Most Recent: Wii U

E3 is over and we still don’t know when the Wii U will be released. All Nintendo will say for now is that the new console will be in stores sometime in 2012. But a Sega executive may have spilled the beans without even realizing it.

Alan Pritchard, Sega’s Executive Vice President of Marketing, sat down with GameSpot during the closing hours of the show to talk about Aliens: Colonial Marines, the Vita, the PSN, movie games and the Wii U. It was during that last subject of conversation that the two sides had this exchange:

GameSpot: Will Sonic Generations be released for the Wii U?

Pritchard: The timing just doesn’t work. Generations releases this November, and the Wii U is coming out next spring/summer. […] But to bring out Generations on a platform six or eight months after we release PS3, 360, and 3DS probably won’t be the best strategy.

Pritchard talks about the Wii U’s release window as falling pretty solidly within the April to June timeframe (Nintendo itself has confirmed the console won’t be released before April). And if anyone at Sega would know, it’s the guy in charge of marketing the games the publisher plans to release for the system. It’s too early to say for sure, but I have a sneaking suspicion that Pritchard was telling the truth.

Speaking to Ubisoft producer Adrian Blunt, the MTV Multiplayer blog has confirmed that the Wii U’s online network will launch with the ability to create unique usernames, very similar to PSN or Xbox Live handles:

“The first is the ability for individuals to make accounts. Rather than a machine having an account, each individual user has an account.”

[MTV Multiplayer asked]: “Equivalent to a gamertag on Xbox Live?”

“Yeah, exactly,” he said.

Blunt would go on to say that Friend Codes are a thing of the past and that the complicated codes will no longer be needed to find your friends on the Nintendo network. Instead, a unified Friend List will take its place:

“Also the ability to easily find friends. Rather than using friend codes, which we’ve had in the past, we’re able to connect players in a much easier way, which allows us to have a community that’s playing together in the game.”

HD graphics, no more Friend Codes, third party support… Nintendo may challenge Sony and Microsoft’s dominance for hardcore gamers yet.

I’m not sure I like the sound of this. A Nintendo representative at E3 has told CVG that the Wii U’s tablet-like controller will not be sold separately from the console. “Both the controller and the console will be sold as one unit. You won’t be able to buy the controller alone,” the spokesman said.

If true, this raises some interesting questions, including what are gamers supposed to do if their Wii U controller breaks, and does this mean that only one Wii U controller can be synced to the console at a time? During the system’s debut at their press conference, Nintendo never showed more than one Wii U controller in operation at a time, and the five-player multiplayer demo Chase Mii was controlled using a single Wii U controller and four Wii Remotes.

If there was any doubt the Wii U wouldn’t match up with the PS3 or Xbox 360, it’s gone now. Nintendo has released the system specs of their tiny behemoth and the console appears more than capable of carrying Nintendo into the HD age.

In addition to being backward compatible with all Wii games and accessories, the system will support SD/SDHC Memory Cards or an external USB hard drive for storage. It will also support a “proprietary high-density optical disc” for game storage (basically, no switching discs) and a variety of video outputs including 720p, 1080i and 1080p.

Hit the break for the first images of the new controller as well as a summary of the system specifications, straight from Nintendo. (more…)