Original mini games now beamed straight to your Wii!

@Kyle81: Bash bash bash...I think this will be great, all those awesome little developers will be able to make some great stuff.

About freaking time.

cant wait to see what the big & indie studios alike'll do...like others, i'm assuming when a cap is announced for file size, its gonna come after some HDD-announcement, possibly at E3. We'll see.

Well I wouldn't be supprised if they beat Xbox arcade and their so called great independent developer crap which is not coming along at all.

I do hope this pushes xbox arcade and their service to start getting better.

sooo does this mean allowing ppl to save games on sd cards or usb drives? or maybe even a hdd!
seriously where will people save all the games?it would suck to have to decide what to delete so you can save the new game.then redownload what you deleted and delete something else to make room and so on.

@Irenicus: Xbox Live Arcade has been fantastic though, offering ton of great offerings. It might not have lots of original content, but still at least were getting new stuff on a regular basis to play, often with new functionality. Catan, Carcasonne? Awesome stuff.

"Early next year"!?!?!?!?

C'mon!

Ok, yeah, This is cool, but take forever will ya?
Oh, and you better release HDD support please.
Or at least allow us to play these games from the SD card.

omg its seriously about time...

A step in the right direction for this machine. perhaps ill have to dust mine off soon...

@Kyle81: sounds like a sales pitch, they dont deliver every wednsesday as they promise they even miss it by weeks the "great games" arn't that many nor great. I do enjoy like turtles 4player co-op I do and poker etc. But then we got doom and mortal kombat 3 that is unplayable due to bad D pad and shitty lag. Worms was a disapointement to :(

I mean arcade games have more lag then like shadowrun 16player online, makes since ya? and as for catan I didn't buy I tried demo then half way thru a play they told me I had to pay to finish a demo, no no that made me mad so /delete

Then carcasonne, hmm is it good? Well the one game that do looks great and im waiting for with all of my heart is bomberman oh god I cant wait they said June release but NO carcassone takes it place?

But yeah arcade aint all bad but in terms of independent games which MS promised and basically killed of and poor d pad with other problems, Nintendo might beat them, in any case I hope it pushes Microsoft to make arcade better for all. Im just not that satisifed 2 years later with arcade.

HDD please? Hell, make it proprietary, fuck us in the ass, and take all our money, as long as some of these games are larger than the average JPEG.

@Irenicus: "sounds like a sales pitch, they dont deliver every wednsesday as they promise they even miss it by weeks the "great games" arn't that many nor great."

They never promised that they would deliver a new Live Arcade game "every Wednesday." They said that they Wednesday is the day that they release Live Arcade games.

However, they haven't missed a single Wednesday in several months! And a lot of those Wednesdays had 2 releases!

I've purchased a number of the recent games like Pinball FX (best arcade pinball game ever as far as I am concerned), Mad Tracks, Boom Boom Rocket, etc... I've been very happy with the games that are coming out in Live Arcade.

Doom and MK3 were released last year, and are old IP. Are you going to judge them on their past performance or their current performance? Because their current performance is pretty damn good!

This is great news. Nintendo's answer to XNA...kinda...almost. So will these indie developers have access to NintendoWare as well?

I also have to say this is near enough confirmation that Wii are getting a hard drive. Nintendo can't expect us to keep deleting and swapping files between SD cards forever. Those USB ports at the back of the console are getting lonley. They need something inside of 'em. :P

@themunk: I'd like them to limit the size to 2 gigs and allow them to run directly from the SD card. Harddrives... not so much yet.

Llamasoft, Behemoth, Wanoko Studios, Gastronaut; these are TEXTBOOK examples of independent developers. Irenicus, what you are complaining about is a lack of HOBBYIST developers who have gotten games published on Arcade yet.

Independent development is alive and well on Arcade and frankly the slate of titles that have been released in the last few months has silenced most critics. If you aren't finding great titles on Arcade, you have unusual taste.

@Rectangle: old performance? well doom MK3 street fighter all broken.

