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Nintendo Confirms Wii on GC Housing at E3

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the still-some-wiggle-room dept.

kukyfrope writes "Nintendo's PR Manager, Matt Atwood, has confirmed accusations that Wii demo stations at E3 were not running inside the Wii case and instead were running inside Gamecube housing using Wii-spec hardware. 'The Wii hardware we exhibited at E3 2006 was made specifically for the E3 show and is not the final mass-production version. Some of this hardware was cased in Nintendo GameCube housing.'" Update: 05/19 21:08 GMT by Z : Changed 'hardware' to 'housing' in title.

14 of 205 comments (clear)

  1. Oh well, I guess that changes everything by UbuntuDupe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I guess I'm not going to buy a Wii now, because they housed the hardware for the demo inside a GameCube.

    Come on Sony, you can poison the well better than that.

    --
    Apology to Ubuntu forum.
    1. Re:Oh well, I guess that changes everything by exley · · Score: 4, Insightful

      While I agree with the parent's sentiment and those in other posts about this story being irrelevant, is there any evidence that Sony was behind this? If not, then the Sony bashing has officially gotten out of hand, and the parent has no business being modded 'Insightful'. You can count me in with the crowd that's not happy with Sony these days, but c'mon. There are plenty of solid things that we can shit all over Sony for, but the knee-jerk accusations aren't gonna cut it. Or at least, they shouldn't. I must be new here.

    2. Re:Oh well, I guess that changes everything by Reapman · · Score: 3, Insightful

      No doubt... not only that, but wasn't there a fair amount of PS3 bashing because the PS3 final design wasn't completed? Regardless what the Wii looks like i'll be buying it.

  2. uh, so? by bunions · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Do I not get it? Why would anyone care what case they were in?

    --
    there is no need to sign your posts. this isn't usenet. your username is right there above your post. stop it.
    1. Re:uh, so? by cosmotron · · Score: 5, Insightful

      It's just something to try to stir up the water...

      --
      Ryan - http://www.thecosmotron.com/
    2. Re:uh, so? by j00r0m4nc3r · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The Sony FUD machine does.

    3. Re:uh, so? by AudioEfex · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why is this being talked about? Because someone at MS or Sony had their panties in a wad because a) virtually all the mainstream media is talking about from E3 is the Wii, b) the enormously positive reaction to the Wii by the gaming "press", and c) both MS and Sony spokespeople have been heavily quoted as saying that in addition to their respective console, consumers will likely want a Wii as well, so they thought this would cause some minor scandal.

      In this case, it's too little, and too late, for character assasination.

      This is why this will blow away into the nothingness; it's not a big deal to begin with, and it's even less of a deal because of the qualified success the Wii showing at E3 was. Just shows how scared they are because their "hardcore I want 32 buttons to mash in a game that takes 10 hours to learn" crowd is getting smaller by the generation, yet Wii is set to appeal to non-gamers, former-gamers, and existing-gamers is a virtually unlimited potential audience.

      AE

    4. Re:uh, so? by Mistshadow2k4 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't get it either. How is this even a news story? (Note I'm not blaimg Zonk for posting it, rather whoever wrote it and thought this mattered even slightly.) Hell, I don't care if they use a GameCube housing for the final product, let alone the demo. I wouldn't even care if the Wii housing was as butt-ugly as my 9th grade English teacher, what I care about is how well the system works and what games will run on it.

      It makes me wonder if the author didn't write this up in the hope that it would be misinterpreted and make Nintendo look bad, while retaining some journalistic integrity. Hmmm, maybe I do get it after all.

      --
      I dream of a better world... one in which chickens can cross roads without their motives being questioned.
  3. Interesting... by revlayle · · Score: 5, Insightful

    ...but not unexpected for a 5-to-6-months-before release demo.

    It showcased what they wanted it to do - they could have cased in hardened dog shit for all I personally would have cared :)

  4. Accusations? by Xxanmorph · · Score: 5, Insightful

    That makes it sound like they were doing something wrong. Who cares what case it was in if the hardware was the real deal?

    1. Re:Accusations? by Kabuthunk · · Score: 3, Insightful

      As far as I'm understanding, all of the internals... you know, the hardest part by an insurmountable amount... appears to have been complete. They just need to drop it into a new case. Given they have 5+ months to do that, they're probably not too worried.

      They have a half-year to make a plastic box to put around the internals. Not exactly brain surgery compared to designing the... y'know... internals. If it were 100% complete for E3, they could be releasing it extraordinarily shortly afterwards.

      Hell, the best case scenario is that the only thing not completed is the case. If there were massive amounts of work to do on the processor or controllers, then they might be screwed. This amount of incomplete is minimal at best.

      --
      Planet Zebeth - Metroid with a twist
  5. We have a right to be dubious by L-Train8 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    There seems to be accusations of "faking it" at every E3. I guess the industry has brought it on itself, showing stuff like the supposed Madden for Xbox 360 screen shots that were much better than the actual game when it shipped. This stuff has been going on for years and it's no wonder that audiences are wary of being duped by faked demos.

    But 6 months before the console hits the shelves, the only hardware that exists is in prototype versions. It is not suprising that the floor models were put together with duct tape, GameCube cases and whatever else they had on-hand. I would be suprised if the actual Wii games don't look better than what Nintendo had on display at this years E3, as developers have more time to work on games and get them polished.

    --

    Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
  6. odd.... by moosesocks · · Score: 3, Insightful

    That's a really odd choice for nintendo, given the fact that the gamecube is a fairly 'customized' piece of hardware (3 boards, funky controller ports, etc) crammed into a REALLY tight space.

    I would have found it much more likely for them to have been put in some generic grey box or something like that for E3........

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    -- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
  7. Missing the point by cookd · · Score: 3, Insightful

    It looks like everybody is missing the point.

    Accusation: Nintendo doesn't have their Wii hardware ready and is just running the demos on GameCube hardware with a new controller plugged in.

    Fact: Nintendo doesn't have their Wii hardware ready and is just running the demos on GameCube hardware that has been upgraded to Wii specs with a new controller plugged in.

    Difference: Accusation is correct: Nintendo doesn't have final hardware ready yet (no biggie). Accusation is incorrect: Nintendo is just using GameCube hardware for demos and dev kits and hasn't gotten the updated hardware story figured out yet (this would be scary).

    --
    Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.