So has anyone been able to make sense of the PR speak around the Wii U online structure so far?
"Our approach will be a flexible one, taking the best of what each of our third-party partners has to offer, marrying that with the best of what Nintendo does and bringing that versus a more rigid, more closed type of environment."
-Reggie Fils-Aime
"We see Wii U as a flexible system. It's not a one-size-fits-all. It's not a centralized system. What John [Riccitiello, Electronic Arts] was describing [at the press conference] was his vision. We'll work with third-parties to understand what the opportunities are, and I think what's going to drive maybe the best examples are individual approaches, the best of cl.ass individual approaches both from third-party and from Nintendo. John was just referring to what he thought might happen."
-Mark Franklin, Director of PR, NoA
"If you look at 3DS and the online of that you'll get an understanding of where we're going with Wii U and we're taking that even further. We can't talk about the details yet as Mr Iwata will announce those slightly later. But with the online of 3DS it's obviously a massive leap on from where we were with DSi and DSi XL. It's smooth, robust, it doesn't drop in and out. The friend code system has also been refined. It still exists but in the same way that you'd need to pair up with friends on PSN or Xbox live. Now it's much closer to that kind of online gaming experience than what it was before. We always try and strike a balance. Because we do have more younger consumers than any other hardware manufacturer or games brand we need to protect them while also making it as accessible as possible for the more active and hardcore consumers to go online. With Wii U I think that we've already hinted that we're looking at getting people in that know and understand online gaming as it's something that perhaps we've struggled with in the past."
-Rob Lowe, Marketing Manager, Nintendo UK
"Online gaming is very important to us, and we've heard the demands of the veteran gamers that want that. So, we're going to be more flexible with online this time when it comes to online, we're going to work with our 3rd party partners. We're not going to have a centralized one type fits all approach, it is going to be more the publishers trying to figure out what they want to do and we'll try to bring that to life and make sure our platform can support that vision."
-Charlie Scibetta, Senior Director of Corporate Communications, NoA
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Is being similar to the 3DS online supposed to inspire confidence in potential Wii U online?
When they mean rigid and closed are they referring specifically to XBL, or do they consider something that's relatively open like PSN, also rigid and closed?
Does decentralization amount to a lack of unified Wii U account? Does it mean there's free reign for third-parties to shoe-horn their pet projects like Origin and uPlay?
Do they just have no idea what they're doing for online a year out from release, does that mean they plan to build an online network within the space of a year?
shinrabanshou
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