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More Wii Remote Questions Answered
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Wii,
After ComputerAndVideogames ran down an extended preview of the Wii remote, there were still some lingering questions. Now, a few of those questions are explored. ComputerAndVideogames tackled battery life and power for the Wii controller; Nintendo believes that the remote should last 60 hours without the pointing function, 30 hours with. ComputerAndVideogames also discusses the pointing capabilities of the remote, saying that the remote doesn’t function as a light gun, but instead operates like a virtual mouse. They don’t rule out this functionality, but it was not present in any of the games tested. Other topics raised include calibration of the controller, replication of motion in games, and the sensor bar. While not as detailed as the previous Wii remote preview, at least some new questions are answered.
Read More 
| ComputerAndVideogames
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Ubisoft To Charge $19.99 For Big Hunk Of Plastic
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Driving, Hardware, Mods/Hacks, Nintendo, Ubisoft, Wii,
Ubisoft’s steering wheel controller for the Wii, essentially a circular frame for the Wii remote, will be included free with two of its launch titles. However, gamers that would like to buy this big piece of molded plastic separately will have to pay $19.99 as reported by GameSpot. Given that there are no electronics in the wheel “add-on” it seems likely that an enterprising third-party could do something very similar for much cheaper.
Read More | GameSpot
Rumor: Toys ‘R’ Us Pre-orders Start October 29
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Rumors, Wii,
A Toys “R” Us employee who is a member of the Cheap Ass Gamer forums has posted information about what are supposed to be the pre-order plans for the toy retailer. Supposedly $50 down will get you a place in line, and pre-orders are planned to start the new holiday Big Book arrives. According to the post, this should be Sunday, October 29th. Apparently, the store’s relationship with Nintendo continues – the poster says that Toys “R” Us will be the official launch partner for the Wii. Also, each store was reported to be getting a huge allocation; the chain supposedly will have more total consoles for pre-order than GameStop. If the numbers of consoles available for pre-order are true, gamers should be able to hit up their local Toys “R” Us on the day that tickets become available without having to camp out. None of this information has been officially confirmed, of course, but the poster’s history does have some insight into previous Toys “R” Us stores.
Read More | Cheap Ass Gamer
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Analysts Talk Latest NPD Data
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Nintendo DS, PlayStation 3, Xbox, Xbox 360,
The latest NPD data showed strong September sales growth; 38% over 2005. Nintendo and the DS showed strong growth, and the “next generation” transition doesn’t seem to have hurt the industry as much as expected. But hidden in the NPD data are some interesting points that various analysts have started to dissect. GameDaily reports on analysis from Michael Pachter of Wedbush Morgan Securities, and Deutsche Bank analyst Jeetil Patel. Pachter sees the PS2 growth as a good sign, with software sales up 12 percent compared to last year. But the original Xbox has been fading fast. As one looks at the numbers, it appears that the Xbox 360 is completely cannibalizing the original Xbox user base. The Xbox 360 seems to be pushing better than expected software sales, a good thing for Microsoft.
Still, things don’t appear to be completely rosy in the Xbox 360 camp. Jeetil Patel feels like the Xbox 360 is underperforming. Tracking the Xbox 360 versus the original Xbox’s sales path seems to indicate that the Xbox 360 has moved fewer net units than the original Xbox at this point in the console life cycle; the lack of units during Microsoft’s holiday launch last year really set the company back. In addition, NPD data has the total Xbox 360 sell through at approximately 2.7 million units. Japan adds only a fraction to that number, with well under 200,000 units sold through in that territory. An optimistic projection for the Xbox 360 in the rest of the world might match the US total. At this point, it is starting to look like Microsoft’s projections of a 10 million unit head start by the time the Playstation 3 launches was extremely aggressive. With probably just over six million Xbox 360 consoles moved worldwide to date, Microsoft would have to nearly double their worldwide sales in October and November to match their goals before Sony’s November launch of the Playstation 3.
Read More | GameDaily BIZ
Nintendo Further Clarifies Wii Sensor Bar Sun Issues
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Wii,
Nintendo’s recent unclear “clarification” of the Wii’s sensitivity to sunlight to 1up left something to be desired. Kikizo pressed a little harder, and got a company representative to admit that the Wii sensor bar can be affected by head-on exposure to sunlight, causing interference. Of course, if the sensor bar is directly facing sunlight then the television that the console is connected to would likely be affected in the same manner. So, it looks like the sun will kill the Wii sensor bar, but only in situations where the sun shines directly into the IR sensors.
