Some great new footage of the Chase Mii and Battle Mii demos has surfaced, which offers the best look we’ve had at those two demos yet. They’re embedded after the break.

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Interviewed at CES, Reggie spoke a little on the philosophy behind the Wii U. He’s confident that the console has the graphical prowess to hold its own against its future competitors, but really wants to focus on creating new experiences with the touchscreen controller.

The big innovation with the Wii U is the controller and the ability to have an interactive experience that leverages all of your traditional input buttons as well as a screen built right into the controller. Yes, the system is HD capable; it’ll generate the most gorgeous pictures. But for us that’s not enough.

We need to continue pushing the overall experience forward. We need to bring new types of entertainment. New types of gaming and the combination of a big first screen — your home TV — coupled with a second screen in your hands, in our view, is going to bring gaming to a whole new experience and to continue driving the industry.

Finally, Reggie boldly claimed that “[the] system is capable to do the most complicated, the most HD-intensive types of games.” What he’s trying to say, I think, is that the Wii U has sufficient horsepower to let developers focus on nurturing new ideas instead of fighting a bloody battle for every last frame.

Bit.Trip Runner2, the next sequel in the critically acclaimed Bit.Trip series, will not be coming to WiiWare due to technical limitations. But in a recent Q&A event, Gaijin Games’s founder Alex Neuse touched on the possibility of bringing the game to the Wii U.

While we can’t confirm anything, I will say that while we were playing with our Wii U [dev kit] the other day, we all thought, “Ooh, I wonder if we should bring Runner2 to the Wii U.”

It’s not much to go on, but it’s nice to hear that they’ve at least considered a Wii U release of the game. Make it happen, Gaijin!

Back at E3, Nintendo showed off a special, private Wii U tech demo that demonstrated the new controller’s gyroscopic sensor. Often referred to as the “Tokyo Street Demo”, the word about it spread but Nintendo refused to let anyone record footage of it.

The veil on this elusive demo (officially titled “Panorama View”) was finally lifted at CES, and you can watch a recording of it below.

Apart from the neat 360-degree effect, one of the blog’s readers has spotted an interesting little detail at the 0:09-second mark. Notice the second Wii U controller on the TV stand, displaying a live feed much like the one on the other controller.

Although we have no way of confirming there isn’t a second Wii U in the room somewhere, it’s possible that both controllers are connected to the same console. Special thanks to Guest for pointing this out!

Reggie was interviewed about the Wii U by Spike TV at CES; and while he didn’t make any groundbreaking announcements, he was happy to provide a vague insight into Nintendo’s plans for 2012 and the Wii U’s long-term strategy. I’d recommend watching the full video interview above, seeing how many points he touches on, but there are a few highlights that I’ll mention in this article.

Chiefly, perhaps, is that Nintendo are aiming to capture an even larger audience with the Wii U than the Wii did. Seeing how phenomenally successful the Wii was, it almost sounds like he wants lightning to strike twice. But Nintendo do have their competitors in an interesting position; and I wouldn’t deny that the Wii U is a huge opportunity for them if they play their cards right.

Reggie also promised that the Wii U would be accompanied by a robust launch lineup, and reaffirmed his hopes that the new controller would bring about a set of new experiences in both video games and other applications.

A NeoGAF user dug up an interesting little piece of news – namely, that Retro Studios have hired three developers from Naughty Dog (best known for the Uncharted series) and Vigil Games (the studio behind Darksiders).

Eric Kozlowsky, a now-former Uncharted 3 artist, claims that his current project will be a major highlight in his career. A Zelda game, perhaps?

I am going to work on another project that I am super excited about. I can’t talk about it too much but if all goes well it might just be one of my crowning achievements as an artist….

It’s no secret that Retro Studios have Wii U dev kits, and this new nugget of news only stirs the hype for their secret project further. Let’s hope we see it unveiled this E3!

FarSight Studios, a developer specializing in accurate pinball simulations, revealed on their Facebook page that they have a Wii U dev kit on hand and fully intend to have a game ready for the launch of the Wii U’s digital distribution platform.

The relevant quip:

Quick Nintendo update: We have dev equipment for the Wii-U and fully anticipate being ready for the launch of its eStore.

Two Tribes, a studio well known for Swords & Soldiers and Toki Tori, seem to be looking into a Wii U version of Toki Tori 2, as evidenced by the following tweet:

[blackbirdpie id=”154679968666877952″]

Toki Tori, in case you’re unfamiliar with it, is a charming puzzle-platformer that stars the titular chicken. You can watch a trailer for the first game in the series below:

Killer Freaks From Outer Space was noted for being one of the few Wii U-exclusive games that were present at E3 2011, even having a teaser trailer to accompany it. An interesting “making of” video, from the studio that produced the trailer, was also released but to much lesser fanfare, as it has only been discovered and spread around recently. Check it out!

Nine new screenshots of Darksiders 2 have surfaced, and they’re looking good. Hit the break to check them out! Continue reading…