E3 2011: Wii U Preview

Posted by Mark Salmela on 06.13.2011

Hands on: 411’s Mark Salmela goes hands-on with Nintendo’s new home console the Wii U at E3.

One of the most anticipated announcements at this year's E3 had to be the official unveiling of Nintendo's next home console. The Nintendo Wii has undoubtedly taken the world by storm since its release on November 2006 and now it was finally time to see what would be next. Well as many of you have seen by now Nintendo's next home console has been revealed, and it will be named the Wii U.



The new console has been named the Wii U because Nintendo wants the experience to be all about you. Clever, I know. The Wii U will feature high definition graphics capable of handling today's most demanding games in glorious 1080p. But the Wii U isn't about that. No, the Wii U is all about the revolutionary new controller.

The new Wii U controller features a 6.2 inch screen with single touch capability similar to the Nintendo DS and Nintendo 3DS touch screens. The Wii U controller includes dual analog sticks, a d-pad, 4 face buttons, and a total of 4 shoulder buttons. The first thing I noticed upon holding the Wii U controller is that it has a bit of a weight to it, but it's not as heavy as I anticipated. The Wii U controller is meant to be moved around in a large space, and the weight will not make it cumbersome to do so.



The Wii U will be able to sense its position in space, which I assume is due to the Wii sensor bar. The Wii U is backwards compatible with all Wii products, including the Wii Remote, Wii Motion Plus, Wii Nun Chuck, and Wii Balance Board. From my experiences the Wii U had no problems properly detecting its position in space. I'm not sure if it's the technology built inside the Wii U controller or if the Wii sensor bar included in the Wii U will be an upgraded model but the Wii U never had a problem being accurate detecting its position in space. This is very impressive considering most gamers are aware of how inaccurate the Wii can be at times.

My pick for the best demo of the Wii U was Battle Mii, which was a Metroid style game where two Mii's with 3D Metroid style controls battled against a UFO controlled by the Wii U controller. Here the ship was controlled with the left analog stick, flying up or down was controlled with the right analog stick, and movement of the camera and aiming was controlled by tilting the Wii U and moving it around. It took a minute to get ahold of the controls but once you got used to it flying was second nature and most importantly fun. I had a blast flying around and hiding behind cover, emerging to fire upon my enemies on the ground with both an explosive charge blast and a normal laser shot. I hope Battle Mii emerges as more than a tech demo.



The demo that showed off the graphics of the Wii U the best was definitely the Zelda HD tech demo. It's important to note that this is not an actual Zelda game nor was Link actually playable, rather you were able to alter various things such as the lighting and the camera while Link fought a giant spider in a large, well detailed castle. The graphics were extremely beautiful and ran smoothly. You could change the camera to play on either the Wii U controller or the TV, with the screen not displaying the game showing off a menu system where you could potentially switch between weapons on the fly. If you're a Legend of Zelda fan you need to check out this demo video, because it could be a sign of things to come.

Another demo that showed off how well the Wii U controller works is Pirate Horde, a music rhythm game where you blocked "arrows" (plungers) shot at you from pirate ships. The TV only showed the pirate ship in front of you while the Wii U controlled could be used to look around and find 2 more pirate ships to your left and right. You would first lower your controller to the ground when the pirates made their appropriate cues then held your controller either left, right, straight, or up in the air in time with the rhythm to block the arrows before shaking the Wii U controller towards the ground to block them. The game was decently fun but was more a tech demo showing off how accurate the Wii U controller could be.



The final demo I got to play was New Super Mario Bros Mii, which was basically New Super Mario Bros Wii, except with your Mii's playable instead of Mario and the action being displayed on both the TV and the Wii U controller. The graphics were definitely ripped from New Super Mario Bros Wii but that was fine, as once again this was a tech demo meant to show off the benefits of the Wii U controller and just how good games could look on that 6.2 inch screen.

My overall impressions is that the Wii U was definitely fun but I won't give a final judgment on the system until we see some actual games taking advantage of the Wii U hardware and its graphical capabilities. As someone who got very tired of using motion controls on the Wii I can say that some of the tech demos would get old very quickly but others such as Battle Mii would be legitimately fun games that wouldn't be possible on any other system. The Wii U has potential but be aware Microsoft and Sony will most likely be unveiling new home consoles in the next 2 years with graphics far surpassing the Wii U just like the Xbox 360 and PS3 have far greater visual capabilities than the Wii. If Nintendo can give the Wii U a competitive price (I'd guess around $299.99 based off what I've seen so far) and Nintendo can keep turning out quality games like it always has than I've recommend picking up a Wii U. As a final note it appears the Wii U is only capable of supporting one Wii U controller at a time, meaning co-op players would have to use Wii Remotes.