Third Parties Surprised By Wii MotionPlus

By Jorge Ba-oh 23.07.2008 20

Nintendo's latest peripheral for Wii, the MotionPlus, came as a surprise to the gaming public. It seems that a fair few third parties also fell into that category.

During E3 the king of console add-ons revealed an advancement for motion control for Wii players: the MotionPlus. The plugin, due to be bundled with Wii Sports Resort, offers increased precision and motion mapping; something that punters have argued should have been implemented with the console's release in 2006.

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Gameinformer discussed the announcement with a handful of third-party developers, and the general consensus was a feeling of annoyance and betrayal. It seems that studios weren't informed of the change, and it seems that aside from Wii Sports it'll take up to 9 months before third parties would release MotionPlus-enabled titles. Titles already deep in development may suffer looking sluggish and not as precise as newer movement-driven titles.

With third parties in the dark and the need to buy additional hardware to make future games function properly, is the future of MotionPlus already a bleak one?

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Guest 23.07.2008#1

Wow, way to go Nintendo.

I knew it. No 1:1 for ages, and probably not in Red Steel 2 like everyone probably wanted, nor in The Conduit. Well done Nintendo. \"We luv r 3rd partys!!!1\" u shur do.

( Edited 23.07.2008 12:47 by SuperLink )

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The Conduit doesn't even really need it. A few third parties probably have been told about it - I would reckon Ubisoft are one of those, and this is the reason for the Red Steel 2 delay (as well as general problems with development). I'd also guess SEGA, Capcom and EA are in on it, at least.

Seems pretty retarted not to tell them. What possible losses could there have been?

"Study this revelation, you nest of adders!"

It seems a big shame for titles like the Conduit, I imagine the could have implemented it well. The reload for the energy orb laser would have been great with it.

Oh, please, 3rd partys for the most part cant manage to scrap gamecube quality games out of the Wii.
They have forfitted any rights to complain about not being at the \"cutting edge\" of what Nintendo announces.

Besides, it will take a good year before Motion+ is in another hands for it to be worth making a big game for.

3rd partys are really just complaining they didnt have enough warning to bring out some rushed shit and stick the logo on the box.

\"It seems a big shame for titles like the Conduit, I imagine the could have implemented it well. The reload for the energy orb laser would have been great with it.\"

The existing Wiimote is good enough for a reload. (which is a boolean gesture action..if your reloading or not is a yes/no thing).

FPS, likewise, is done ver the IR sensor system...rotational axis is not needed.

Of course, Condiuit could have implimented it...purhapes for, saying, batting stuff back with a gun butt.

But Motionplus is for giving developers the \"missing axis\", and really, specific games have to be designed from the ground up to use it.

( Edited 23.07.2008 13:53 by Darkflame )

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SuperLink said:
I knew it. No 1:1 for ages, and probably not in Red Steel 2 like everyone probably wanted, nor in The Conduit. Well done Nintendo. "We luv r 3rd partys!!!1" u shur do.

I think another reason is that Ubisoft saw the conduit and Hight voltage said no to them, so they thought oh fuck, it's going to sell way more than RS2, we actually have to work on it.

Anyway, i'm sure that Nintendo showed it to enough companies(atleast the decent ones) and gave certain companies a big boot to the face by not telling them.

Wasn't the Wii remote a massive shock to alot of the third parties three years ago?

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Guest 23.07.2008#8

Well, nobody can really say anything about this news as Gameinformer doesn't say which developers they spoke to. It seems logical to me they would contact a few big developers instead of small ones, and then this all seems pretty dumb for Nintendo to do.

Sounds like Nintendo are admitting that the motion controls aren't good enough as they are.

As for not telling 3rd parties- it's a great way to piss off gamers and of course the 3rd parties themselves.

Guest 23.07.2008#10

It's a pretty smart business move if you think about how much more money Nintendo can make by releasing a remote and then this thing, instead of releasing the full thing at the start.
Gamers think "Oh imagine how great it would be if you could actually have a proper 1:1 sword fight in Zelda", Nintendo: "We just invented the solution!". Gamers; "Yay! I can't wait to try this."

It's very hard to not get cynical about stuff like this.

Nintendo has a history for not making it accommodating for 3rd parties to develop games on their systems. I don't think you'll ever see decent 3rd party support on a Nintendo system, no matter how many systems they have. The ratio of Nintendo games bought to Non-nintendo games will always really favour the former.

If they'd told all of the third parties we'd probably just have a bunch of stupid gimmick games a lot sooner. Seriously, if they were making crap before this came out what's going to make them take things seriously now?

