Author Topic: Official NOA Nintendo WiFi Announcement (Read 8624 times)

TheYoungerPlumber · « **on:** October 05, 2005, 04:04:02 PM »

Nintendo alludes to official American Nintendo Wi-Fi hotspots, the USB adapter, and the confirmed online games.

NINTENDO CREATES AN EASY, ACCESSIBLE VIDEO GAME NETWORK – AND IT'S FREE

On Nov. 14, Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection Ushers in New Era of Free Wireless Gaming

REDMOND, Wash., Oct. 5, 2005 – On Nov. 14, Nintendo® Wi-Fi Connection will begin a new era of easy, social gaming. For the first time, characters from the Nintendo universe will be playable online, as part of a unique wireless community, accessible inside or outside the home. Nintendo DS™ games like Mario Kart® DS, Animal Crossing®: Wild World and Metroid® Prime Hunters will require no additional charge for online play. Each is scheduled to launch in the coming months, along with the first third-party title using Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, Activision's Tony Hawk's American SK8Land, developed by Vicarious Visions.

From home, if the user already has a Wi-Fi network, the Nintendo DS unit will connect directly to it with minimal setup procedures. Those who have a high-speed Internet connection such as cable or DSL, but no wireless network, can use the Nintendo Wi-Fi USB Connector, sold separately, that will plug into a computer USB port to create a wireless access point to connect to Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection.

Outside of the home, players will be able to connect in a variety of ways, including at thousands of free Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection hotspots nationwide. More details about these hotspots and how to connect outside of the home will be announced shortly.

Nintendo DS is just the first Nintendo system to connect via the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. The same service will be incorporated into Nintendo's next-generation home console, code-named Nintendo Revolution, set for release in 2006.

"Nintendo has taken the online video gaming model and rewritten the definition of community," said Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo of America's executive vice president of sales & marketing. "With easy setup and no added service fees, players far and wide will log in and play with one another as easily as if they were sitting in the same room."

Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection will create a welcome, inviting atmosphere where video game players of all kinds can log on wirelessly and begin playing. The service will be used in different ways for different games. In Mario Kart DS, four players at a time can race over Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. Racers can pick opponents from their roster of friends, match up randomly against strangers of comparable skill levels or simply choose to race against anyone in the world. Mario Kart DS launches Nov. 14.

People who hang out in Animal Crossing: Wild World can travel to other players' towns or invite up to three other players to visit their own towns, simply by opening the town gate. The four players then can interact and play together simultaneously in one town. Players must know one another and register to their respective friend rosters before they can connect. Animal Crossing: Wild World is set to launch on Dec. 5.

Activision's Tony Hawk's American Sk8land will let players compete head-to-head in multiplayer games in a variety of modes. Players also can create custom skateboard art and graffiti tags, and share them with other players via Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection. The service will track global high scores and stats. Tony Hawk's American SK8Land will launch on Nov. 14.

Games in development include Metroid Prime Hunters, slated to launch in the first quarter of 2006. Players can hook up for play with registered friends, automatch with other players based on a skill-level match or play with anyone; Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection quickly finds the best match with other players online.

Rhoq · « **Reply #1 on:** October 05, 2005, 04:42:21 PM »

I notice that NOA's press release makes no mention of what platform will be required for the ""Nintendo Wi-Fi USB Connector".

The reports from NCL earlier today specifically mentioned "Windows XP only" due to the necessary software, so where will these us MacOS-X users? I'm sure I don't have to point it out, by there are plenty of Mac owners that are also Nintendo fanboys. I'm one of them. Nintendo needs to have MacOS-X support come November 14th, unless of course the "USB Connector" is compatible right out of the box without any addition software to be installed in MacOS. (Drivers and such are more of "Windows thing", anyways).

Caliban · « **Reply #2 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:13:03 PM »

Rhoq, read what TYP said at the end of this page http://www.planetgamecube.com/news.cfm?action=item&id=6562

brian577 · « **Reply #3 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:22:33 PM »

That faq discribing Mac support does mention several different products compatible with OS X however it does not mention any USB based products. As far I can tell you will need a PC or a Mac with Virtual PC running Windows XP installed.

Kairon · « **Reply #4 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:22:54 PM »

ANIMAL CROSSING DS DEC FIVE? DFIVE? THIS YEAR?

YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAY!

~Carmine M. Red
Kairon@aol.com

BigJim · « **Reply #5 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:27:04 PM »

If you're SOL on drivers, you can get a wireless router for less than what their website is selling the adapter for. And it won't matter what OS you have.

brian577 · « **Reply #6 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:41:40 PM »

Ahh... I see what your saying I didin't notice the mention of support for existing networks, I assumed Nintendo Wifi would use some kind of special protocol to access the network, requiring the use of the adapter.

Djunknown · « **Reply #7 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:53:33 PM »

Quote
In Mario Kart DS, four players at a time can race over Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection.

