Next Wiimotes may integrate MotionPlus

July 17th, 2008, 21:02 Posted By: Shrygue

via Games Industry


Nintendo's Katsuya Eguchi has revealed that future iterations of the Wii remote could have MotionPlus technology built-in, reports our sister site, Eurogamer.net.

As revealed at E3 earlier this week, the new MotionPlus add-on currently exists only as an extra peripheral that slots into the bottom of the regular Wii remote. However, that could change in the future.

"As to looking at whether or not it will be an attachment or built in - we're always looking at how hardware should evolve and where we should take it," Eguchi said, speaking at an E3 developer roundtable.

Nintendo is still to decide if MotionPlus should be integral to Wii remotes, or if "it might be good to keep it as an attachment we only use for certain software".

"Unfortunately I don't have a definite direction to give you today, but it's something we'll be looking at," he said.

Earlier in the Q&A session, Eguchi dismissed suggestions the Wii MotionPlus add-on is designed to do what the Wii remote was supposed to do in the first place. Responding to a question from an IGN journalist, he said, "Of course, you always want more, and as we were working on the title we thought it would be nice to have more than what we had.

"But we're not dissatisfied with [the original Wii Sports] at all. We're very happy with what we did." He added that he's confident the original Wii Sports offers a "very good experience" for players.

In the future, Eguchi observed, MotionPlus could be used in more complex sports games. It would be possible to track the movement of a tennis racket head, for example, so you could pull off top spins or slice. "But we have to ask ourselves, is that easy to play? Is that something we want to do just because it's realistic?"

Nintendo is keen not to "alienate" players, continued Eguchi, and wants to "appeal to wide audiences" as well as serious gamers. That means offering "a low difficulty hurdle at the beginning, then finding ways to add depth to the game and keep everyone happy".

He concluded, "People who are really good at gaming can of course move on and challenge themselves to do these things that are built into the game, or to try things out on their own." As the saying goes (or rather is literally translated), "We want a gaming experience where 'the more you bite, the more flavour you get'."

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