EA Sports boss, Peter Moore, recently divulged how the EA Sports team handled creating ‘causal’ games for Wii at this years Edinburgh Interactive conference.

“In all the games we made, everything was focused on making things more realistic, each year – particularly at the beginning of a cycle – sports games were used to show how realistic video games had become,” he said. “That was fine back in the early ’80s when there was a huge chasm beteen what the real world looked like and what games showed.”

“But then this thing [the Wii] came along and presented us with some challenges. The dynamics changed with the launch of the Wii – play and fun was coming back in, the demographic was changing enormously, and the amount of time to play was being compressed.”

“It was hard. A lot of people at that time thought they would move on from our studios – they wanted to chase the core consumer.” Moore explained that Wii Sports was considered a serious rival, and that EA Sports staff were ‘unwilling’ to cater to the ‘casual’ consumers (now the majority of the market) and couldn’t handle the need to step back in terms of visuals.

- Peter Moore, EA Sports

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European gamers who purchase and register the forthcoming Metroid Prime Trilogy on the Nintendo Wii will qualify for one of the 5,000 downloads of the original Metroid on the Virtual Console.

To qualify for the promotion, players must be one of the first lucky 5000 who register their copy of Metroid Prime Trilogy on the European Club Nintendo website and who have previously registered one of the Metroid Prime games (Metroid Prime, Metroid Prime 2: Echoes, or Metroid Prime 3: Corruption).”

-Nintendo Europe

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Capcom have announced that they’re teaming up with Nintendo to promote the immensely popular Monster Hunter 3 overseas.

According to Japan’s Nihon Keizai Shimbun financial newspaper Capcom will be doubling its strength by teaming up with Nintendo to promote Monster Hunter 3. The developer, which sold over 500,000 units of the game in its first two days, will be making use of Nintendo’s expertise in promoting the Pokemon franchise to help further increase sales.

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According to online gaming publication, Siliconera, Nintendo have rather amusingly registered a patent with the European Patent Database for a inflatable horse accessory.

The Wii Horseback Riding Saddle is apparently an inflatable saddle with a pouch where players can insert the Wii Remote. Players can then hold the Nunchuck up as a set of reins or “a raised hand for balance as in Bronco riding, a lasso, a sword or other weapon”.

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Nintendo president, Satoru Iwata, has causally informed investors that he doesn’t believe Nintendo need a new console anytime soon.

“Among the 295.6 million active users, 209.5 million people are playing with our products. To tell you the truth, we at Nintendo had set 200 million as an internal milestone, and we already surpassed it this spring!.

“In addition, among 149.5 million of potential users – another room of expansion – there are 86.1 million people who have never tried Wii or DS yet. So numerically there is still a possibility to even double the current user population of Wii and DS.

“Thus we do not believe at all that the expansion has come to an end nor do we need a new console any time soon. So we have not set specific years for the lifespan of current game systems.”
- Satoru Iwata

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Popular technology website Techradar.com have devised seven excellent ways to get more from your Nintendo Wii. Any other additional trickery you can think of list it in the comments section. Have fun.

1. Email a chum’s Wii

You’ll need to have a record of those damnably unmemorable friend codes for anyone you want to mail, but once you do it’s simple: just drop a message to w[friendcode]@wii.com. For instance, w1234567891011@wii.com.

2. Add a smooth, constant blue glow to your Wii

The blue lighting around the disc slot normally only glows when the Wii’s got some sort of announcement for you, and disappears once you’ve read it. However, you can lend your lounge a sci-fi feel by making that tastefull glow permanent. Just email your own Wii – using the system in the tip above – but never read the message (which can take up to an hour to arrive, incidentally). As long as it stays unread, that cheeky light will keep on twinkling.

3. Mario attack

If you’re downloading something from the Wii shop – be it a new channel or a virtual console title – have a gander at what the Mario animation in the progress bar is wearing. If he’s dressed in red and white (as opposed to his traditional red and blue togs), you can make him chuck fireballs with the A button.

4. Puzzle puzzle

Unlock a hidden hardcore mode in the Photo Channel’s jigsaw mini-game. Move the cursor over the number of pieces you want to split your photo into, but hold down the 1 button before you select the option. The resulting jigsaw will be split into 194 pieces, which makes for quite the pictorial challenge.

5. Restore MP3 playback

Speaking of the photo channel, you were probably narked to discover that last year’s update to do it inexplicably removed MP3 soundtrack support, lumping us with AAC tracks only. Yeah thanks, Ninty. Fortunately, you can downgrade to the original version by heading to Wii Settings then Data Management, then selecting the Channels tab and choosing to delete the Photo Channel entirely. Don’t worry, it won’t disappear – instead, it’ll revert to sweet old version 1.0, replete with MP3 support.

6. Fix stubborn Wiimotes

If you’re having trouble getting a new or borrowed Wiimote to synch with your console, there’s a way to make the Wii completely forget about all the remotes it’s paired with so that you can start afresh. Turn the Wii off and unplug it from the wall. Wait 30 seconds, then plug it in and turn it on again. When the Health & Safety warning pops up, open the flap on the front of the Wii, then press and hold down the red SYNC button for 15 seconds. And that’s it – all the synced controllers will be forgotten. Then pair all your Wiimotes with the console using the standard method.

7. Use your Wiimotes with your PC

Yep, the Wiimote uses standard Bluetooth wireless tech to talk to the console – which means it can also work with a PC. So your Wii controller can double up as a remote control for movie watching, or you can even play any game with it. You’ll need either built-in Bluetooth support or a USB adaptor in your PC, plus free app GlovePIE to get it working. There’s a little bit of faff involved, but the instructions at the GlovePIE site will talk you through it. You can also download pre-made profiles for specific games.

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Resident Evil: Darkside Chronicles producer Masachika Kawata believes that his teams new title sets a new standard for in-game visuals on the Nintendo Wii.

“I think it’s perfectly possible to create great horror presentation on the Wii. In fact, unfortunately, we’re not able to show it off just yet, but very shortly we’re hoping to show off a stage from a new scenario and I think when fans get a look at that they will really be asking themselves, is this really on the Wii? Actually, we went to Nintendo’s offices earlier on this month to show them this new stage and they were really, really impressed by it and impressed by what we were able to get out of the Wii.”

- Masachika Kawata, Capcom

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Capcom’s recently released Monster Hunter 3 has quadrupled Nintendo Wii sales throughout Japan.

The critically acclaimed Monster Hunter 3 has shifted a monstrous amount of Wii units in Japan. Sales for the Nintendo Wii were 95,357, up from about 24,000 units the week prior. Looks as though Nintendo are thoroughly reaping the benefits of the franchise appearing on their console.

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According to the latest issue of the prestigious Famitsu magazine Nintendo have issued a trademark for the Super Mario Collection.

Whilst links have been made between Super Mario All-Stars and the proposed trademark, nothing has actually been confirmed. Undoubtedly the title will surface for either the Wii Virtual Console or the Nintendo DS at some point in the near future.

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Activision have officially announced that the original Call of Duty: Modern Warfare will be arriving on Nintendo Wii, November 10th.

Modern Warfare for the Nintendo Wii won’t be developed by original developer, Infinity Ward, but instead will developed by Treyarch. Whilst it isn’t Modern Warfare 2 as many were previously expecting, it will still be a welcomed addition to the ever-extensive Wii back catalogue.

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