What a pity. I had my heart set on 8, but maybe the lag was too much for 8 people simultaneosly [sp?]. Maybe you can have 4 people playing next to you, then have the other 4 elsewhere in the world? Probably not, but it was worth a shot

Nintendo Wi-fi connection= Nintendo's answer to Xbox live? It'll be interesting what they have in store for the Rev...

NotSoStu · « **Reply #8 on:** October 05, 2005, 05:55:28 PM »

As for the USB device's cost, it'll supposedly come optionally bundled with Mario Kart DS, with the entire thing being $50. $15 for a router? Not bad.

Mario · « **Reply #9 on:** October 05, 2005, 06:12:19 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: Stu L Tissimus
As for the USB device's cost, it'll supposedly come optionally bundled with Mario Kart DS, with the entire thing being $50. $15 for a router? Not bad.

Where did you hear this?

TheYoungerPlumber · « **Reply #10 on:** October 05, 2005, 08:37:06 PM »

http://www.planetgamecube.com/news.cfm?action=item&id=6569 <<< This description of the device and the custom software makes me less confident in my OSX statement. Often wireless cards come with network management software that isn't needed, though....

wandering · « **Reply #11 on:** October 06, 2005, 10:13:37 AM »

I'll be interested to see how long Nintendon will be able to keep their online service 'safe' and kid-friendly, as they seem to want to do. Everything released so far makes it seem like they're being pretty careful - in Animal Crossing you can only visit he towns of people you know, andin Tony Hawk it seems like they're hinting that only high scores will be global, and designs and what not can only be shared with your friends.

But how long will it be before something slips through? Surely offensive names will be hard to keep up with, if Nintendo is even interested in keeping up with them at all. And even in Animal Crossing..... let's say you have a group of young kids who play together and visit each other's towns, yes? All it would take is for one of those friends to visit his/her big brother's town, and for big brother's town to have been visited by various people from message boards, and - blam! Naughtiness spreads throught the little kids' towns like wildfire, and little kids discover just how 'wild' the world really is.

mantidor · « **Reply #12 on:** October 06, 2005, 10:16:14 AM »

Thats why the named the game like that!

ShyGuy · « **Reply #13 on:** October 06, 2005, 11:15:07 AM »

Sex education on the dirty streets of a digital town called Animal Crossing.... Has there be any reports of perverts in Pictochat hanging at the mall or something?

Bill Aurion · « **Reply #14 on:** October 06, 2005, 11:23:23 AM »

I'm pretty sure Animal Crossing would employ a "friends-only" method of online gaming...

stevey · « **Reply #15 on:** October 06, 2005, 12:27:55 PM »

I think nintendo wifi will be clean because pervert are on sony side and all the racist homophobs are on xboxlive, +

demans respect

wandering · « **Reply #16 on:** October 06, 2005, 12:35:49 PM »

"I'm pretty sure Animal Crossing would employ a "friends-only" method of online gaming..."
yeah, but, at a certain point, in a game where charachters, charachters' letters, constalations, etc freely flow from town to town, how do you prevent stuff from spreading around?

With the original animal crossing, I knew, like, 2 people who had the game, and knew they didn't really insert naughtiness into their towns. With AC, I'll prolly invite all sorts of people over, and visit other people's towns, from the internet.... and I also have a younger sister.... and if she gets her own DS and own copy of the game, I'm sure she'll visit my town...... see where I'm going with this?

Bill Aurion · « **Reply #17 on:** October 06, 2005, 12:42:01 PM »

Um, with the format I'm suggesting you don't visit strangers and strangers don't visit you...

And people can't visit your town if you aren't in it...

Ian Sane · « **Reply #18 on:** October 06, 2005, 01:02:52 PM »

You can worry about keeping the online games kid-safe but the truth is nothing is totally kid-safe. You can control what your kids watch on TV and what videogames they play and what movies they see but it's not going to be perfect. If your kid goes to school some other kid is going to tell him about sex or teach him swear words. He's going to see a movie or TV show or game at a friend's house you might not want him to see. It's just going to happen unless you home school your kid and watch him 24 hours a day.

So Nintendo should do what parents should do: try their best. It's not going to be perfect but with some monitoring, word filters, and allowing the option to only play with friends they could get something that's good enough. And if anyone still has a problem don't let your kids play online. Hell an online computer is automatically a treasure chest of porn if you're not careful so I think the potential dangers of anything to do with the internet is common knowledge.

wandering · « **Reply #19 on:** October 06, 2005, 03:26:20 PM »

I agree with that partly, but... 2 things make Animal Crossing a bit of a special case. First off, stuff comes to you in AC indirectly. In real life, if I visit a friend's house, and that friend has sex toys in his closet, and then I visit another friend's house, and that friend has little kids, I don't have to worry about the sex toys deciding to move into the house with the kids. Second off, Nintendo is deliberately painting these games as kids friendly. I understand nothing's perfect, but here Nintendo could really be lulling parents into a false sense of security.