Read More | Kikizo
EB Games Canada: Wii Pre-Orders Require $200 Canadian
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Corporate News, Nintendo, Wii,
While US gamers can start lining up to pre-order their Wii consoles tomorrow with only $50 in their pocket, it looks like Canadian gamers are going to have to lay out a little more. Not only do Canadian gamers have to wait until Monday for their pre-orders, but those pre-orders will require a $200 Canadian, unless they have $50 worth of stuff to trade. While this offer isn’t nearly as screwed up as the limited pre-order program in Hawaii, it does highlight the massive profit-taking enterprise that is the GameStop / EB Games software trade-in program. GameStop’s trade-in values tend to be extremely low and on top of that they seem think nothing of selling counterfeit merchandise. While GameStop seemed to be making strides at improving their pre-order program in the US, it looks like they took a few steps back in Canada.
Read More | GamesStop
Zelda.com Updated With Twilight Princess Info
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Adventure, Nintendo, Role Playing Games, Screenshots, Wii,
Nintendo of America recently updated their Zelda.com site with new information about The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Much of the information has been previously released elsewhere, but the company has also added a bunch of new screenshots of the game, showing off more of the action. The Wii version of the game is scheduled to launch with the console, while the Gamecube version will be released on December 12th in the United States.
Read More | Zelda.com via GoNintendo
New Survey Shows PS3 First, Xbox 360 Last
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Culture, Nintendo, PlayStation 3, Wii, Xbox 360,
A new survey from recently the recently formed research company Interpret shows the Xbox 360 trailing in mindshare in the next generation console wars. Interpret’s survey targeted 2,000 online users; these users were then apparently weighted against 2004 Census data. In the data released to Next Generation, the weighted data shows 8.9 million consumers ready to pony up money for the PS3, 5.7 million would purchase the Wii, and 800,000 would buy the Xbox 360 at full price. It’s hard to attach much weight to the survey, though, without further information.
While Interpret LLC is a new company, its founders consist of veterans from ratings giant Nielsen; there is a lot of experience at the helm. But without more particulars, it is hard to judge if Interpret’s extrapolations are valid. There are some interesting points from the research; Interpret believes that while Microsoft has had tremendous success over the past year, the company has not been able to expand its audience beyond the hardcore gamer. It is also easy for gamers online to get an insulated view of the industry. Certainly, Sony has had a lot of bad news related to the Playstation 3, but a lot of this information will not trickle down to the mainstream audience. While this survey paints a bad picture for Microsoft, there is a huge gap between surveys, statistics, and the real world.
Read More | Next Generation
Xfire Announces PS3 Middleware Solution, Wii Possible
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Corporate News, Internet, Nintendo, PC, PlayStation 3, Wii,
When 1up apparently found clues pointing to Sony using Xfire as a matching service for their Playstation 3 Network, Sony representatives were quick to downplay this as a part of the Xfire integration for Untold Legends: Dark Kingdom and not as a part of Sony’s official network.
Xfire today clarified their support on Untold Legends with GameSpot, indicating that on the PC and PS3, Xfire will be providing “cross-platform text chat and friends-list features” with support for new features in the future. In addition, Xfire will be licensing their middleware to other companies that want to bring advanced matchmaking features to the Playstation 3. Xfire also let slip that they were in talks with “one other console maker,” so unless Xfire is very confused, this would likely be Nintendo.
With the announcement that Untold Legends will support Xfire, and Full Auto 2 will utilize GameSpy’s services, it is starting to look more and more that Sony’s online network may be more bare-bones, with its own sign-in, but leaving more advanced networking features to established companies for the time being. This doesn’t preclude Sony from implementing these features in the future, but it does seem to indicate that Sony doesn’t quite have everything laid out right now and are instead leveraging partnerships to get the functionality that they want.
Read More | Gamespot
Wii Pre-Orders Start Friday, October 13, at GameStop/EB
Posted by Christopher Sasaki Categories: Hardware, Nintendo, Wii,
GoNintendo has official confirmation that Nintendo Wii pre-orders will start Friday, October 13. The site has a scan of the the confirmation e-mail sent from GameStop’s corporate headquarters; while Wii console allocations aren’t given, GameStop responds to some issues reported by customers during the PS3 pre-order event (as quick as that was). First, GameStop stores are not to have reservation lists or other methods of holding pre-orders before the program starts. All pre-orders are to be allocated in a first-come, first-serve basis for customers in store. According to the e-mail, customers “must be physically present at the store at opening time… to make their reservation deposit.”
GameStop also stresses that stores are not to force bundles on customers, or otherwise give preference to gamers that had previously pre-ordered Wii games or accessories. This contradicts what some customers were told earlier by GameStop employees, and may cause some conflicts. GameStop also stressed that stores were not to have special opening times for the pre-order start; no midnight or early openings would be allowed.
While the Xbox 360 pre-order system was basically a nightmare, and the PS3 pre-orders didn’t last long enough for issues become a problem, Nintendo’s larger allocation of consoles will help alleviate some of the pre-order issues. At the very least, it looks like GameSpot is trying to eliminate some of the problems they have had in the past.
Read More | GoNintendo
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