On Fine-Tuning Wii Controls

MTV Games has a great article looking at how developers are refining Wii controls, now that they've had most of a year to work on them. The game cited is the Wii version of Marvel: Ultimate Alliance; the Wiimote is used to represent Thor's Hammer, Spidey's webshooters, and Wolverine's claws, among other things. From the article: "'Now in some cases people will do something that's not going to work right, and in that case they're probably going to have to adjust the way they do it,' said Chrzanowski, a black Wii development controller in hand. 'But that's a rare case.' He wasn't talking idly. He said a system developed by a Vicarious colleague, Jesse Raymond, a few weeks ago has been crunching the data of dozens of players who have tested the game on the Wii, analyzing the results of requests for players to do 10 swipes in a row or 10 stabs in a row, recognizing which moves the current version of the game fails to recognize as the intended gesture, tweaking the code, checking the pool of data from the gesture trials again for any new misunderstandings, repeat and recode, again and again."

Comments

Pah.

[jb.hl.com]

I can control where my Wii goes perfectly. Don't need no fine tuning here.

(I've stooped to making a urine/Wii joke on Slashdot. This is truly the stuff of suicide notes. :P)

Re:Pah.

[Das Modell]

Stop trying to control everything and just let go! Let go! -- Tyler Durden, Fight Club

Re:Pah.

[jb.hl.com]

HAHAH!

Fuck you, you owe me a new keyboard, this one's all wet, since my mouth decided to stop controlling the gin and tonic in it and start laughing instead. :D

I am in heaven

[UbuntuDupe]

Not only are they going to have lightsabers, but now:

Spidey's webshooters, and Wolverine's claws

Seems there's no limit to the possibilities. You can act out whatever superhero or whatnot fantasy you've had. Hack up zombies with chainsaws holstered to your arms? Have a Wiimote strapped to the back of your wrist to operate like Boba Fett's cord launcher? "Punch enemies" realistically? Have a Wiimote on each limb for a more complex version of DDR that can detect 3D body motions? Why not!

I'm really interested to see what developers will put on the market. (of what they'll let hobbyists do...)

Re:I am in heaven

[Khakionion]

I would love to see some sort of "Gesture Toolkit" for devs that lets you assemble curves with orientation and direction (Bezier vectors, you heard it here first), and a library to detect said curves from input.

Re:I am in heaven

[MBCook]

DDR nothing, I can't wait for Punchout Wii. One in each hand, REAL boxing type moves. You can block, punch, uppercut, jab, etc. That would rule. Also, have you seen the Madden video going around? Neither of those tends to be my kind of game but I'll have to try 'em out anyway.

Re:I am in heaven

['nother poster]

If the pain is more than a minor discomfort it's probably too far.

Re:I am in heaven

['nother poster]

Leisure Suit Larry in the World of the Wiimote Wizards?

Re:I am in heaven

[Rude Turnip]

I'm waiting for a Wiimote-enabled 3D version of Joust, where you have a Wiimote in each hand and have to flap your arms and run around the room. The real value would be in watching someone play the game.

Re:I am in heaven

[7Prime]

Fuck Harry Potter... this would actually make the Wind Waker FUN!!!

Re:I am in heaven

[caffeinatedOnline]

You might want to check out MadCap Boxing in the arcade. You 'wear' 2 gloves (each has some good weight to it) and motion capture captures your moves. I played it at a local arcade here in town, and actually was sweating by the end of the game. Information about it

Re:I am in heaven

[fotbr]

I dunno....look at how DDR did.

Your typical lives-on-mcdonalds-takeout-200lb-10-year-old-gamer , maybe. "Most" video game people? Don't think so.

It's like the DS.

[Lave]

Initially, with it's relatively weak graphics, and the difficulty for developers to craft new games that utilised the touch screen the DS looked to flaunder next to the much stronger graphical power of the PSP. However the unoriginal content and expensive disk medium that was crippled with bad load times (let alone battery life issues) held the PSP back.

To me that sounds prophetic. I think the Wii will get a bad reception - based on the graphical inequality of the software and the (percieved) difficulties 3rd parties will have utilising the Remote. But as that experience grows believe developers will be able to create a catalogue of games that can't be acquired anywhere else - and the Wii will really shine.

Re:It's like the DS.

[Klowner]

And they're already talking 20+ titles available at launch, and I'm pretty sure all of them are using the Wiimote in interesting ways. Plus I won't have to sell my car to get one.

Re:It's like the DS.

[grumbel]

I'm pretty sure all of them are using the Wiimote in interesting ways.

Some will use the Wiimote in interesting ways, but all of them, no way. I wouldn't be suprised if half the launch titles turn out to be rather shitty normal-gameplay games quick&dirtily adopted to the Wiimote. For example Tony Hawk Downhill Jam only uses the Wiimote as analogstick replacement, not for anything exciting, which might mean that it actually plays worse with Wiimote then with a normal controller (Wiimote doesn't auto-center like analogstick, so controls could get pretty imprecise).

We will for sure see lots of interesting games on the Wii, but we will for sure also see a lot of bad ones. DS had its fair share of junk and the touchscreen is a lot easier to manage then a 3D Wiimote.

Re:It's like the DS.

[poot_rootbeer]

However the unoriginal content and expensive disk medium that was crippled with bad load times (let alone battery life issues) held the PSP back.

