Satoru Iwata
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Nintendo Direct time travels with news tonight, tomorrow, yesterday
Nintendo Direct, the all-Nintendo-news, some-of-the-time video series from official Nintendo headquarters, is hitting the airwaves tonight. Technically, it's noon EST tomorrow, April 21, but folks in the US can expect announcements from the Japanese feed starting at 8:30 p.m. PST tonight, Friday, April 20. The European announcements will hit at 1 p.m. CET (4 a.m. PST), April 21.Nintendo hasn't revealed what it will discuss tonight, but it has left us a trail of clues. CEO Satoru Iwata sent out invitations to this weekend's Nintendo Direct on 3DS' Spot Pass, showing him with a giant, suspicious Kirby plushie. Kid Icarus: Uprising's Masahiro Sakurai tweeted to expect Uprising news and Theatrhythm Final Fantasy's Masanobu Suzui suggested fans should watch the feed, Andriasang translates.We'll have our eyes and fingertips ready to roll for any breakout Kirby-Kid-Icarus-Theatrhythm crossover news tonight, because really, it's not like we had any plans on a Friday night or anything.
Kid Icarus: Uprising prototype began on Wii and PC
Before Kid Icarus: Uprising became the carpal tunnel syndrome-inducing good time it is today, it began development on the PC and Wii. In a new Iwata Asks column, designer Masahiro Sakurai shares the story of development and some neat prototype videos showcasing Kid Icarus: Uprising as it was way before its E3 2010 unveiling. At the outset, Sakurai's company Project Sora didn't even have 3DS dev kits, so they had to start on PC and Wii.The videos -- uploaded to YouTube by Siliconera and embedded above and past the break -- were created to illustrate Sakurai's vision to new dev-team members coming onto the project. Iwata admits the reason it took so long to get Kid Icarus: Uprising out the door was having to port the already established work on PC and Wii over to 3DS.%Gallery-145129%
Iwata interested in NFC payments, tolerant of microtransactions
Nintendo president Satoru Iwata gave his customary Q&A session to stockholders following the company's financial results briefing. Surprisingly, the stockholders asked a lot of stuff about future plans, instead of just hostile questions about why Nintendo is losing money.Iwata elaborated on the NFC functionality of the Wii U, specifying its utility for reading credit cards. "If we can provide a system in which consumers can use such e-money," he said, "they will far more easily be able to make payments than by entering credit card numbers or purchasing the Nintendo Prepaid Cards at stores." Of course, Nintendo has been sheepish about going into online business, which Iwata admitted. "To the views that Nintendo is cautious, conservative, or even negative about business on a network," he said, "our answer is, in short, that we will make a bold attempt when the time is ripe. Unless the timing is right, we will lose the consumers who do not have an Internet connection."Iwata explained that Nintendo is working to find a solution that pleases both customers and retailers before offering full-game downloads, but went on to say that microtransactions, another new-ish development in online games, are not something he'd have a problem with. "We plan to ensure a relative level of flexibility for the Nintendo 3DS and the Wii U software compatible with the Nintendo Network as long as the developer has built a trusting relationship with consumers, except for the cases that consumers will be too disadvantaged," he said. "Regulations with a certain degree of strictness" will be in place to protect customers. Nintendo "will not turn down" requests to add microtransactions to games "as far as they can establish an appropriate relationship with their customers."
Nintendo: 3DS sales prove there's still room for dedicated gaming handhelds
Nintendo President Satoru Iwata believes the company has proven there's still a market for dedicated gaming handheld hardware like the 3DS. In a briefing -- which covered a lot of ground -- Iwata revealed the pictured chart above, comparing internal Nintendo weekly sales data of the Wii, DS and 3DS. The executive said the initial sales pace of the 3DS was "unsatisfactory," but the device gained momentum after the price cut and the launch of popular games like Super Mario 3D Land, Mario Kart 7 (and Monster Hunter 3 (Tri) G in Japan)."Last summer, when the sales pace of the Nintendo 3DS was slow, there were extreme remarks saying, 'With the penetration of smartphones, will there still be a market for handheld hardware?,' which was almost equal to 'Handheld hardware is not necessary anymore,'" Iwata said. "I believe we proved that such opinions are incorrect."In the end, however, Nintendo did not reach its internal sales goal for the device, despite the 3DS gaining momentum and ending the year with a respectable 15 million unit sales. Iwata says the company could not cover the lack of units sold pre-price drop, which is one of the reasons for its negatively revised financial forecasts.