Anway, it's not a HUGE deal, ultimately parents are responsible for their kids.... and the case of animal crossing, all you really have to do is a) make sure that you know everyone who you and your kids visit or let visit in the game, and b) check around town to make sure naughty stuff isn't slipping in. It just troubles me somewhat because AC is the kind of game that parents will see as kid-friendly, and then just give it to their kids and never, ever look at it. And then kids will visit other kids towns, and those kids will have visited other peoples towns, and those peoples towns will be filled to the brim with naughty pictures, dirty words, and sex jokes, and then those things will start filtering back….
Just seems like something that might make the whole Hot Coffee scandal look like, well, the non-issue that it was.

KnowsNothing · « **Reply #20 on:** October 06, 2005, 03:31:37 PM »

Quote
In real life, if I visit a friend's house, and that friend has sex toys in his closet, and then I visit another friend's house, and that friend has little kids, I don't have to worry about the sex toys deciding to move into the house with the kids.

Okay, this is just a strange sentance, especially considering it reads as if your second friend has children in his closet.

Or is that what you meant?

Also, I sure hope they include the sign function in the game, hurrah for limitless sources of entertainment!

Artimus · « **Reply #21 on:** October 06, 2005, 05:28:33 PM »

As long as AC has lots to do in the towns this'll be great. We'll all have to play with each other!

Wild world indeed

UncleBob · « **Reply #22 on:** October 07, 2005, 06:59:31 AM »

I think we're forgetting a part of Animal Crossing (assuming it moves over to Wild World).

Picture this happening. You (an 16-18 year old "adult") visit an Internet friend's town. In this town, your internet friend has a "theme" that has struck the town of everyone wearing shirts that say "F" (Imangine what that word would really be). So when you go back to your town, one of your friend's town folk move over and they're wearing an "F" shirt... Which shortly becomes the "Theme" in your town... and every character in town is wearing it... And lord, what would happen if you get to mess with character's catch phrases.

So the sex toys in a friends closet isn't really a good example...

wandering · « **Reply #23 on:** October 07, 2005, 09:24:49 AM »

Well, I think that's what I was trying to say with the sex toys example. In real life, you can visit a smutty friend without that having any affect on your own home. In Animal Crossing, you can't.

Quote
Okay, this is just a strange sentance, especially considering it reads as if your second friend has children in his closet.

Or is that what you meant?

Yeah, no. I wasn't trying to imply that friend number 2 is Michael Jackson, if that's what you're getting at (if he was, I imagine his kids would have a lot more to worry about than artificially intelligent sex toys...)

Ian Sane · « **Reply #24 on:** October 07, 2005, 09:39:20 AM »

Why can't Nintendo just make it so that you willingly trade things like fashion designs? Like you yourself have to introduce the new custom pattern design to your town or it doesn't come over. That way there's more control. When a character arrives from another town they can only bring with them custom designs that you have "cleared". If you haven't cleared it they go back to an in-game outfit.

Things like catchphrases are easy to catch too. They can just put a filter in so that swear words and sexually suggestive words just aren't allowed. So when you suggest "F*CK YOUR MAMA!!" as a catchphrase the character says "I don't think that's a good catchphrase."

Artimus · « **Reply #25 on:** October 07, 2005, 10:03:34 AM »

I'd think it'd be much better if they programmed it to like "Someone get the soap!" or "Sorry, what'd you say? I was too busy doing YOUR mama!"

wandering · « **Reply #26 on:** October 07, 2005, 10:12:57 AM »

Gee Whillikers, I think Mario needs to come and wash this thread up with his water pack!

C'mon everybody, let's sing: Clean is better than dirty, cause dirty is meaner than clean!

stevey · « **Reply #27 on:** October 07, 2005, 11:52:09 AM »

Ummm who would fill there town in porn and f bombs in the 1st place?

Karl Castaneda #2 · « **Reply #28 on:** October 07, 2005, 11:57:20 AM »

Stevey, have you ever been to the Internet?

Artimus · « **Reply #29 on:** October 07, 2005, 03:06:08 PM »

Quote
Originally posted by: ViewtifulGamer
Stevey, have you ever been to the Internet?

Hahahahahahaha.

This is so exciting, just for the fact I want to go to Stevey's town and teach them how to say "Stevey! What the **** are you doing!?"

nickmitch · « **Reply #30 on:** October 07, 2005, 05:20:21 PM »

I'd totally fill my town with f bombs and porn! It's the best way to world domination.

Distract the resistence troops with porn and give a big "F YOU!" to the protesters.

News:

Author Topic: Official NOA Nintendo WiFi Announcement (Read 8624 times)