Nintendo came late to the party this year, holding their press conference this morning as opposed to following tradition and doing it on Monday. With rumors abound about Project Cafe and lots of buzz around the 3DS, Nintendo was poised this year to once again steal the E3 crown. Did they succeed?
Details about their presser are after the jump!
- Shigeru Miamoto appeared first to celebrate Zelda’s 25th anniversary in fine style, complete with a live orchestra. After thanking the fans and the developers who have been a part of Zelda’s 25 year journey (older than me, yeesh), Miamoto confirmed that all Nintendo platforms will see a release of a Zelda title: Link’s Awakening on the DSi through the E-Shop, Ocarina of Time on the 3DS and Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword on the Wii by year’s end. As an added surprise, Four Swords will be available as a free download through the E-Shop for everyone!
- Satoru Iwata, President and CEO of Nintendo, took over for Miamoto at this point to tease the audience a little bit about their upcoming system. After he finished his tantalizing speech, we were given a trailer about the various 3DS games that are coming this year including Super Mario, Mario Kart, Luigi’s Mansion 2 and Kid Icarus!
- The Nintendo big-wig parade continued after Iwata as Reggie Fils-Amie swaggered out to demonstrate Star Fox running on the 3DS.
- Reggie also dropped news about the Pokedex 3DS which functions exactly as you imagine it would, except in 3D. It’s live right now after you download the update.
- The Nintendo conference was dominated by the 3DS at this point, but Reggie finally gave in and told us all about Nintendo’s new hotness: Project Cafe, now officially called the Wii U. Nintendo hopes that this system will address the concerns that the hardcore had about the Wii in addition to maintaining the market share they have with casual gamers.
- No big announcement like this is complete without a trailer, and the Wii U is no exception. Here’s the introductory trailer for the Wii U seen at Nintendo’s briefing.
- The Wii U controller can function as the console itself, taking the action off the TV and putting it on the screen integrated into the controller. It functions as a tablet crossed with a traditional controller and puts all sorts of interesting possibilities into play.
- All of the Wii U games on the E3 show floor are just demos made to demonstrate the controller’s capabilities and are not indicative of final products. However, Reggie announced that Lego City Stores is being developed for the Wii U.
- After explaining the Wii U and its capabilities (and teasing a Smash Bros release), a montage of developers interested in the Wii U was shown, confirming Batman: Arkham City, Darksiders 2 and more.
- No pricing was announced for the Wii U, but its estimated release date is between April and December of 2012.
- Nintendo also showed off an early example of the Wii U’s power. There was also a montage of third party games for the Wii U with a few surprises tucked in.
- EA’s John Riccitiello followed up the Wii U information dump with a pledge that EA will launch all of their popular AAA games on the Wii U, bolstering its line-up of third party games.
So that was Nintendo’s press conference, everyone. They went heavy on the 3DS for the first bit then brought out the Wii U to seal the deal. The Wii U definitely brings up some interesting possibilities and I can’t wait to read more about it and really get my head around the concept.
What did you guys think of Nintendo’s showing? Did they take the E3 crown, or were you kind of “meh” on the whole thing? Who came out on top this year? What’s your opinion on the Wii U and the big 3DS push? Go!
Man, I have to say the big three did little to impress at E3 this year. Like I thought, Nintendo’s showing seems dominated by 3DS releases of games we’ve all beat already. And same with the Wii U. Except for Skyward Sword, were there any new games at this conference? I mean, I know the 3DS is powerful and all that, and it looks cool, but why do I want to buy a system that only releases old games in 3D?
I put my reluctant vote in for Sony as the “winner”, but all three shows were really underwhelming as far as I can tell. Hope the developers have better shows than these three…
I grade them with an D, almost an F. They failed to promise anything to me as a hardcore gamer. The Wii U may be another “revolution” (more like jumping on the tablet craze) but I dont believe they will be able to deliver on what they promised. I know for a fact that I need to see more about the system and its capabilities, along with what improvements (if any) will be made to the online realm of the Wii U. Even online improvements could leave me unimpressed.
