Sources: Nintendo to announce HD console this summer for release later next year

Infendo 26 Comments 3378 views Infendo

Just as the Wii is seriously cooling down, Game Informer reports, citing multiple sources, that Nintendo will announce a “competitive” HD console at E3 “this summer, if not sooner.” From the report:

In fact, Nintendo is already showing publishers the system in an effort to get them interested and allow them plenty of time to start developing titles in anticipation of the system’s reported late 2012 launch. This advance support marks a change from when the Wii launched. At that time, several Western publishers were outright surprised by the announcement, and it affected the software support for the platform… 

“Nintendo is doing this one right,” said an anonymous source. “[It’s] not a gimmick like the Wii.” What else, beyond graphics, this may imply about the system is unknown. What kind of controls the system will support (we imagine a need for both classic analog configurations and motion controllers) or what level of software and infrastructure Nintendo will provide for online gaming is also unknown. However, it’s a positive sign that the system might be more than just an HD Wii.

When asked for comment, Game Informer had originally quoted a Nintendo spokesman as saying, “Stay tuned,” according to Infendo reader Milom. Game Informer has since changed that response to the boilerplate, “Nintendo does not comment on rumors or speculation.”

In any case, exciting times for Nintendo fans. That said, how do you think the new console will work?

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26 Comments

  1. It’s about time.

  2. hmm….
    perhaps they’ve come up with a more advance motion tech….
    but i disgress it’s Nintendo we’re talking about here of course it will add to the experience of gaming they’ve either inovated or made handhelds as powerful (if not more) than a console of it’s era
    e.g. nes to gameboy as nintendo 64 to ds (more or less..)

    whatever it is we’ll love or hate it but for now let’s enjoy the 3ds it’s still new the console can wait XD

  3. My wild guess: The Vitality Sensor has evolved into a new, tiny, wireless controller you wear on your fingertip. You’ll control the games by simply pointing your finger at the screen.

  4. control games with your mind

    think about (rofl pun ftw)

  5. Nintendo finally created the Matrix. Its only viable competition will be Sony’s Skynet. Videogame Armageddon is inevitable.

  6. Milom here, my wording may have been strange so I appologize but I HAVE NO SOURCE stating that game informer changes their “stay tuned” response. It is me here, you can check the e-mail address.

    However I did mention that @e3expo tweeted this article. It all look pretty hopeful to me!

    I think the vitality senser lead is good, I think it’s probably evolved into something much more impressive. Vitality glove anyone? Hell, vitality SUIT!

    Either way, Nintendo have an oppertunity to own the Market again here, they’re competitors products are aging, but the Wii is such a stark contrast that it makes it seem as if this is not so. If they come out with something really NEXT-GEN, it’ll force both Sony and Microsoft (who want their consoles to last another few years) to think fat and release rush jobs to the Market. Nintendo’s then got the upper hand!

  7. Oops. Read the article again, realised it’s completely right! I thought you were saying that I’d said games informer had changed their comment. I read the article pretty soon after it was published so they could have changed it. Checking in my laptop’s history, hasn’t caches the page! Damnit. As a source I don’t sound to good right now, but since there’s nothing else saying ‘stay tuned’ in the article, I’m certain I saw what I saw!

  8. I’m still waiting on good 3ds games :(… I still would love to play me some Zelda HD though.. That’d be pretty cool, though still.. Graphics and hardware is only so much of the fun… Where are the games? *sigh*.. I really wanna be excited, but I’m still just using my 3ds as a 250$ pedometer… Oh nintendo… where are your games? 🙁

  9. Virtual Reality? Do stuff with your mind? A controller that only requires 1 hand?!?! Has to be something super-duper cool about it!

  10. I don’t know why I feel this way, but being first mover in the next Generation worries me. Perhaps it’s my Dreamcast memories haunting me but I don’t think I’d want to be first or last into the next Gen because so much in the gaming market is going to change in the next couple years.

  11. Hi.

    If you look in the source for this site, you will see that you have a whole load of strange medical links hidden away in an invisible DIV.

    For some reason, some of these are linking to non-existent posts on my site, and to be honest I’d rather they didn’t. I assume you’ve been hacked, though why a hacker would want to be seeding broken links to me and the other sites (who also have nothing to do with medicine) listed, I do not know.

    If you could deal with that, I’d appreciate it.

  12. Cool, looks like you’ve managed to get rid of it. If you could let me know where it was coming from in your code, I’d appreciate it, so I can try and get this sorted with all the other sites that seem to be infected in the same way.

  13. Yep and I am going say it, and have been saying it since late last year, Nintendo will show a glimpse of “super Wii” at this year’s E3.

  14. I’m actually a bit worried about this. Because if they plan to just make a Wii HD with merely better graphics and stuff as the attraction, it seems to be ignoring their whole ‘disruption/blue ocean’ business strategy until now and trying to compete directly with Sony and Microsoft.

    But hey, it’s just rumours, and I bet Nintendo will show something really clever and unique along with fancier graphics and such.