I don't mind seeing some quality come out before everyone else gets their hands on this. That way Nintendo can set the standard. Plus games like The Conduit don't really need it.

darkflame pretty much put everything in perspective.


Bart.... said:
It's a pretty smart business move if you think about how much more money Nintendo can make by releasing a remote and then this thing, instead of releasing the full thing at the start.
Gamers think "Oh imagine how great it would be if you could actually have a proper 1:1 sword fight in Zelda", Nintendo: "We just invented the solution!". Gamers; "Yay! I can't wait to try this."

It's very hard to not get cynical about stuff like this.

They did the exact same with the Balance Board I think. They didn't tell anyone about it, and yet pretty soon titles started coming through including it.

Half the GameInformer article was speculation, speculation of which goes completely against what we've already seen. As long as it's interesting and does enough, then it'll sell. Despite what's been said above, it kinda seems more like Nintendo have usually been pretty accommodating to 3rd parties in spite of surprise announcements.

I really don't see their point on games in deep development. Kinda seems obvious so what would be the point of mentioning it. If after 2 months we've got balance board stuff, I kinda doubt it'd be 6 months minimum for anything to come about.

You know what? This is bullsh*t. If anyone has the right to feel annoyed and "betrayed(?)", it's Nintendo and us Wii owners. The sheer amount of sub-GameCube quality games they've been shoveling on Wii is sickening. What GameCube was capable of was very impressive (Rogue Squadron 2 & 3, RE4, MP 1 & 2, SF Adventures, Mario Sunshine, etc.) and considering how much more powerful and efficient Wii is than GC, we should be getting games that are at the very least, twice the quality of the above mentioned GC titles. Consistently. They have absolutely NO right to complain.

I'm really sick of them screwing us over with their low-budget, half-assed, un-inspired, content/feature gimped shite. If Wii was selling poorly, then I can say there's some merit to their lack of effort, but that isn't the case. Not in the slightest. So no. Epic fail.

The Wii Remote works quite well as it is. Any problems with their motion controls is a direct result of poorly thought out and/or implemented motion recognition. Which isn't surprising considering the quality of almost every other aspect of their games is utter crap (i.e. gfx, sfx, Wi-Fi, content, features, etc.).

The Wii Remote works quite well as it is, but it's mainly with medium to large sized movements at preset-like speeds. Better results can be achieved, but like anything else, it requires some actual effort to get. Devs have stated before 1:1 ratio has been achieved and tested, but performance had been rather twitchy (although, that could also be from a lack of proper effort).

Wii MotionPlus, on the other hand, allows games to recognize more subtle and intricate movements at slower speeds allowing for more refined and intuitive gameplay than just the Wii Remote alone. I don't see this as a sign "Nintendo's admitting the Wii Remote fails to deliver" at all.

I find it hard to believe Nintendo wouldn't have clued in 3rd parties without having a good reason. It's possible they only recently reached a point where Wii MotionPlus was at a presentable level and, with E3 imminent, saw they opportunity to showcase their brand new attachment and seized it. Either way, it isn't launching for about year.

Chance favors the prepared mind.

So the original Wii-Mote was half-assed?

I sold my soul to Sony for a PS3...

Yet again even more people pissed of at Nintendo.

Honestly Nintendo, good fucking job on your E3 showing.

RATGUOF said:
So the original Wii-Mote was half-assed?

Actually it works quite well in the games where developers knew how to use it properly instead of just throwing in random waggle.

tiamat1990 said:
Yet again even more people pissed of at Nintendo.

Honestly Nintendo, good fucking job on your E3 showing.


I watched ALL of the E3 press conferences and they were ALL snore fests. Smilie
E3 just isn't the same anymore.

This is probably an experiment to be properly implemented in the next Generation of console, or Wii2 if you like. This may not take off apart from some Nintendo developed titles (they probably won't force people to buy it) and a few 3rd party releases for a hardcore audience. This will come into its own when it is implemented at launch on another console, and we will get our great games, providing Nintendo hasn't completely sold out by then Smilie

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Actually, I agree with MechaG2, if you look at it that way the 3rd party companies (mainly the small ones) DESERVE this, for the shit they put out on our consoles. Only just now I realised that. If they were making dodgy titles pre-E3, that couldn't even match pre-MOTION standards, what makes people think that telling them in advance would improve the quality of their work?
Yes, we might miss out on decent motion+ titles.
Yes, they arn't ALL bad developers.
But i really don't think that Ninty would be so stupid as to not warn ANYONE about this, at least one big-name brand has to know (a chance for R.S 2), and if that's the case then I have no sympathy for the people responsible for $59.99 space-fillers that line the shelves at my local EB games.

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