Nintendo: E3's Our Coming Out Party!

March 30th, 2006, 19:57 Posted By: wraggster

Nintendo has gone on the offensive again today and has been speaking in an exclusive interview with Next-Gen.biz about the Revolution's innovative controller (or wand or nunchuck, whatever you want to call it), claiming it's both extremely easy to use and likening it in the intuitive stakes to DS's touchscreen interface.
Beth Llewelyn, who is Nintendo's senior director of public relations, has assured anyone who reckons the controller looks too complex holds that opinion simply because they haven't played around with it. "The single controller is extremely intuitive,"

Llewelyn said, "You pick it up and maybe you press a button and maybe you just move it around and things happen on screen. That is very non-intimidating".

"I don't play games that often," continued Llewelyn, "but I love DS because I love the easy interface so this is very familiar to me. I think the nunchuck seems a little strange to many people but once you get it in your hand it feels completely natural," Llewelyn added.
Pheweee, well that's a huge weight of our minds because we were beginning to wonder, what with the controller being nicknamed the nunchuck and all, whether we'd have to undergo intensive ninja training before we could play a Revolution game. Llewelyn went on to say that, while as far as she's aware the controller has yet to tested on or by the public, response from the home crowd - i.e. Nintendo - and third parties who have dabbled has been "very positive".

"I think we'll get some positive feedback at E3. The reaction we've got so far has all been very good. That's just with demos so when we show actual games it should be very rewarding," Llewelyn continued, calling this year's E3 "the big coming out party for Revolution."

"The big thing is to get everyone to experience it. It's about the nature of the gameplay, the controller and the movement. People need to experience it for real and E3 will allow them to do that."

Llewelyn also responded to questions about Virtual Console and the recent news that Sega's pledged support, saying it's an "exciting way to build up the library. We certainly have a great library of legacy games and it adds excitement to add Sega's in as well."

Judging by Llewelyn's comments, it's highly possible that Nintendo will get other publishers and developers on board too. Apparently, "There are discussions going on all the time behind closed doors," in connection with the download service and she didn't rule out going back as far at the Commodore 64 for content.

It was announced at GDC recently, of course, that part of Nintendo's battle plan for Virtual Console is to support and make available new games too. "Mr. Iwata touched on that, talking about offering developers the tools to create new games. The idea is that there is an opportunity there for new games. Discussions have also been going on with publishers", Llewelyn stated about the Xbox Live Arcade-style aspect of Virtual Console.

She concluded: "We've shown that we are willing to disrupt the norm and go out on a limb and be successful with games like Brain Training and that shows third parties what can be done. Developers don't always have to go with massive budgets and two-year development schedules."

Similar opinion on supporting 'smaller' new games on Virtual Console has been voiced by Nintendo president Satoru Iwata in an interview in CNN's Game Over column.

"If we can come up with an addictive, but simple title - such as Tetris 15 years ago - my attention should be focused on containing costs," Iwata commented. "So, I would make it available through the Virtual Console. I think the opportunity for ourselves will be much larger than software that costs $50-$60." Interesting stuff, although he did add that "Of course, there are a number of people waiting for a 'masterpiece' title. For those games, we'll utilized traditional distribution channels."

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