STMicroelectronics sensors to be used in Nintendo’s Wii

STMicroelectronics on May 9 announced that its three-axis acceleration sensors will be used to provide a motion-activated user interface for Nintendo’s new home console, Wii.

Expected to dramatically change the way people play games, the Wii controller includes ST’s high-performance acceleration sensors that can detect the motion and tilt of a player’s hand in all 3 dimensions and convert it into immediate game action.

Driven by ST’s Micro Electro-Mechanical Systems (MEMS) technology — micron-sized structures that interact with the physical world — the Wii controller can respond to changes in direction, speed, and acceleration, down to the most delicate movements. Specifically, the controllers use embedded acceleration sensors to enable players’ wrist, arm, and hand movements to interact with the games.

Tilt measurements allow users to move characters, while the accurate three-axis acceleration sensing easily transforms the controller into a virtual sword, gearshift, or musical instrument.

The acceleration sensor’s miniature dimensions (5×5×1.5mm) significantly contribute to the user-friendly volume and weight of the TV-control-shaped handpiece.

Ultra-low power consumption of ST’s MEMS devices prolongs the battery life of the controller and the high thermal stability avoids unwanted motion sensing in varying temperature conditions.

The robust design of the sensor also provides very high immunity to vibration and a shock resistance up to 10,000g.

More About: STMicroelectronics, acceleration sensors, Nintendo, Wii

Official press release: Opera announced that Opera partners with Nintendo to put browser on the Wii™ game console

Oslo, Norway and Los Angeles, Calif., May 10, 2006

Opera Software, a world leader in Web browser technology, today announced that Nintendo’s much anticipated new generation game console, Wii, will use the Opera browser.

Users of the Wii console will browse the Internet using their consoles. Navigating via the innovative new Wii Remote controller, users can visit Web sites in between gaming sessions.

“Nintendo is clearly visionary in leading the gaming industry into the new era in gaming, and a wonderful partner for Opera,” says Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software. “We are thrilled to expand our partnership with Nintendo, and work with them to deliver the best gaming experience on the Wii console and the Nintendo DS™.”

“For our Wii console launch in 2006, we required a browser that was fast and secure with support for the latest standards including AJAX. Opera proved perfect for our purposes and is an exceptional addition to both the Nintendo DS and the Wii console,” said Genyo Takeda, senior managing director and general manager, Integrated Research & Development Division, Nintendo Co., Ltd.

Opera and Nintendo announced their partnership to deliver the full Opera browser for the Nintendo DS on February 15, 2006. The Nintendo DS browser is scheduled for release in Japan this summer. Nintendo has not yet announced its global launch plans for this product.

About Opera for Devices

Opera provides an optimized implementation of Internet technologies for handheld devices, digital TV and other devices, with innovative and powerful features that seamlessly adapt the Internet experience to suit varying screen sizes and input devices. In addition to being a full Internet browser, Opera is a high performance execution environment for Web applications and dynamic user interfaces based on interoperable open Web technologies such as AJAX.

http://www.opera.com/products/devices

About Opera Software ASA

Opera Software ASA has redefined Web browsing for PCs, mobile phones and other networked devices. Opera’s cross- platform Web browser technology is renowned for its small size, performance and standards-compliance, while giving users a faster, safer and more dynamic online experience. Opera Software is headquartered in Oslo, Norway, with offices around the world. The company is listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange under the ticker symbol OPERA. Learn more about Opera at www.opera.com.

About Nintendo

The worldwide leader and innovator in the creation of interactive entertainment, Nintendo Co., Ltd., of Kyoto, Japan, manufactures and markets hardware and software for its popular home and portable video game systems. To date, Nintendo has sold more than 2 billion video games worldwide and more than 360 million hardware units globally, creating such industry icons as Mario(R) and Donkey Kong and launched franchises like The Legend of Zelda(R) and Pokemon(R). Nintendo manufactures and markets hardware and software for its popular video game systems, including the Nintendo GameCube™, Game Boy Advance, and Nintendo DS™.

source: Opera

More About: Opera, Nintendo, game console, Wii, Wii console

New Nintendo WII controller

This is a image of the redesigned Nintendo wii-motion controller

• Some changes:
• Now is a longer controll
• The B button was redesigned , now is like a trigger button
• They changed the power button shape
• Added the small speaker

More About: wii-motion, controller

Time Magazine has released an article about the Nintendo Wii console, A time’s reporter was allowed to try the new wii controller and play some game demos.

Here are some important aspects of the Article:

“the industry is deeply troubled. Fewer innovative games are being published, and gamers are getting bored. Games have become so expensive to create that companies won’t risk money on fresh ideas”

“Here’s Microsoft’s plan for the Xbox 360: faster chips and better online service. And here’s Sony’s plan for the Playstation 3: faster chips and better online service. But Iwata thinks that with a sufficiently innovative approach, Nintendo can reinvent gaming and in the process turn nongamers into gamers.”

“Iwata has noticed is something that most gamers have long ago forgotten: to nongamers, video games are really hard. Like hard as in homework. The standard video-game controller is a kind of Siamese-twin affair, two joysticks fused together and studded with buttons, two triggers and a four-way toggle switch called a d-pad. In a game like Halo, players have to manipulate both joysticks simultaneously while working both triggers and pounding half a dozen buttons at the same time. The learning curve is steep.”

