Iwata at GDC

http://www.revolutionreport.com/articles/read/354

Revolution Report's Aaron Canaday was on hand at Nintendo's GDC 2006 Keynote, delivered by Nintendo Co. Ltd. President Satoru Iwata. The focus of the presentation was split into two major parts, the first being the Nintendo DS, and the second regarding the Virtual Console service planned for Nintendo's new home console, still code-named Revolution.

Iwata announced that Nintendo's Wi-Fi Connection service on Nintendo DS has reached one million unique users five times faster than Xbox Live. A large portion of the DS presentation focused on live demos of upcoming release Brain Age, as well as Metroid Prime: Hunters. A new iteration of the Zelda series, The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, has also been announced for Nintendo DS, to be released later this year.

To end the presentation, Iwata announced that Sega and Hudson have signed up to provide content for the Revolution's Virtual Console. Sega plans to provide content from their Genesis game library, and Hudson will be providing content from the TurboGrafx. He alluded to many other hardware manufacturer's that are also jumping on the bandwagon.

Details from Iwata's speech are outlined below. Check back later today for more detailed impressions from the Revolution Report staff.

10:47 A.M. PST - Keynote has begun. Iwata is opening with a story.

10:49 A.M. PST - Nintendo's positioning in the market is akin to Pepsi, being number one in soft drinks by strategy.

10:53 A.M. PST - Iwata makes joke that all creative ideas start with the board of directors.

10:56 A.M. PST - Iwata came up with the idea for Brain Training, a game designed to exercise the brain for the Nintendo DS to be released this May to the United States.

11:02 A.M. PST - Iwata says they would have retailers play Brain Training before giving them actual units to sell to gauge their reaction.

11:02 A.M. PST - Bill Trinen of NOA Localization comes on stage to demo Brain Age.

11:05 A.M. PST - Revolution Report's Aaron Canaday makes note that Bill Trinen is amazing at Brain Age, and the audience is applauding in admiration.

11:08 A.M. PST - Brain Age is an interactive training program. Bill Trinen reveals "Quick Play" -- turning the DS sideways and shows off games like counting, math, and verbal gaming. The game appears to generate the features at random so players aren't accustomed to a routine. Voice recognition and hand writing play a role in this.

11:08 A.M. PST - Satoru Iwata invites gamers to come up and demonstrate the game.

11:09 A.M. PST - Geoff Keighley (G4's Attack of the Show host), game designer Will Wright, and GDC Director Jamil Moledina take the stage.

11:11 A.M. PST - The three try out Brain Age and compete in an arithmetic challenge. Bill beats everyone. Bill had a brain age of 20, Wright scored 41, Moledina scored 37, and Keighley scored 66.

11:12 A.M. PST - In another math competition, Moledina scored 31, Wright scored 32, and Trinen scored 29.

11:14 A.M. PST - Brain Training has sold more than 5 million copies for Japan. Originally, retailers had orders for 70,000 games, but a month later placed orders for about 800,000.

11:16 A.M. PST - As a gift, all people in attendance of the keynote received a copy of Brain Age to try for themselves. Nintendo gave copies to employees to take home for family and friends that don't normally play games.

11:17 A.M. PST - Iwata begins discussing online networking.

11:19 A.M. PST - Iwata wanted to give an opportunity to people who normally wouldn't be willing to play online by making it simple to use on DS. This, in turn, expands the market, according to Iwata.

11:21 A.M. PST - Nintendo Wi-Fi network has had over 29 million gaming session with over 1 million users. Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection reached 1 million users five times as fast as Xbox Live, Iwata said.

11:23 A.M. PST - Bill Trinen returns to the stage with a demonstration of Metroid Prime: Hunters on the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection.

11:25 A.M. PST - Creators of the game take on Bill in a battle of Metroid Prime: Hunters on stage in normal deathmatch mode.

11:28 A.M. PST - First-person shooter developers are encouraged to experiment with Metroid Prime: Hunters and the possibilities of the Nintendo DS.

11:29 A.M. PST - Tetris DS and the New Super Mario Bros. is brought up into discussion.

