Slashdot Mirror
Wii 2 Unlikely For 2011, Maybe In 2012
An anonymous reader writes "As discussed on Slashdot earlier this year, the lack of a next-generation Wii may be hurting Nintendo. That doesn't seem to concern the company's US chief, Reggie Fils-Aime, who said this week that a Wii 2 might not appear until 2012. He wants to sell a few million more consoles before a successor is launched. So, no Wii 2 for 2010 or 2011 — meanwhile, the PS3 and Xbox consoles get motion control support and other content enhancements. What does that mean for the success of Nintendo's gaming console business? Has the innovator been out-innovated due to a sluggish product roadmap?"
The Wii only started losing steam this past year, and they still sell boatloads of them every month. Granted, it's a much smaller boat than it was before, but they are still moving units. Even though the current generation of consoles are starting to directly impact the potential complexity of games, they still have a bit of life left in them...Wii included. Here's to hoping that Nintendo focuses more on the hardware this time. Don't get me wrong, there have been some amazing games released for the Wii (Muramasa: The Demon Blade being one of the better ones), but I'd like to see more emphasis on gaming prowess rather than a focus on the "general" market.
Not that I expect that to happen; Nintendo is a business, after all...
Living With a Nerd
Why would they bother? Microsoft and Sony are skipping a new generation of consol in favor of adding motion control to existing systems. Even with a year's delay,Nintendo will beat Microsoft and Sony to the next generation console. They still have good motion control and can draw from the Wii as well as Kinect for a new generation. Nintendo is in excellent shape.
The Wii's motion controls were evolutionary, not revolutionary.
Nintendo obviously believed the motion controls were revolutionary - the Wii codename was revolution. Look inside the battery compartment of the Wiimote and you'll still see the code RVL-003.
In any case, it did revolutionise gaming input in a tangible way and brought a whole new demographic into gaming as a result.
What was it? The R&D department for the Wii was about 5-7 people and their system was based off old technology slapped on a Gamecube. I'm not dismissing the success of the Wii, but perhaps their R&D is not for hardware, but for marketing. The casual gamer is a goldmine, that's what makes Nintendo so successful.
I was under the impression that their reasons for sticking with the older hardware had nothing to do with keeping the price down, but rather a way to keep things more familiar for developers. Since they were going to have to be learning an entirely new control scheme, Nintendo didn't want devs to have to deal with complex new hardware as well ("hardware" independent of the control mechanisms, obviously.) Now that developers (kind of) have a handle on the motion controls, Nintendo can give them more powerful innards to work with.
Standard "this is only my opinion, I have no basis for any of it" boilerplate applies.
Living With a Nerd
Aren't you more likely to need to extend the living room if you go with the Kinect? The optimal distance from the sensor is 6' for single player, 8' for two player (and that's not including the space you need to leave around yourself so you don't bump into things). I think that will be the single biggest issue with Kinect - the technology seems great and there is definitely potential there if it works as promises, but particularly here in Europe, just having the physical space to play is a problem.
The five-year-rule is a long-standing tradition for console generations going back to the Atari days (even through several recessions and the console "collapse" of 1982). Both the 360 and PS3 are starting to show their age at this point (especially the 360, which doesn't even have a blu-ray drive), with no new console generation on the horizon. The 360 is now 5 years old and the PS3 is 4, and neither has even announced a new console generation. I'm tired of my console dropping further and further behind PC's, while all MS and Sony want to do is release lame Wii knockoff controllers. I'm tired of consoles that aren't powerful enough to handle MMO's, require multiple disc swaps to support the latest games, and slow to a crawl with modern high res textures.
Screw Nintendo, and screw Move and Kinect. Give me a new console generation!
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
For you it turned out to be a gimmick, for me it was (and still is) the only console I have in my house. It's not that I can't afford a PS3 or 360 it's that I can get everything else I want on my PC, so I do. I look forward to Wii2 or whatever they'll call it.