“Nintendo threw away the controller-as-we-know-it and replaced it with something that nobody in his right mind would recognize as video-game hardware at all: a short, stubby, wireless wand that resembles nothing so much as a TV remote control. Humble as it looks on the outside, it’s packed full of gadgetry: it’s part laser pointer and part motion sensor, so it knows where you’re aiming it, when and how fast you move it and how far it is from the TV screen. There’s a strong whiff of voodoo about it. If you want your character on the screen to swing a sword, you just swing the controller. If you want to aim your gun, you just aim the wand and pull the trigger.”

After playing the Wariowar minigames , he commented:

“It’s a remarkable experience. Instead of passively playing the games, with the new controller you physically perform them. You act them out. It’s almost like theater: the fourth wall between game and player dissolves. The sense of immersion–the illusion that you, personally, are projected into the game world–is powerful. And there’s an instant party atmosphere in the room. One advantage of the new controller is that it not only is fun, it looks fun. When you play with an old-style controller, you look like a loser, a blank-eyed joystick fondler. But when you’re jumping around and shaking your hulamaker, everybody’s having a good time.”

“We created a task force internally at Nintendo,” Iwata says, “whose objective was to come up with games that would attract people who don’t play games.” Last year they set out to design a game for the elderly. Amazingly, they succeeded. Brain Age is a set of electronic puzzles (including Sudoku) that purports to keep aging minds nimble. It was released for one of Nintendo’s portable platforms, the Nintendo DS, last year. So far, it has sold 2 million copies, many of them to people who had never bought a game before.”

“The name Wii not wii-thstanding, Nintendo has grasped two important notions that have eluded its competitors. The first is, Don’t listen to your customers. The hard-core gaming community is extremely vocal–they blog a lot–but if Nintendo kept listening to them, hard-core gamers would be the only audience it ever had. “[Wii] was unimaginable for them,” Iwata says. “And because it was unimaginable, they could not say that they wanted it. If you are simply listening to requests from the customer, you can satisfy their needs, but you can never surprise them. Sony and Microsoft make daily-necessity kinds of things. They have to listen to the needs of the customers and try to comply with their requests. That kind of approach has been deeply ingrained in their minds.”

“Cutting-edge design has become more important than cutting-edge technology. There is a persistent belief among engineers that consumers want more power and more features. That is incorrect. Look at Apple’s iPod, a device that didn’t and doesn’t do much more than the competition. It won because it’s easier, and sexier, to use. In many ways, Nintendo is the Apple of the gaming world”

Full Story: A Game For All Ages

More About: Time Magazine, Nintendo Wii console, wii controller, game demos, Iwata

Rumored Twilight Princess Control Scheme

This are the rumored Control Scheme that gamers will be able to use for the upcomgin Twilight Princess title on the Nintendo Wii console

The Wii-wand/tv-remote/revmote (call it what you want) will be used for camera control. When “A” is pressed it will control your actions.
“A” button (big one) will be used as lock-on targeting (The “L” buttons was used on GameCube). When locked on, the revmote will be used to swing your sword, use your bow or hook etc.
The D-pad will be used as the original C-buttons for you inventory, since it’s right at your thumb.
The “a” and “b” buttons will be used for camera control as well (see image)
The nun-chuck add-on will be used for steering Link while the two buttons act like “A” and “B” on the GameCube.

Controller

The Wii controller sets aside the traditional controller seen in other mainstream consoles in an attempt to appeal to a larger audience. The controller is shaped like a television remote control and is held with one hand. Due to its symmetrical nature, the Wii’s controller is able to be used by either hand, unlike other controllers. The controller can also be rotated 90 degrees counter-clockwise and used like the NES controller.

he controller is also able to sense motion; a sensor placed near the television allows the computer to sense the controller’s position in three-dimensional space. Other sensors in the controller itself allow it to sense its tilt and yaw. This allows players to mimic actual game actions, such as swinging a sword or using a flashlight, instead of simply pushing buttons. An early marketing video showed actors miming such actions as fishing, cooking, drumming, conducting an orchestra, shooting a gun, sword fighting, performing dental surgery, and what seems to be, a game of Super Mario Bros. with one handed play.[9]

The controller also features an expansion port at the bottom which will allow various attachments to be added to the controller. Nintendo has revealed one of these attachments to be a unit which features an analog stick and 2 trigger buttons. It will connect to the main Wii controller via a short cord, and its appearance while connected to the main controller has led it to become dubbed “The Nunchaku”. Nintendo has stated the aforementioned “Nunchaku” add-on may be bundled with the Wii console.

Nintendo has also announced a controller “shell” which will resemble a traditional game controller called the “Classic-Style Expansion Controller”. The Wii “remote” will fit inside this shell which will allow gamers to play games using a traditional controller while retaining the “remote”’s motion sensitivity. According to Satoru Iwata, it is meant for playing “the existing games, virtual console games, and multi-platform games”.[2]

Despite the controller’s similarity to lightguns which are only compatible with standard-definition cathode ray tube televisions, Nintendo has stated the Wii and its controller will be compatible with all televisions including digital projectors.