificial catch-up speed boosts here; all of the balancing comes from the item system. (Karts also have an "Items" statistic now, which influences how often you get the good stuff.)

If you have any illusions about your skill in driving cartoon vehicles, they will quickly be shattered the first time you go up against a driver who's mastered "snaking," which is a technique for executing drift boosts on straightaways. Drivers with extremely high degrees of accomplishment in single-player mode get stars above their name during races, up to three, but you can be sure when you find someone with even one star on their handle that you're in for a tough battle. Similarly, you'll encounter all kinds of strategy online, including players who'll get a Blue Shell and sit on it until just before you cross the finish line. But even in that case, it's balanced by the fact that the driver will probably have to have foregone many other items in order to hold onto that shell. This is the best-balanced Mario Kart, arguably, since the original, and it may be even better than that.

While we're on the topic of shooting shells at your opponents, the sorriest omission in Mario Kart DS is the fact that its