Wii U controller to pack NFC, says Iwata, create new gameplay options
Aching for more details on Nintendo's elusive Wii U console? Let Satoru Iwata scratch your itch -- quarterly reports aren't just for reporting losses and announcing new networks, after all. Boss hog Iwata told investors that Nintendo is spicing up their next console's tablet-esque controller with a little NFC magic. Nintendo's President briefly entertains the possibilities of a console controller rocking near field communication, suggesting that Skylander-like figurines or NFC enabled cards could be created to present a "new play format in the video game world." He even says the technology might be used to implement micropayments. Sounds neat -- but will you be able to buy DLC with your Google Wallet?
Skylanders-esque NFC tech built into Wii U's WiiPad
Adding onto the mounting pile of news coming from an investor's briefing with Nintendo president Satoru Iwata comes word that the Wii U's tablet-like controller will have "Near Field Communication" technology (NFC). In Nintendo's words, the tech will serve to "read and write data via noncontact NFC and to expand the new play format in the video game world." Owners can reportedly create their own cards and figurines for use with the WiiPad's NFC functionality.Confusing as that may be, Iwata means that the Wii U's WiiPad will come equipped with similar tech to that used in Skylanders alter its gameplay via real world objects (Skylanders uses RFID tech, which isn't exactly the same, but a similar concept). The tech could conceivably be used to make credit card payments as well, which Iwata specifically mentions in the last paragraph.We wish it was all announcements of new entries in classic franchises and promises of unified online systems, folks, but that's just how it goes. On the bright side, more Drobot?Update: This post originally stated that Near Field Communication tech is also used in the Skylanders game from Activision, which isn't accurate. Skylanders uses RFID technology, which is similar but not identical. Sorry about that, folks!
Nintendo officially announces Nintendo Network, promises personal accounts for Wii U
Nintendo's third quarter financial briefing just spilled the beans on the recently spied Nintendo Network, causing Nintendo fans everywhere to collectively sigh, "It's about time." Company head honcho Satoru Iwata says the network will offer "competitions and communication among users, as well as the sales of digital content," and in the case of the Wii U, will introduce personal user accounts. Iwata stopped just short of confirming that the Nintendo Network will end the company's policy of tying downloaded titles to Nintendo hardware, rather than individual users, but mentioned that it packed an infrastructure that supports not only add-on content, but fully downloadable retail games as well."This concept was built into the design of the Nintendo 3DS, and we already have the necessary infrastructure," Iwata said, "We will prepare the same infrastructure for the Wii U. However, we have not decided the concrete timing of when we will start it." Iwata pointed to Mario Kart 7's community building features and DLC offerings in the upcoming Theatrythm Final Fantasy as an early look at how the Nintendo Network is trying differentiate itself from the outfit's existing Nintendo Wi-Fi connection services. Hit the source link to read Iwata's briefing for yourself.
New side-scrolling Super Mario headed to 3DS
Think New Super Mario Bros., but newer. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata assured investors today that a new 2D Super Mario game is in the works for 3DS, this one distinguished by its "side-scrolling action."Iwata offered no further information about the game in his presentation, but expects it to launch sometime within Nintendo's next fiscal year. That places the new Mario's debut sometime after March 2012 -- just far enough to complete Super Mario 3D Land and yearn for the days when things were nice and flat.
Wii U getting user accounts as part of 'Nintendo Network'
Nintendo is slowly catching up in the online department, as Satoru Iwata unveiled the "Nintendo Network" in an investor presentation today. The "Nintendo Network," whose logo was just spotted on the Japanese Theatrhythm cover, will cover "competitions and communication among users, as well as the sales of digital content," Iwata said, for both 3DS and Wii U. Elements, like the "Community" building functionality, have already been implemented in Mario Kart 7.For the Wii U, the Nintendo Network will support multiple personal user accounts per system, finally ending Nintendo's insistence on tying software purchases to a single system.The Network may also entail digital sales of retail 3DS games. "This concept was built into the design of the Nintendo 3DS, and we already have the necessary infrastructure," Iwata said. "We will prepare the same infrastructure for the Wii U. However, we have not decided the concrete timing of when we will start it."
Wii U launching worldwide in time for 'year-end season'
Speaking to reporters in Osaka after Nintendo's earnings release today, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata offered the most specific information about the Wii U's various international release windows yet -- revealing that they're all roughly similar.According to Reuters, Iwata said that the console will be released in the US, Europe, Australia, and Japan "for the year-end season." Previous windows have placed the Wii U in 2012, and then in the second half of 2012. With that crucial timing in place, all Nintendo needs is a decent price and a few great launch games, and all the mistakes of the 3DS's launch can be avoided.
