Activision’s CEO, Eric Hirshberg, spoke his thoughts on the Wii U, pledging his company’s support for the new console.

We will be supporting the Wii U. You bet against Nintendo at your peril.

As a long-time Nintendo fan myself, this confidence in the Wii U and Nintendo’s future makes me happy. However, Activision hasn’t revealed anything they’re working on for the system yet – we don’t even know if they have anything in development at this point.

Still, seeing as Activision owns the rights to a slew of popular franchises (not the least of which is Call of Duty), this can only be good news.

According to Ubisoft, friend codes are a thing of the past. Friend codes has often come under criticism from gamers but Nintendo’s position on friend codes has been stubborn and refused to let them go for the Nintendo 3DS. Could it be that they have scrapped them for the Wii U?

Yes, if the statements by Ubisoft producer, Adrian Blunt are anything to go by. It was while talking about Ghost Reacon Online for the Wii U that he let slip that friend codes were now a thing of the past.

When asked why he thought the Wii U would be a good fit for Ghost Recon Online, seeing as Nintendo isn’t exactly known for its online prowess, he said, “There’s a few things on that,” he said. “The first is the ability for individuals to make accounts. Rather than a machine having an account, each individual user has an account.”

He was then asked whether friend codes would be replaced with a system similar to the gamertag method that Microsoft employs and he said: “Yeah, exactly. Rather than using friend codes, which we’ve had in the past, we’re able to connect players in a much easier way, which allows us to have a community that’s playing together in the game.”

Adding to this that Reggie said that they would have all the functionality that is being used in PSN and Xbox Live and it seems like we will be saying bye bye to friend codes.

If friend codes truly are dead, will you be mourning them?

Speaking to IGN in an interview, Masahiro Sakurai had a couple of interesting things to say about Super Smash Bros. When asked about the possibility of a Capcom character or two making it into the game’s Wii U and 3DS installment, he replied:

I can’t say that it’s entirely out of the realm of possibility that some Capcom character could appear in the next Smash Bros. The big problem, though, comes from the idea of trying to get characters from a completely different universe to fit with the style that has been dictated by Nintendo’s characters in a fighting game.

Furthermore, he made it clear how miraculous it was that he got Nintendo’s own worlds to mesh together at all, noting specifically the difficulty of adding Pokémon to the mix. It’s understandable how much harder it gets with third-party characters, but seeing Solid Snake and Sonic in Super Smash Bros. Brawl gives me hope that Sakurai might go to the trouble of securing a few licenses for the next game once again.

If you could choose one Capcom character to make it into Super Smash Bros. 4, who would it be? My personal pick is Okami Amaterasu.

EA has been showing Nintendo a lot of love over the Wii U. They seemed to be supporting the Wii U console in full, and now EA president Frank Gibeau has shared some ideas on how one of their biggest franchises, Battlefield, could be enhanced by the Wii U’s features.

What’s really going to make [Wii U] stand out for core gamers is the new controller. It’s touchscreen, it’s elegant and it works seamlessly with the experience. We’ve just had a little bit of time with it and we’ve uncovered new ways of playing Battlefield that I’m really excited about.

He also said that “you can imagine that there are new ways of playing the game from a commander mode or for being able to drive from a different position inside of a vehicle. What I really liked about it was how good it felt in your hands. In addition to that it’s super powerful. It allows you to do a lot of things that no other controller can do.”

The fact that EA are considering bringing their major first person shooter to the Wii U is a pretty exciting prospect. Let’s hope more third-parties follow suit.

A numbered Final Fantasy title hasn’t been on a Nintendo console since Final Fantasy VI. These days they grace Sony and Microsoft platforms, but it could be that Final Fantasy is finally coming home.

According to Now Gamer, Square Enix producer Yoshinori Kitase admits that they have been looking into the Wii U as a possible platform to bring the Final Fantasy franchise to.

“Three or four years ago we joked around about developing a Final Fantasy game on the Wii Fit balance board,” Kitase told NowGamer at E3. “But after seeing Wii U revealed at Nintendo’s conference, we are now considering the possibilities of bringing the Final Fantasy series to the format.”

Final Fantasy 15 to be a Wii U exclusive? Probably not but it’s nice to see that Square are taking the Wii U seriously.

On a related note, it’s worth noting that Square Enix is planning to set up a ‘next-generation’ studio for the eight generation of home consoles.

Gearbox Software, the team developing Aliens: Colonial Marines recently spoke to Kotaku about how the Wii U version of the game would take full advantage of what the console’s controller can do.

Randy Pitchford of Gearbox Software talked about three ways that the Aliens’ game would be using the Wii U’s new controller. First of all the entire game can be played on the device with the TV off. Which means you could pretty much play through the entire game without seeing it on the TV.

