Yes, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, after several months past E3 and dozens of rumors, the Nintendo Wii finally has some concrete information about its launch. About time, too. First, let's start with the basic info, and I'll move on with other stuff later.
Release info for (North and South) AmericaLaunch price: $249.99 ($250)
Launch date: Sunday, November 19, 2006
Release info for Japan (if anyone wants to know)Launch price: 25,000 yen (~213 U.S.D.)
Launch date: Saturday, December 2, 2006
Release info for EuropeLaunch price: £179 (249 euros)
Launch date: Friday, December 8, 2006
Release info for Australia (and neighboring regions, I'm assuming)Launch price: 399.95 AUD (~$300.38/£160)
Launch date: Thursday, December 7, 2006
Go
here for a list of dates and prices in all announced worldwide regions.
What's in the package?1 Wii remote
1 "nunchuck" attachment for the Wii remote
AC adapter
Audio/video cable
Sensor bar with stand
Console stand (to set up vertically if desired)
2 AA batteries
Extra: Wii Sports, which features the tennis, golf, and baseball we heard about, and will also include newly-announced bowling and boxing, will be included as a bundled game in all regions except Japan (where it will be sold separately, but will include an extra controller).
Additional Wii remotes will retail for $40, nunchucks for $20, and the "classic controller" wasn't really announced, but is supposed to be around $20. Also, the console will only come in white at launch, instead of both white and black as previously announced.
What about the games, fool?The
price of Wii games is now officially confirmed to be
$49.99 (50 bucks). This was stated before, but now it's...well, official. Note that this is only for first- (and presumably second-) party games. Third parties can technically charge what they want, although a couple have already confirmed $50 price tags.
Launch games (U.S.)This is, as of now, a confirmed list, but expect changes even up until the actual launch. I think there are supposed to be 25 definite launch titles but...I only found 21.
Excite Truck
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Wii Sports (bundled with all regional packages except Japan)
Call of Duty 3
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance
Rapala Tournament Fishing
Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam
World Series of Poker
Trauma Center: Second Opinion
Madden NFL 07
Need for Speed: Carbon
Elebits
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz
Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII
Far Cry: Vengeance
GT Pro Series
Monster 4x4: World Circuit
Open Season
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Red Steel
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent
Unfortunately, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption has been delayed until 2007 (likely to come out before March 31). Also, the GameCube version of Twilight Princess has been delayed until December 11.
What about Super Mario Galaxy and Super Smash Bros. Brawl?Those were never launch titles to begin with.
Virtual Console info?Supposedly, the price for games is supposed to be $5-10 each, probably with NES games at the lower end of the spectrum and N64 ones at the highest.
How do you buy games? Similar to Xbox Live Arcade games, you spend "Wii points," which will come in card form at--I assume--any store that sells games. One example is that a 2000 point Wii card is available for $20, and if NES games are 500 points, SNES games are 800 points, and N64 games are 1000 points, that's the conclusion you come to where games are $5, $8, and $10 each.
These are the companies which are looking to either port or make games for the Virtual Console. Like the XLA, the Wii VC will also feature brand new, original games. Games that will be ported, however, will come from the NES, SNES, N64, as well as the Genesis and TurboGrafx-16, and the MSX.
D4E
Atlus
Bandai Namco Games
Banpresto
Capcom
Chun Soft
Enterbrain
HAL Laboratory Inc.
Hudson
Irem
Jaleco
Kemco
Koei
Konami
Masaya
Net Farm
PAON
Rocket company
Sega
Taito
Takara Tomy
Tecmo
Sunsoft
Square Enix (Final Fantasy ports, anyone?)
There's also a list of supposed VC launch games, but I haven't seen it confirmed by big name sites like IGN and GameSpot (then again, I'm still wading through the articles), but there are supposed to be around 25-30 VC launch games, with around 10 added every month. I'll edit this with a list when it comes.
Anything else?Nintendo also announced some new multimedia capabilities for the Wii. As of now I assume the DVD playback option has been scrapped, but I'll check back on that. Basically, the new functions are called "Wii Channels."
What can you do on these Wii channels? There are several, and one of which is the Mii Channel (how clever). Here you can create a personalized avatar of yourself, much like the ones of Miyamoto and Iwata at E3 while playing tennis on Wii Sports. The supposed icon of yourself is stored in the remote's memory capabilities, so if you take it to someone's house and you play a game like Wii Sports or something, it'll still remember your customized little caricature.
Another announced feature (or channel, I guess) is photo editing software. Since the Wii is compatible with secure digital (SD) cards, you can transfer and edit photos or something. Some form of movie editing is also available, apparently.
Also included are separate channels, including a weather station and a news channel. The Internet browser Opera is developing for the Wii is another feature, as you can browse the 'Net, too. Unfortunately, this (browsing the Internet) will not be free, and will require prepaid Wii points.
Edit: turns out the browser will be free until June 2007, meaning if you download it before then you're set.
Additional "unfortunately's" include the fact that Pokemon Battle Revolution will be the first online multiplayer game, but it's not set out 'til next year. Games using WiiConnect24 weren't mentioned.
Good news is that the Wii will support SD cards, and I don't think Nintendo said anything about whether they were making their own specific, compatible brand. This means that while the Wii has limited internal memory (512 MB), you can get cheap SD cards with huge amounts of memory. This also opens up the possiblity of external HDD's, but at this point I doubt that's gonna happen.
Most of the above features will require some sort of wireless router. However, with the DS, I guess you can use a wired one if Nintendo makes another compatible dongle. The Wii is also reportedly region free, like the PS3, which should make importing for both consoles much, much easier.
Edit: turns out the Wii is not region free. Well, damn.
That's about it for now.
Sources: IGN and GameSpot mostly.
wii.ign.com/articles/732/732669p1.htmlwww.gamespot.com/events/wiilaunch/index.html?tag=topslot;action;2---
If there's anything I missed, go ahead and tell me. I'll also answer any questions if anyone has any. I'll update when needed and post my opinions about all this l8trz
I hope you people read this, it took a while to find out everything and talk about it. =P
Last Edit: Oct 7, 2006 21:10:54 GMT by Ess Ohh