Enjoy this video of Wii's 'Kiki Trick,' since you probably won't get to play the game
If you weren't raptly watching last night's Nintendo Direct presentation, you missed the incredible video for Kiki Trick, an audio-based Wii game from Metroid's Yoshio Sakamoto and the WarioWare team. In the above clip, you'll see Nintendo president Satoru Iwata try to decipher a robot's nightmare voice, assign sounds to the act of eating ramen in the correct order, and match audio tracks to video clips. It looks weird and fascinating, and of course it has no chance of ever leaving Japan. The Nintendo Direct site has more videos from last night, including clips for Dynasty Warriors Vs., Bravely Default, Girls RPG Cinderellife, and -- you absolutely must see this -- Satoru Iwata playing New Love Plus. In fact, we're just going to go ahead and put that one after the break.
Watch Nintendo prez Satoru Iwata's 'Direct' conference right here [update: it's over!]
Update: And we're out, folks. We'll have a roundup of tonight's trailers for you bright and early in the morning. Thanks for joining us (and don't forget to take your VHS copy of Uncle Buck home, dude)! Starting at 10PM ET / 12PM JT this evening slash afternoon (depending on where in the world you are), Nintendo president Satoru Iwata will once more address eager fans and press alike in his second pre-record "Nintendo Direct" address. He'll be doing so via Ustream, and he'll apparently be dishing plans for Nintendo products on both Wii and 3DS consoles that are planned for the next few months ("through March 2012," Nintendo of Japan's Twitter feed teased last week) -- we're thinking it'll be launch dates for some of those Mario titles (Paper Mario, Mario Tennis, etc.), and an update on some other upcoming products. In our continued efforts to keep your eyeballs locked to Joystiq for as much of the day as possible, we've dropped the stream into this post so you can follow along without having to leave our comforting embrace. We'll also be breaking out any news as Mr. Iwata reveals it, so stay tuned!
Iwata Claus drops a holiday Nintendo Direct vid on Dec. 26
In October, Satoru Iwata hosted a "Nintendo Direct" video, in which he introduced the pink 3DS, detailed the big firmware update, and gave release windows for some eShop releases. Iwata will host another video press conference on December 27 at noon JST, or 10PM EST on December 26, according to a new "event" set up on the publisher's Ustream site. This time, we suspect we'll learn release dates -- or windows -- for at least some of its big upcoming releases, like Luigi's Mansion 2, Mario Tennis, Metal Gear Solid Snake Eater 3D, or Paper Mario. Last time, the Japanese video was followed the next morning by a Nintendo of America version, hosted by NOA president Reggie Fils-Aime. The same will probably happen this time. [Santa hat from Maridav / Shutterstock]
Mario Kart 7 sells 420K its first week in Japan, Iwata says game did even better internationally
Nintendo president Satoru Iwata recently held a state of the union with Japanese newspaper Nikkei (via Andriasang) for the company's performance in its home country. Mario Kart 7, which launched on December 1, has done quite well. In its first week on retail shelves, the game sold a whopping 420,000 copies, almost double the first-week performance sales of Mario Kart DS back in 2005. And, according to Iwata, the game did even better abroad, though we kinda already knew that. Despite suffering through a lackluster launch, Nintendo's latest handheld is set to reach the three million sold mark two weeks faster than the original DS did, Iwata said. Thanks, price cut! He expects the 3DS to hit four million before its one year anniversary on February 26.
Iwata: 3DS is Nintendo 'priority,' even at the sake of short-term profitability
In a recent Q&A following a semi-annual investor's meeting, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata laid out the company's plans for its slow-starting handheld, the 3DS. "We came to the conclusion that we needed to make that bold investment," Iwata explained, "instead of focusing just on this term's profitability, so that we would be able to make the Nintendo 3DS an important foundation for Nintendo for years to come." He added that the company expects the system's profitability to improve dramatically during the fiscal year ending March 2013. Iwata mentioned that, falling in line with this strategy, unspecified 3DS games were delayed from the holiday release window to prevent being overlooked due to overcrowding. The only major first-party 3DS titles scheduled for the rest of the year are Super Mario 3D Land (November 13) and Mario Kart 7 (December 4). He also discussed the company's plans to expand the eShop with an "add-on" marketplace for individual games, and the ability to access the store using PCs and Smartphones. You can read more about this initiative in our post from last week, though it lacks Iwata's almost comically tardy discovery of social networking platforms. He's kind of like your grandpa who just discovered Facebook, likes everything you post, and leaves embarrassing comments on all your pictures in all-caps.