To me that was the worst of the lot. The PSVita is more appealing to me than the Wii U. Perhaps I missed some things too, but they seem to have fallen completely short on promising to get back to hardcore gamers. They are throwing some nice title names but nothing to sell me, and Im a huge fan of Mario Kart and SSB. Doesn’t mean their tech wasn’t nifty, but to me it gave me nothing to really look forward to.
I think Nintendo did a horribly lackluster job at E3. Very unimpressed and disappointed.
The only way Nintendo could have come out and impressed me with the WiiU was if they showed it running GTA5 lol.
The conference was on par for the others this year, pretty forgettable.
When Reggie stood there with the DS, 3DS, Wii, and WiiU logos behind him talking about how each is a revolution I had to role my eyes. If each is so revolutionary why do we get a new one almost every year. This Nintendo stuff is starting to add up.
I’m very unimpressed. You can’t reveal a system and not give the full specs and not even a single game running… I do not like the controller, I would rather have that leaked one. Maybe I’m too oldschool. As an extra feature I guess it would be kinda cool but I want a regular controller and they might include one like they did on the Wii. As far as the race for the handheld systems PSVita is way ahead of the 3DS to be honest. Nintendo, as always, relies on the classics to sell shitty hardware like 3DS. Yes I would like to play Zelda; yes I would like to play Mario and Mario Kart, Starfox, SSB and so on but why is the 3DS 250€ and the Vita that is way better in specs and features is also 250€? Doesn’t make sense to me.
I feel that there was far too much about the 3DS, I guess they’re doing their best to save the system after its rocky release. Wii U, hmm, I have many questions and so few answers, and what little we saw failed to impress me. Nintendo didn’t show very much of anything special, other than the Wii U, which, again, wasn’t that incredible.
Nintendo gets a C, almost exactly level with Sony. I’d say Microsoft did come out on top, but that’s not because they had an awesome show, their show was just a little better than the others. Like winning at a sport when you were the only player to show up, not even the rest of your team was there, just you. All the conferences together, get a B, there weren’t many amazing or incredible things shown, and everyone seemed to fall flat on their press conferences, it was a little disappointing.
Assassin’s Creed: Revelations looks pretty cool though, I’m definitely excited for that.
Didn’t see the conference myself, but I did see the system on the show floor today. I won’t get to play with it until probably tomorrow, but I saw the controllers chained to some booth babes and it looks really interesting. Skyward Sword looked great on the system as well.
Nintendo didn’t impress me. Mario 3DS looks boring and same-ish. Skyward Sword looks good, but it’s on the Wii, so it’s running on unimpressive, archaic technology. The only thing I enjoyed was the HD tech demo for Zelda. I really didn’t notice it at first, but then it hit me. So yeah, glad I didn’t waste my money on any Nintendo stuff this year.
Mixed bag from Nintendo this year. Quite a few games announced for the 3DS, but nothing that was surprising or unexpected. Looking forward to Luigi’s Mansion 2, I quite enjoyed the first one. Kid Icarus and Starfox are looking really good too.
First thing about the Wii U – not a fan of the name, but otherwise it looks like it could work. I think it will take a year or two for the developers to really bring out the potential in it, a lot like Kinect and Move are starting to do. What surprised me was that Nintendo didn’t really have any games to show for it. You would expect them to have an early version of a Mario or Zelda running on it to get people really excited, but no such luck. Still, there were some good games announced, like Arkham City etc. And getting EA up on stage was interesting too.
Also, does anyone else get the feeling that Iwata may have slipped up in mentioning Smash Bros? It just seemed like he wasn’t supposed to say anything about it.
Not too bad a conference but that’s only based on how good the Wii U COULD be. So in other words I liked their promises that weren’t backed by anything solid lol.
EA getting up and promising AAA support was a great move but I hope they follow through with it.
The controller and functions, while intriguing, surely can’t have many useful applications in-game beyond an inventory/map (IOW, it’s a DS XXXXXXXL) or for a WarioWare game. One thing they potential could use it to solve the the age old complaint of intrusive HUDs. The HUD wouldn’t be in the way of your character if they aren’t even on the screen! That bein said, I like HUDs (especially organic integration like Dead Space), but I know some people who don’t.
Also, any hope for a new Smash Bros is welcome. Nerf Smash Balls (or Kirby’s and Ness/Lucas’ at least)!