Well pinball is a good game no denying that, mad tracks meh boom boom whatever no thanks. As for every wednesday they did make that promise im not gonna digg up the quote now but I had xbox since beta on xbox 1 and launch of 360 and they did make that promise and many other promises that they broken.

Now all companies break promises it is not like they are family so I wont loose any sleep over it. But I am not satisifed with arcade most ppl I know on xbox live aint, they could do so much more and still can. My next big hope and game I want is Bomberman which looks like they done a perfect job with, but it is a shame things like indy developers making 360 games aint happening their software they released for making games... well which they wont publish or help getting published.

Atleast they increased the size limit now which prolly is a big reason to why many games feel broken I mean mortal kombat 3 on arcade is 49mb I think it was and mortal kombat 2 on PSN is 250mb.

Anyway I hope this will push MS in the right direction, that is all and it is nice to see nintendo and any company going further with this, my dream is a youtube thing of cheap arcade games anyone with time and an idea can make.

2 gigs for a downloadable game? That's huge! The old cap for XboxLive Arcade games was 50 mb. I think you meant 2 gigs for total storage, thus allowing you to use an SD card.

Kyle81 is bashing Nintendo, color me shocked.

On a more serious note, does anyone know where small developers can get a wiiware sdk? I made this:

[www.thisisnotalabel.com]

a few weeks ago and have been thinking about trying to port it to an actual wii.

Well, they're about two years behind in the downloadable content game, but if the material's worth it and they release a bigger hard drive, I will forgive them. After all...it is Nintendo and I love them.

Wiiware sounds awsome, great idea. This may lead me to believe that Nintendo may release a mass storage device for the Wii, perhaps secret hardware that will be shown at E3?

They needed this sooner or later. I just wanna see how these geniuses are going to pull off the "not having a hard drive" bit.

Does this mean they will make it easier to actually get a devkit in the first place? Since at the moment its virtually impossible for small indie developers.

"XBox Live Arcade Wednesdays" was a program started up last Summer that had 5 arcade games being released over a 5 week period. [www.xbox.com]

They then extended the program to include another 5 games:
[www.winsupersite.com]

"Microsoft's original Xbox Live Arcade Wednesdays program was so effective, the company decided to extend it for at least another five games. This time around, the game selection varies between classic card games like Texas Hold 'Em and UNO and, yes, classic arcade titles like Scramble and Time Pilot."

Then it pretty much continued from there. But I don't recall ever seeing anyone say that they would be releasing new games every Wednesday. I have seen wording like "regular releases," though. And they have certainly done that. Though they have missed a Wednesday here and there, I'd still call the releases "regular."

My question is, can "Wii-Ware" provide original software applications? IE: Channels? If so, that also means that developers can make MP3 players or software based DVD playback for the Wii. The possibilities are endless really. But that's assuming Nintendo will give developers that kind of freedom.

Late Nintendo, very late. Should have been out a lot sooner and instead we need to wait to 2008. Well, i guess better late than never.

I really do hope we will see some original games... I mean, hopefully it won't be just minigames/party games. Hopefully we see some rpg's or fps's.

does this mean we're finally gonna get line-rider for the wii?

and finally maybe an actual reason to bother using the classic controller? wavebird ftw!

OMG! This is awesome news! Hopefully, most people don't just draw the line at games...some useful apps for my Wii would be nice!

Good News!

So, what about dev kits? Do you need hardware, or will they provide a PC based SDK? Can anyone get their hands on one? How much?

Kotaku reporters, get to work! :P

@Kyle81: So the 360 and PS3 downloadable games aren't minigames?

@Irenicus: "but it is a shame things like indy developers making 360 games aint happening their software they released for making games... well which they wont publish or help getting published."

Your attrocious sentance structure and grammar asside, I have serious problems with your statement.

Despite being out of beta, XNA isn't ready to go from hobyist tool to full-fledged development platform yet. Plus it wasn't necessarily meant as a way to develop for XBLA.