11:30 A.M. PST - A Nintendo DS Zelda has now been confirmed, called Phantom Hourglass, a mixture between Wind Waker and traditional Zelda. You can use the stylus to control boomerang movements, simply by drawing the path of the boomerang, and will be launched later this year. The game will be cel-shaded, with maps placed on the top rather than the bottom, in order to use the stylus for the gaming in the bottom screen.

11:33 A.M. PST - Iwata begins speaking on his influences for the Revolution controller.

11:34 A.M. PST - Press release just came out. Sega and Hudson games on Virtual Console. Retro Studios was involved in the creation of the nunchaku controller. "Revolution owners will be able to relive their past gaming glories from the Sega Genesis console by playing a "best of" selection from more than 1,000 Genesis titles, as well as games sold for the TurboGrafx console (a system jointly developed by NEC and Hudson). These games join Revolution's access to 20 years of fan-favorite Nintendo games from the NES(R), Super NES(R) and Nintendo(R) 64 eras."

11:39 A.M. PST - Iwata says the most important thing about the Nintendo Revolution is still to be told. Iwata is talking about the challenges of developing a video game.

11:41 A.M. PST - Iwata re-emphasizes, as several times before, that huge amounts of money are needed to market games and elaborate on graphics for new consoles. Iwata thinks a game like Tetris would today be shot down because it doesn't have good graphics.

11:43 A.M. PST - Hardware manufacturers jumping on bandwagon after finding out Virtual Console is similar to Apple's iTunes.

11:44 A.M. PST - "At Nintendo, we do not run from risk, we run to it", said Iwata at the end of the keynote address.

The keynote has now concluded. Stay tuned to our front page for more specifics regarding these latest developments.


1,000 Genesis games and TurboGrafx games to go along with our NES, SNES, and N64 downloads. Zelda DS will be cell-shaded. Nintendo WiFi Connection reachers 1 million unique gamers five times faster than Xbox Live.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

OMG! *splooge*
Heh!
This is great news for fans of the Rev! It's quickly becoming the official emulator of choice for the next generation.
All that's left now is pricing, which could get hairy.
Still, one could look to Gametap or similar virtual arcade services to find whereabouts the dollars will fall.
Still, great article!

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Were they referring to the Revolution as Virtual Console, or did I miss something entirely?

This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

So was anything even revealed.

I sure as hell ain't reading that mess.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Unfortunately no, what is said at the end was basically the high points. Was hoping for a release date of some kind, but looks like E3 this year will be the reveal-all time.

How ya doing, buddy?

Originally Posted by Darkcomet72

Were they referring to the Revolution as Virtual Console, or did I miss something entirely?

Other then that, WIN.

Virtual console refers to the emulator that will allow you to play Genesis, TurboGrafix16, NES, SNES, and N64 on the system via a downloadable ROM service, similar to Gametap.
Also, the Revolution is still the code name for the project, it isn't official yet. If they change the name now, they'd be losing lots of free advertising based on everyone in discussion referring to it as the Rev.

[Quote-Diversion]Unfortunately no, what is said at the end was basically the high points. Was hoping for a release date of some kind, but looks like E3 this year will be the reveal-all time.[/Quote]

GDC is rarely a place for big announcements. Normally it's announcements about development kits, specs, etc., and they wait to reveal their big guns at E3.

What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?

They made big enough announcements to spark more E3 attention, so they've got great attention.

Many are unwilling to admit it, but every person in the gaming world wants to know what Nintendo is going to do with the Revolution. Everyone is curious, whether they like them or not. Nintendo has the biggest show to put on out of the competitors... I can't wait.

FELIPE NO

Originally Posted by Diversion

They made big enough announcements to spark more E3 attention, so they've got great attention.

Many are unwilling to admit it, but every person in the gaming world wants to know what Nintendo is going to do with the Revolution. Everyone is curious, whether they like them or not. Nintendo has the biggest show to put on out of the competitors... I can't wait.

I couldn't have put it better!

What, you don't want my bikini-clad body?

lololololol


no.

How ya doing, buddy?