Nintendo's Iwata says Vitality Sensor is coming "not too late" in 2010
By Donald Melanson 
posted August 10th 2009 5:33PM
posted August 10th 2009 5:33PM
We know, it's been tough waiting for word of a release date for Nintendo's Wii Vitality Sensor. Almost as tough as figuring out what it actually does. Nintendo's Satoru Iwata now looks to be clearing up a few details on both fronts, however, telling investors that the company "would like to deliver the actual product not too late in the year next year," and adding that the first game for it will have a "theme of relaxation, which is completely opposite from traditional ones, to enrich the users' lives." He also again mentioned the idea of using it to measure "how horrified a player is in a horror title" as another possibility, and compared the device to Wii Fit, which he says also initially caused people to doubt how well it would sell.
[Via Joystiq]
[Via Joystiq]
Im so excited about this!!! If only i had one right now to measure my skyrocketing blood pressure.
Besides measuring your blood pressure (while waiting for ps3 slim), what else can you do with this?
One end is connected to your finger and the other end is connected to your wii. :)
i'm still waiting for the Wii porn games. Nothing says penis simulation like a wiimote dildo attachment. And pretty soon, we'll be able to check our "vitality" with this new sensor. You all DO want Nintendo to stop making kiddie games, right? Welcome to the golden age of virtual porn.
Vitality Sensor Plus Coming in 2011!!
Congrats you've been F'd 20 more bucks
The Wii Vitality Sensor pretty much sums up my opinion of the Wii gaming experience.
Agreed, the fact that they can't come up with anything SETA did with Tetris64 or forum users suggested shows worlds about how little creativity they actually have
Now I'm really curious as to how they're going to make this a 'want' product. On paper, it sounds really boring (to me). To relax, I would rather be away from the 'tube. To play a game, they might have something here, but I'm not sure what.
...but as a health-monitoring thing (and not a game) I see some success. Seeing that people are all too happy to spend on health things (or health-monitoring things) as long as they aren't doing much work and/or the activity can be made enjoyable.
I can see some broader uses, but nothing fundamentally game changing(pardon the pun). Maybe in a FPS, when your pulse goes faster your cross hair becomes less steady, especially when using a sniper rifle? Or when your pulse goes faster it enables you to run a little bit faster than normal for a bit due to adrenaline? Maybe even cloud your vision depending on it. At any rate, I'm not sure how successful it'll be unless it's really low cost since it could only really add a tiny bit more immersion.
They will probably put it in Wii Fit 3 so you can measure pulse rate before/during/after exercise and it can customise the exercises so as to make your pulse rate gets to the right range for more effective exercise. Then there will be a 'relaxation mode' (as mentioned) where you have to slow your pulse to get trippy visual effects or something.
Apart from that, it might be used in some stupid minigames on WiiWare (maybe some Japan-only fortune telling / 'compatibility' stuff), and apart from *that* it will sink without trace.
Nintendo are great and all, I just got Sports Resort and it's good fun, but if you don't care what your pulse rate is, you're not even near the target market for this peripheral imo. I mean, maybe they will find some way to integrate it in the next Zelda or Mario but, yeah, actually - no they won't.
i guess this would be a sure hit in the "not quite dead yet" demographics.
Not too late to TOTALLY MISS THE POINT.
How long before someone hooks this up to a vibrator and fleshlight to create a very realistic cyberdildonic sex game?
+10
... perhaps some sort of death clock!
I think I speak for the masses when I say that nobody gives a shit about this stupid device. Officially.
Thanks.
"I think"
well that was your first mistake.
God those are beautiful hands...
God that's a beautiful hand...
Nintendo comparing the doubts we all have about the Vitality Sensor to the initial doubts about Wii Fit is flawed.
Wii Fit was seen by everyone as a product that COULD be useful, but people thought no one would buy into it or care to use it.
The Wii Vitality Sensor is a product that almost no one can see as useful AND people also think no one will buy into it or care to use it.
Big difference.
It's like Yoga with wires.
Yoga Fired!
Will it make my hands look that smooth and silky as well?
yes, with a healthy dose of photoshop.
This would work great with that the sanity system from Eternal Darkness. I believe Nintendo still has the copyright to it, granted I'm not too fond of keeping my finger in a heart rate monitor the whole time.
Now you can have "The Chair", the home game.
Looks just like a pulse oximeter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pulse_oximeter). A device used in medicine to measure a patients o2 saturation and, *gasp*, pulse. It probably measures a gamers pulse a correlates to a sense or "relaxation" or "horror".
Damn it Nintendo, I don't need another gimmicky peripheral. How about some decent games instead! I'm tired of watching my Wii collect dust :(
If you're tired of watching your Wii collect dust, perhaps you should look at hiring a maid.
Lol, yeah ok that's one solution. Not the one I was thinking of!