Secondly, (and my favourite use) the controller will be used as a motion tracker, a device from the Alien series that can track the location of friends and enemies from their movement. Players might be asked to do a ‘sweep’ of the area which will involve them moving the controller around them to search for enemies which will show up as blips on the controller’s screen.

Next up, the Wii U controller screen can act as a fully interactive map that will allow players to play through areas with a map of the surrounding area. And finally, the device will sometimes be used in minigames to unlock doors.

It’s good to see that developers are really thinking hard about how they can use the controller to enhance gameplay. The game is still in prototype stage at the moment so I wouldn’t be suprised to hear more ways that the Aliens’ game will be using the Wii U’s unique features.

“The Wii U is really bad ass,” Pitchord said. “We have a lot of great ideas that we’re already working on.”

So what do you think about how Aliens: Colonial Marines will be using the Wii U’s controller?

Will a MGS game come to the Wii U?

Eurogamer has been chatting to Kojima Productions about the possibility of Metal Gear Solid on the Wii U. Creative producer, Yoshikazu Matsuhana told the gaming site that they had been aware of Nintendo’s new console way before it was shown at E3 and that Nintendo had approached them with it.

With the impending release of Metal Gear Solid on the 3DS it would be great to see a Metal Gear title on the Wii U as well. This is what Matsuhana had to say about it.

We are very much thinking about possibilities with the Wii U and it looks like a very fun system. As for whether we’ll have something at launch for the Wii – we can’t say that. Probably not, but we definitely have things in mind. We’re also looking at the public reaction. If there are enough people who say they want us to bring something to the Wii U that also factors into things.

When asked whether Metal Gear Solid 5 would be a nice fit for Nintendo’s newest home console he responded cheerfully that he could say nothing and that it was top secret.

Ubisoft recently revealed that they were developing two new IP’s for the Nintendo Wii U and now the first details about one of them are coming out. The game is called Killer Freaks From Outer Space and is an exclusive first-person shooter for the Wii U.

Killer Freaks From Outer Space is set in London (horaay!) and you play as one of a few survivors taking down a hoard of killer aliens with a host of weapons. Aiming is done using the Wii U’s new controller and you move your character using the control sticks. Points and rewards are given for kills and the game will have some destructible environments.

The controller will act as a viewpoint so if you move the controller the character’s view moves in that direction. The controller can also be used to show what’s happening on the TV.

Some of the other features included are:

• 1 Vs 1 play where the other person uses a classic controller
• Use the Wii U controller to get an overhead view
• The accelerometer usage: If you more fast then the character will turn fast

Ubisoft are convinced that their game will change how first person shooters are played. Whether this points to the fact that there will not be optional controls (for example, aiming with control sticks instead of moving the controller) is unknown at the moment.

This is what Guillemon had to say about Killer Freaks on the Wii U. “When Nintendo launches a new console, it’s always a big milestone for the industry and a great opportunity for creativity,” said Yves Guillemot, chief executive office at Ubisoft. “Killer Freaks will make the most of all the fantastic capabilities of the Wii U and provide hardcore players with a gaming experience like no other they have seen or played before.”

Continue reading for screenshots and a trailer.

Continue reading…

Sorry GameCube, but it seems your days are finally over.

That’s it, to put it bluntly. Reggie confirmed just a couple of hours ago that the Wii U won’t play any GameCube games. Nintendo’s reason for this is unknown, but my bet is that they want to move on and leave the GameCube in the past. Before you ask, the new console doesn’t have any ports for GameCube controllers or memory cards, either.

Considering how many awesome games there were on the GameCube, though, I’m calling it right now that we’ll eventually see the best of them appear on the Wii U’s inevitable Virtual Console service.

I'll have the tablet and you guys can have the Wiimotes

Ever since Nintendo demonstrated the Wii U controller in a multiplayer game questions have been surrounding it. The demonstration only showed local multiplayer with one person using the controller while the other players used Wii controllers. This seemed to suggest that only one person in a multiplayer game would be using the Wii U’s new controller.

It now seems that this has been confirmed. According to CVG, they asked a Nintendo spokesperson about the price of the Wii U and the controller the spokesperson had this to say: “”Both the controller and the console will be sold as one unit. You won’t be able to buy the controller alone.”

The Nintendo representative also went on to say that multi-player games for the Wii U were being designed with the idea of one person using the Wii U tablet controller while the others used Wiimotes.

There is a chance that the Nintendo rep was mistaken or that Nintendo might allow for more than one tablet in the future but if not, what do you think of the idea of only one tablet for multi-player games?