Nintendo looking to develop 'new genres' again
Much of Nintendo's success in the DS/Wii era came from games in unusual, previously unpopular, or brand new genres -- like, say, the daily math minigame genre invented for Brain Age. During an investor presentation, president Satoru Iwata said that Nintendo is wisely working on inventing some new kinds of games to get the wide appeal that Brain Age and Wii Fit achieved, planning to release some games in new genres over the next fiscal year. Iwata noted that it is more difficult now to invent surprising new styles of game with smartphone developers doing weird stuff by the boatload. "However," he said, "the company will aim to develop and launch products that can provide meaningful surprises to the public by taking advantage of the company's position of being able to make new proposals that integrate both hardware and software, and of its ability to develop products that can be accepted by a wide variety of consumers, irrespective of age, gender or past gaming experience." After all, you can't bundle an iPhone game with a balance board or something like that. Well, you could, but wouldn't. Nintendo still has that advantage.
HAL's NES Ghostbusters II game almost came to North America
The Ghostbusters II game we got in America, developed by Kemco and published by Activision, was poop. Meanwhile, Japan and Europe got a completely different Ghostbusters II game called New Ghostbusters II by talented developer HAL Laboratory -- creators of Kirby and Lolo, and employer of future Nintendo president Satoru Iwata. It was much less poop-like. New Ghostbusters II never came out in North America, likely because Activision had already secured the rights for a game based on the movie. Nintendo Player discovered (and dumped) a prototype of an unreleased US version of HAL's Ghostbusters II game, and documented the minimal differences between that version and the ones released elsewhere. Apparently, HAL did have plans to release this at some point! And then, for some reason, potentially because of interference from Activision or Vigo the Carpathian, it instead became the footnote it is now.
Nintendo adding sleep mode downloads to 3DS eShop, planning web interface
Nintendo has evidently listened to the feedback about the 3DS's awkward eShop, announcing several improvements to the interface in an investor presentation. President Satoru Iwata confirmed the addition of "add-on content" download capabilities, as part of the November firmware update. "This is a feature a number of software creators have been looking forward to," he said. In addition, the firmware update will add the ability for publishers to release demos, "for which they can put a limit on the number of trials." Also nice (and previously missing): the ability for users to download content while in sleep mode. Iwata revealed future plans for a web-based PC/smartphone interface for the eShop, in order to make it easier to discover highly rated games without first having to check the eShop on the 3DS. At first, the web eShop will generate QR codes that you can point the 3DS at to buy stuff. "That function is already included in the upcoming system update for the Nintendo 3DS," Iwata said. Nintendo plans to add full web-based shopping later. The next step, and the one about which Nintendo didn't say much: actually putting some things in the eShop to buy.
Iwata reveals three canned Kirby games, more than a decade in the making
The relative ease of Kirby games usually result in their powderpuff protagonist avoiding death from start to finish -- however, Kirby's not immune to the most permanent form of death there is: Project cancellation. In the most recent Iwata Asks, Kirby's Return to Dreamland producer Shigefumi Kawase revealed that three installments in the franchise were killed off mid-development, explaining "We spent 11 years ... making and abandoning these three games." The three Kirby titles in questions would have been starkly different: One was a 2.5D four-player adventure title (sort of like Return to Dreamland, but with more depth), one was a fully-3D exploration-centric game and the other was an animated platformer with "pop-up visuals." They sound charming as all-get-out, which makes us all the more forlorn that they're dead as doornails. Goodnight, sweet princes. May flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.
Nintendo 3DS to add 3D video capture, upgraded eShop and more
Satoru Iwata came on stage at Nintendo's pre-Tokyo Game Show shindig and announced the 3DS will be getting a few upgrades soon. No word on any hardware changes -- yet -- but owners can expect 3D video capture as well as upgrades to the Street Pass Mii Plaza and eShop. The press conference is still ongoing, so check back for more details as they're announced or watch the live video stream (in Japanese) embedded after the break. Update: And it's all over! Nothing else new to speak of on the hardware front, and we didn't catch any more news about those software changes either. We're just getting our TGS team on the ground in Japan now, so expect more news in the days to come.