  15. I wouldn’t expect the new console to be as innovative as the Wii was. They really captured lightning in a bottle last time. That’s hard to top.

  16. Wii had so much revenue that I bet Nintendo spent a significant amount on R&D and they will surprise us again (I hope so)…

  17. Not gonna lie: the vitality sensor evolution theory sounds kick a$$…

    Anyways, I want more than HD guys… And Nintendo needs more games… But maybe that’s just me…

  18. I don’t know what to think of this, really. I had hoped Nintendo would ignore all the idiots shouting for HD, and just go with what they wanted to make. Some sites say it’s ‘to recapture the hardcore audience’, but here’s a fact for you: ‘hardcore’ is a worthless term with a worthless meaning. If we’re talking about ‘fans’, though, Nintendo has given them plenty to enjoy and they needn’t change anything.

    If HD is the only big new thing of the next console, I’ll be sorrowfully disappointed.

  19. @Arjen, I agree that HD should not be the only advance…but given Nintendo’s last three hardware releases I doubt they would consider that innovation. I will be rather annoyed if their next console is not HD(although to be honest I would still buy it). This is not because I want photo-realistic graphics in every game but because the Wii looks pretty cruddy on my HDTV. The HDTV market has grown considerably since the launch of the Wii. You can get a decent sized one for a couple hundred bucks now. I think it would be a large mistake to ignore HD with their next console, not because they need to recapture the “hardcore” but because they need to get with the times. I can only imagine what surprise they will have for us.

  20. I’m down if it has Tatsunoko vs Capcom 2: Cross Generation of Awesome.

    otherwise… meh.

  21. I’m hoping for some kind of awesome new feature in the Wii 2. HD is the cherry on top imo. Good content is just as important as a fun system to play it on.

  22. Hopefully “waggle” will be greatly improved to go along with the lovely HD graphics. The sensor bar is too easily blocked or confused on the current Wii.

  23. Feels like a mistake to me. Wii has not lived up to its potential, and putting it down early is not the answer. Is Nintendo really ready to dial back their install base to zero and start from scratch again?

    Wii sales are down because there isn’t any software coming out. Software sells consoles. Seems like Nintendo has forgotten all the lessons from DS and Wii and are diving back into the “more power/better graphics” arms race that nearly bankrupted them.

    Third parties and the online gamersphere cry for WiiHD, but why would Nintendo cater to the hardcore when that audience has all but abandoned them? The sucess of Wii and DS was not becasue of hardware specs, motion controls, touchscreen, casual minigames, Miis, resolution or gimmicks. Great software sells hardware. The hardware is just a box to play great games. Wii desperately needs GAMES, not a hardware reboot. Nintendo is squandering the success they have had from Wii and DS and they don’t even seem to realize it.

    None of the new market customers they have created are going to follow them to a new, expensive, hardcore HD console. The economy is the toilet. Gas is going to be $5 a gallon this summer. People are struggling. Who is ready to drop $400 on a new Nintendo console (or $250 on a new handheld)? The hardcore gamersphere, sure, but then who? The whole point of Wii was to grow the customer base. Doing a complete 180 will, once again, alienate those customers and leave Nintendo, MS and Sony fighting for the same tiny fraction of the total potential population.

    Nintendo could milk the Wii for another 4-5 years if they would just release some more great games that people can get excited about. They could release another 2D Mario and coast through 2011 on that alone. How about Xenoblade and Last Story? SNES had lots of great RPGs. Wii sales have not stagneted because of aging hardware. The hardware DOES NOT MATTER!!! Wii sales have stagneted because there aren’t any great games coming out for it. It seems so simple, but Nintendo have grown so arrogant that they don’t see it.

    3DS does not excite me. A new Nintendo console with HD resolution and X360-type games also does not excite me. Wii excited me when it was first released, but that exctement has faded as Nintendo has squandered Wii’s potential. For them to fall back into the “more power” arms race that has been destroying this industry for the last 15 years doesn’t excite me, either.

  24. The wii isn’t selling as much because everybody and their mother has bought one, nothing to do with games. The system is 5 years old, and was already underpowered at the time. Makes sense to roll out the new shiny.

  25. Some realistic ideas:

    1. Pokémotion built-in to controller for visual fx in motion.
    2. HD already announced by Miyamoyo yrs ago.
    3. touch screen? Conceivable.
    4. ??? some new innovation in control. Maybe an interactive floor projector/cam for visual foot control?
    5. Intel i7 custom processor

  26. Nintendolife said they had some credible info on Twitter, could be spewing rubbish but they seem confident. I managed to get something out of them. For more detail see @bananaoomarang on Twitter but here’s the interesting bit:

    I say:

    “is it more of an evolution or a revolution? Surely you can say that….”

    They reply:

    “It will be a combination of everything you would expect from Nintendo and yet surprising at the same time!”

    I reply:

    “got it. Inovitave hardware + software + raw power.”

    They then reply:

    “Think you’ve nailed it!”

    Either a dead end, or guessed correctly. They then proceeded to re-tweet my guess. So, there’s something to go on. If true, sounds exiting!

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