Vigil Games have released the first trailer of Darksiders 2, their upcoming game for the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Wii U. It’s only a short teaser, but it’s still neat to finally see some kind of video material pertaining to the game.

It could be that Nintendo are on their fourth or fifth Wii U development kit. A member over at NeoGAF has uncovered a document on a Singaporean government site that suggests just this.

The Wii U’s release date is steadily approaching, though no exact date has been revealed. All we know it will launch sometime after April 2012.

Even though the Nintendo 3DS seemingly had some struggles since its release in March, the holiday season is often the barometer for games and success. Nintendo have certainly tried to pull out the winter stops with late-year Nintendo 3DS releases like Super Mario 3D Land and upcoming titles like Mario Kart 7. According to multiple reports, the brand has seen a major sales boost over the past few weeks, especially with the recent launch of Super Mario 3D Land. While this is great news for the 3DS, it also shines some light on what kind of reaction we can expect to see towards the Wii U in 2012.

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Shin’en Multimedia – better known as the developer behind the ambitious WiiWare hit Jett Rocket – are confident that Nintendo are putting out an incredible platform in the Wii U. While nothing is in the pipeline just yet, their CEO Manfred Linzner expressed his interest in the console, promising that they would take a closer look at it later.

We think Nintendo are going to release another ingenious platform with the Wii U. We’ll definitely look into it later on.

Jett Rocket, in case you’re unfamiliar with it, is a WiiWare action title that gained popularity for its polished visuals and speedy gameplay.

A set of job listings for Ubisoft Quebec would certainly lead you to believe so. The set was tweeted by Emile Gauthier, a “communication guy” at the company, as a public call for talent to work on an upcoming “AAA MMORPG game”.

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Sounds like we’ve got an announcement from Ubisoft to look forward to in the future. The fact that it’s supposedly a triple-A title could mean that it will be a particularly important entry in one of Ubisoft’s flagship franchises. A well-made MMO could also serve as the ultimate demonstration of the Wii U’s online capabilities.

Many gamers (myself included) have been greatly enjoying The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword over the past couple of weeks, pleased with all the new and refreshing gameplay elements it brought to the Zelda franchise. However, in the newest issue of Nintendo Power, Eiji Aonuma revealed that Skyward Sword was only the beginning – Zelda Wii U is destined to “once again challenge the conventions of Zelda”.

Skyward Sword is a title where we took aim at all the conventions of the Zelda series. While that may have been difficult, I think that confronting those challenges resulted in something that has a great deal of value. When it comes to Wii U, we’ll obviously want to add new elements that take advantage of the capabilities of the platform. I think using that as a lens through which we once again challenge the conventions of Zelda is more important than just making another Zelda game. With that in mind, please expect big things from the Zelda series to come!

Nintendo have already outdone themselves to make Skyward Sword the ultimate Wii game; but if Aonuma’s just warming up, I can’t wait to see what else his team will create now that they have a powerful next-generation console to work with.

Vigil’s Colin Banstead, the director of Darksiders 2, has some interesting ideas in mind for making use of the Wii U controller. Specifically, he’s interested in an augmented reality-esque implementation of a throwing mechanism.

One thing I saw at the [E3] press conference that I thought would be cool is using the controller as a kind of AR thing.

Because we’ve got a mechanism in the game where you throw stuff. In the first Darksiders game, you’d have to pick something up and throw it at a target.

It’s always a little difficult to use a joystick to aim precisely and you could have it so as you picked up the [Wii U] controller it would sense when it was held up in front of you and it would turn into a display showing you what was on the screen, and you’d move the target with the controller.

Along with Ninja Gaiden 3: Razor’s Edge, Darksiders 2 is the only other Wii U launch title we know of so far. You can pre-order it at Amazon here.

Reggie firmly believes that the Wii and Wii U will cater to entirely different audiences from this point onwards, which he hopes will enable the two consoles to co-exist peacefully “for some time”. Citing the new $149.99 price point the Wii now sells at as the key factor in reaching an “expanded demographic”. And it makes sense, considering that the so-called “core” audience with an interest in the Wii has had 5 years to pick one up.

He let out another interesting quip, though, which hints at a possible way to “migrate” from a Wii to a Wii U.

We haven’t announced pricing for Wii U, but you can definitely expect that pricing is going to be different and that the games are going to be different. We do believe that Wii and Wii U will coexist for some time. As we drive the install base of Wii, we’re really setting people up to take their gaming library and be able to transfer it over to Wii U.

The statement is quite vague, but it seems the Wii’s new purpose will be to serve as a “starter” console for those looking to get into video games in a low-cost way, with the possibility of a seamless transfer of save data and digital purchases to a Wii U once they’re ready to “step it up”. It certainly sounds like a clever way to leverage an existing, popular product to drive interest in a new one.

Square Enix’s Yoshinori Kitase, who previously mentioned the possibility of bringing Final Fantasy to the Wii U, has commented on the Wii U, praising its tech specs and HD visuals. However, while he hopes that his company’s multiplatform titles will see releases on it, he isn’t entirely sure it’s going to happen.

With the Wii U, it’s great that there’s a high definition console from Nintendo on the market, which was previously lacking. As far as the specs are concerned, the Wii U seems like something we could develop easily for as well. Hopefully that becomes part of our multiplatform lineup, but we can’t be certain as of now.

According to a recent tweet from the studio’s Twitter account, it’s certainly possible that the creators of Bit.Trip may have a Wii U in the house.

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Gaijin later denied that the “mysterious device” was an iPad, which leaves us with an accurate description of the Wii U’s controller. If that’s the case, it’s great to see a relatively small independent developer gaining access to the console this early into its lifespan and may be proof that Nintendo truly are making efforts to reach out beyond big-budget giants like EA and Ubisoft.

Of course, they haven’t outright confirmed that their “device” was a Wii U, either; but really, how many pieces of electronic hardware can you think of that are white, have a “giant touchscreen”, a microphone, a camera, and get a games developer excited?