As for indie developers makeing games for XBLA, it's happening. NinjaBee just released Band of Bugs, and has released plenty of other games for the service. Garage Games did Marble Blast. PopCap has released a bunch of games. Clearly the indie games are there.

About time they announced it. I for one will be looking forward to what WiiWare will bring. And if Nintendo doesn't release a hard drive, this will crash and burn quick.

@Brill: Sorry, but that will probably not happen. Games are one thing, but Nintendo isn't looking at other developers for Wii applications on their system. The potential would be interesting, but could also be harmful. I can imagine over a dozen developers making their professional or indie type of mp3 player and maybe some would get the look and feel right that would match the Wii, but most will get it wrong. Also, that is a permanent application that would be on the Wii. It would be easier to come to a price agreement on a single wiiware game then a new channel/program/application.

Other Wii channels will probably be handled in-house.

Tiberian, I don't think this move is really late. Nintendo tested the waters with the Virtual Console. I think they've had WiiWare planned out, but were waiting for the right time. Nintendo has stated that they are looking to slowly add channels, and content (rather than right out of the gate).

@Jonn: "So the 360 and PS3 downloadable games aren't minigames?"

I suppose that a few could probably be classified as such. But most are not.

I'm glad they finally announced it. Really, it wasn't a matter of if, just when.

It would be cool if we could also download demos for free.

@AGiES: bla bla bla, sorry but XNA is a failure and they did express that developers hobbysts could make games using XNA for XBLA.

Thats what they stated and wanted but did not try to deliver in the end. XBLA is still not good enough, sorry but it aint, perhaps in another year? when 360 is reaching end of life cycle, MS needs to work harder, and less with anti piracy streaming/install bullshit. And more with games and features and making it all easier, all the time we keep hearing developers beeing pissed with microsoft and arcade when making games, delays after delays.

Their key staff keeps leaving to or left anyway, it does seem to get better and I see some games looking good soon to be out but Nintendo with this announcement has a good chance of becoming beeing number 1, in shorter time.... No I dont know many who are "satisfied" with arcade.

All I am going to say is FINALLY! (not til 2008? Arrgh)

Good news, but kinda crummy that we've had to wait this long (and will have to wait quite a bit longer).

They may as well have announced HDD support. Everyone knows it's coming. The only question now is whether they'll require a proprietary drive or not. This being Nintendo, I'm going to go way out on a limb and say yes. ;)

@ rectangle, sorry dude, but it seems microsoft pays you to debate in the comments section.

@Tybee: I hope they require it otherwise there will be limits on how big the games can be. (like what XBLA did for awhile)

"All good things come to those who wait."

Finally some good news about the Wii. About time.

@PaulMorel: If you're interested in programming Wii games, start here:

[warioworld.com]

Funny, that when Microsoft speculate about inplementing motion control for products in the future, people jump all over them, but now Nintendo are doing something exactly the same as Microsoft it's all fine.

Not that I have a problem with Nintendo doing this, just people with double standards.

Personally, I really like Xbox Live Arcade, and one of the reasons for that is there tight quality control. They don't just let any old garbage on there, and they don't put up too many similar games. There's a great variety, and I don't see Nintendo catching up anytime soon, especially if they don't launch until 2008.

Microsoft have also been talking about an extension of the Arcade which will allow anyone with XNA to upload their games onto a "you tube style" database, were anyone can play and rate the games.

great, but now we need a harddrive so people can actually make quality games...

I hope we see a version of the SF2HD gme heading to XBL. I want a 2d Wii SF game that isnt 10 years old, with crappy graphics.

Why is everybody complaining about waiting so long? Didnt the system come out in november?

Yay! Hopefully we'll see some great, original ideas that use the Wii remote in inventive ways, and show major publishers that PS2 ports are not going to cut it.

@majortom1981:

Because people are winy impatient unsatisfiable imbeciles?

A little late, Nintendo?

Maybe this could be the answer for the Pollen Sonata developers.