Nintendo’s Fils-Aime on Wii and Second Life
By Adam Reuters
SECOND LIFE, Nov 29 (Reuters) - Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime sat down with bureau chief Adam Reuters on Wednesday for an interview inside the Reuters Auditorium in Second Life to talk about the company’s popular new Wii console, the overlap between the Wii and Second Life, and possibilities created by its innovative motion-sensitive controller.
Jump to the listen / download links below the transcript
The following is an edited transcript. (photos by Taran Rampersad)
Adam Reuters: It seems like there is a lot of crossover between the Second Life demographic, which is very evenly split by gender and brings in people who aren’t traditional gamers, and the audience you’re going for with the Wii.
Reggie Fils-Aime: We have focused from a Nintendo perspective on bringing gaming back to the masses. We want core gamers as well as brand new gamers — women, older consumers, people who never saw themselves as gamers, and that seems very much like the Second Life audience.
AR: I know a lot of people are interested in the avatar system in the Wii set-up, can you talk a little bit about that?
RFA: The Mii’s are fabulous — the ability to create an avatar of yourself using the program we have built into the Wii console. You use these characters in a variety of game. Right now you can use it Wii sports, but there will be a variety of games you can use it as well.
When you plug your console into the Wii console, the Mii travels. It can show up in the audience of a game going on in Germany or Australia.
AR: Do you have plans to create a social network in the future around the Mii? Maybe online profiles or the ability to customize it further?
RFA: We think the ability to customize your Mii if very fascinating, adding more personality, more information, so certainly that’s something we’re looking at.
AR: Will we see anything cross-platform, bringing the Mii to Second Life or vice versa?
RFA: We have had so much interest from a variety of virtual networks out there. We have Miis showing up on MySpace, and other places, so I’d love to see it show up on Second Life.
AR: The fact that the Wii controller is 3D has a lot of people thinking, ‘how can I hack this thing.’? What’s Nintendo’s policy towards people taking their own initiative there?
RFA: We would rather people not hack into the Wii controller or into the system, and I have to say our technology is pretty robust.
AR: Are there any games currently or in development that will use the 3D interface to reach in and use the controller to move in three dimensions?
RFA: The best example is probably Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, where you’ll be able to use the Wii remote and the nunchuck to manipulate the hand of the main character. So to open a door, you’d reach out, twist and pull back. All that type of interaction is being programmed right now by the world’s best developers.
AR: What is Nintendo’s thinking on MMO’s, is it something that the company is looking at, or is it possible with the game’s current hardware?
RFA: The Wii certainly has enough power to drive an MMO and make it totally interactive. Are we as a first party looking at it? Not so far, but are we encouraging other developers to look into this? Absolutely. We believe with the nunchuck and the Wii remote it could be a fantastic MMO.
There’s nothing from a pure MMO standpoint in the pipeline but I have spoken with a handful of developers and it’s something they’re intrigued with.
AR: When the Opera web browser comes out for the Wii, which will be flash-enabled, will people be able to play Flash games with their Wii controller?
RFA: The Wii is a closed system. But if we worked with publishers to make Flash content, we could make it available. If you go to a Web site with a Flash game you should be able to play it, but not necessarily with the full 3D motion of the Wii remote.
There have been a number of development companies that have reached out to us who say they want Flash-enabled games to play on the Wii console.
AR: We’ve got a question from Howie Lament: ‘Why is Nintendo keeping the region lock system on the Wii console? People have to jump through hoops to play the games they love.’
RFA: The region system is focused on us having great games in the U.S. for the way the TVs are set up, versus PAL, the way that European TVs are set up, so quite frankly we needed to do this this way to manage the technology.
AR: Someone in the audience has put up a video on YouTube, he’s playing his Wii maybe a bit too vigorously, the controller slips out of his hand and becomes a projectile. I know there are extensive warnings, but do you maybe need a stronger hand strap?
RFA: We keep telling people three things: When you’re playing Wii and your hand gets sweaty, you gotta wipe it off. And you have to properly attach the strap, some people aren’t quite doing it the right way, which can lead to the Wii remote potentially flying off. And the third piece, a lot of consumers when they’re playing Wii Bowling are actually letting go of the Wii remote like it’s a real bowling ball.
AR: They shouldn’t do that?
RFA: They shouldn’t do that. So wipe off your hands, use the Wii properly, and don’t throw the remote.
AR: Practice proper Wii hygiene?
RFA: Exactly. Proper Wii care is very important.
AR: We’ve got another question from the audience: Are there plans to bring the Wii-mote to other platforms?
RFA: For us, the Wii remote is part of our strategy that differentiates us from our competition. So we’re not eager to see it showing up on other platforms.
AR: There’s a pretty large community of people in Second Life who have disabilities, who enjoy the fact that Second Life gives them the ability to move and act freely. Now that the Wii has brought physical motion back to gaming, is that a potential issue?
RFA: We have a lot of work with some charities to bring disabled people to Redmond, and we did that early on with the Wii. We could really see how sensitive the Wii remote was, without requiring a large range of motion.
AR: I know you’ve been busy with the launch, but now that you have a little more time, will you be taking another look at Second Life?
RFA: I absolutely will.
Note: There is a small audio cut-out near the 10 minute mark.