I don't think I agree that a primary reason for the DS's phenomenal success has been the relative disappointment that the PSP has been. I think it's perfectly valid to measure the DS on its own merits.

I wonder -- if Sony had not developed the PSP, would Nintendo have bothered releasing the DS at all? Or would they have been content to eke a few more years of life out of the Gameboy Advance platform? In that regard, perhaps Sony does deserve some of the credit for the DS.

Re:It's like the DS.

[gstoddart]

I think the Wii will get a bad reception - based on the graphical inequality of the software and the (percieved) difficulties 3rd parties will have utilising the Remote.

You could be right, but I'm inclined to think the buyers of the Wii will be the shiney-graphics be-damned type

Over the years, I've become increasingly furstrated with games. I'm getting old (well, pushing 40), and I don't have the ability to actually operate all of the button sequences and stuff needed to control a game anymore. I don't get much enjoyment out of them; they just frustrate me and make me feel I wasted my money.

I'm hoping the gameplay with the Wii will be all I'm hearing it might be. And that it comes out of the gate with a good selection of fun titles to play. If that happens, it could well make the Wii a very successful system. I've been thinking of going to a Nintendo console for a while now, and the Wii might just accelerate that move. My PS2 has already been relegated to the almost never used category, and I'd kind of like a replacement with some titles I can just pick and play for anywhere between 20 minutes and a few hours depending on my mood.

I guess we'll just have to wait and see what the initial titles look/play like, and how well received they are. Personally, I think the XBox and the PS3 are going to get the 'need more graphics' type of gamer, whereas the Wii is going to get the younger/family/casual gamer market more.

Hell, I'd take a friggin "bop the weasel" (*) game with a Wii controller, it could be fun.

Cheers

(*) And I don't mean the Slashdot naughty interpretation of bop the weasel, I mean whack-a-mole. =)

Re:It's like the DS.

[MuNansen]

I disagree it won't be for "hardcore" gamers. I think it's just for smart gamers. I've played half a dozen games at the competitive level, played almost every MMOG in existence, and been playing most my life. I'm tired-as-hell of the arms race of graphics > gameplay getting all the press. I don't think it's actually made games worse, as there was never a time where the majority of games were worth buying, it's just shifted the attention.

I could care less about the PS3. They obviously don't understand gamers, nor respect them. There will be some good games, but I can get 10x as many good games on my DS and PC, and the Wii is the only console that really excites me (though since I'm joining BioWare, might have to get an Xbox and play Mass Effect...not like that's a bad thing).

PS3 isn't for the "true" or "hardcore" gamers, it's for the sucker gamers. A good Madden game or two, or the next Final Fantasy, isn't worth $700 when you can have just as much fun for a lot less money. The only people that NEED the PS3 are the ones that NEED to follow MTV-inspired franchises. Wannabe-gangsta teens are NOT the true "gaming crowd." They didn't start the gaming craze, and they're not the heart of it. They're just the deep pockets that Sony can manipulate with marketing.

Zelda: TLP & Red Steel

[ShadowsHawk]

It will be interesting to see the difference between a Nintendo game and an Ubisoft game. I expect that it will shed a bit of light on how well the 3rd party studios handle a new style of development.

If the release games are good, I can't wait...

[dividedsky319]

If the release games for the Wii are good and use the Wii-mote fairly well, I can't wait to play the games that come out one or two years down the line.

Of course with new technology there's a period where the developers are learning how to fully utilize the new features... look at the DS.

Take Castlevania, for example. Dawn of Sorrow's annoying "seal" you had to draw after killing a boss was pointless and just a way to say "hey, we used the touch screen!" But once they learned that for their particular style of game, the advantage of the DS is in its two screens and not its touch screen, they did away with the seal system for the sequel.

It's definitely possible that games at release may go overboard with the Wii-mote, but as time goes on developers will learn how to best utilize the Wii's features.

Re:If the release games are good, I can't wait...

[KDR_11k]

The third, rarely spoken about use of the touchscreen is to tell helper monsters which enemies to target...

Can't Wait to see the cheat codes

[Anonymous Coward]

After playing through a game it is often fun to fire up gamefaqs and see just what stupid things you can do with cheat codes, now I just can't wait to see how you input them!

"Ok, to turn on god mode you need to hold down "B" and "Z" draw a pentacle, a hexagon, and then flip the controller back and forth 5 times"

hehe

Re:Can't Wait to see the cheat codes

[Khyber]

My head a'splode thinking of trying to do Konami's new version of "up up down down left right left right b a start" already. I have the feeling I'd end up looking like I'm playing with myself the wrong way.

Re:Can't Wait to see the cheat codes

[KDR_11k]

"Pause the game, draw a left-hand pentagram with the remote and say into the speaker 'I pledge my soul to the dark lord so that he may grant my wishes'"

And what's more...

[RyoShin]

I can't for the life of me remember which article stated it, but I read an article talking about the differences in multi-platform games. Apparently, on the 360/PS3, you can map certain actions to certain buttons, but you never have full immediate access to all moves for all characters.

With the Wii, where every movement in a different direction is a mappable button unto itself, you have immediate access to every move for every character based on the motions.

Too bad Nintendo's so family oriented...

[murphotronic]

I'm sure the porn industry could do quite well with interactive motion controllers...