BYOND's Nintendo gathering Guild

Wii homebrew continues - USB mass storage support

Fri, 02 May 2008 13:31:50 GMT

* 1 May 08: A USB Mass storage device file/folder lister demo has been released on the #wiidev channel by svpe, the same person who made the first SD elfloader. It is still in testing stages and the code needs to be cleaned up, so no download link will be provided here. It is compatible with anything that adheres to the USB Mass Storage Device specification and FAT16, including USB memory sticks, flash drives, certain phones/MP3 Players, some FAT-formatted USB Hard Drives and even single-slot card readers. When a cleaned-up version is released it will be posted here. Very early and probably buggy source code is available now

WiiBrew

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Wii homebrew ftw!

Nintendo Looking into Flash Memory Solution

Thu, 01 May 2008 18:41:18 GMT

IGN WII
US, May 1, 2008 - Nintendo's recent earnings report was full of great news for investors as the company's fortunes soared to record highs. But what does it all mean for gamers?

Company president Satoru Iwata provide some hints in a Q&A session following the company's press briefing last week. Today, Nintendo provided an English transcript of that session.

Iwata spoke at length on a number of issues, but one in particular caught our eye: the hot topic of the Wii's limited flash memory. Said Iwata, "Statistically speaking, it is true that there are a small number of customers who feel that the flash memory is too small, while many others find that they have plenty of memory. However, because this small number of people are none other than the most avid players, we know we have to review the best possible solution to eliminate their inconvenience."

So keep on complaining, Nintendo fanatics, and you may one day have full access to your virtual Wii games collection without having to delete stuff.

Iwata also gave some vague indication of the current performance of the WiiWare and Virtual Console download services. Total sales for the fiscal year for the two services combined came to 7.8 billion yen.

There's actually a fundamental difference between the WiiWare and Virtual Console businesses, Iwata explained. For the Virtual Console, Nintendo manages the full process of preparing software, even from 3rd parties. As it faces the business risks from distributing games on the service, it also takes a larger share of the profits. For WiiWare, 3rd parties face all the business risks themselves and handle marketing, and thus they get a larger portion of the profits.

For more of Iwata's comments, be sure and check out Nintendo's English transcript of the Iwata Q&A session for yourself.
IGN.COM

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Hopefully, Nintendo will actually finalize this. It obviously shows Nintendo still somewhat care about the hardcore audience. With this extended memory, the wii can hopefully broaden its market and games.

Brawl Gameplay Videos + Tournament

Sun, 09 Mar 2008 17:34:46 GMT

Well Brawl is already taking BYOND'S Member Homepage by storm so i might aswell add to it.

Incase you guys are a bit reluctant to get Brawl i have a few videos i made with the japanese version a while ago:

Video One

Video Two

I am also going to offer a Brawl Tourney/Competition Just for BYOND! The prize will be a Membership!

Tournament Info:
The tournament will be in Two weeks SATURDAY (March 22nd 2008). Everyone who posts their Friend Code in the Guild Thread automatically enters!

SmashBros. Brawl Friend Codes

Sat, 08 Mar 2008 13:42:33 GMT

Post all your Friend Codes in the Nintendo Guild's Forum thread!

Linux on Wii

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 15:36:08 GMT

Team GamecubeLinux:
24 Feb 2008: Long time, no see Although we haven't posted any news in the last 2 years, we have silently continued our work keeping the kernel patches up to date. With the latest 2.6.24 release we have added support for the USB Gecko adapter as a console and terminal, so you can now logon into your gc-linux distro using minicom or HyperTerminal (TM). And last but not least, we have finally run natively Linux on the Nintendo Wii through Team Tweezers' twilight-hack. We have released a small usbgecko-enabled Proof of Concept mini-distro to prove it. Did I say have fun? :)

Source

Linux on Wii

Tue, 26 Feb 2008 15:35:46 GMT

GDC 2008: Pay to Play Your Wii

Fri, 22 Feb 2008 15:52:16 GMT

IGN.com:
"US, February 22, 2008 - During a Game Developers Conference session called "Planning the Wii Menu" today, Nintendo's Takashi Aoyama announced a new Pay to Play program. This will be a new version of the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection (NWFC). Aoyama explained that NWFC will remain a free service, but forthcoming experiences will require users to pay a fee to enjoy. These services will fall under the new NWFC: Pay to Play program. Games that utilize the new service will feature a logo similar to the one used for NWFC but is orange and reads Pay to Play at the bottom.

Unfortunately, Aoyama did not go into details about what games or services we will be paying to play. He did say Nintendo is taking steps to ensure consumers don't mistakenly buy a Pay to Play game with the expectation that they will be able to access the entire game for no extra charge."

UPDATE CONFIRMED BY GONINTENDO:
On top of that, it was confirmed that Nintendo will finally allow downloadable content for Wii games. This applies to disc-based games, WiiWare titles, and so on. The new content will be available for purchase through the games that feature DLC. Perhaps this will finally allow us to download songs for GHIII, and hopefully it will be in place by the time Rock Band is released on our platform.

For some reason a lot of Wii gamers are getting really pissed off, i don't see why...well not yet anyway. Nothing specific has been announced...My bet is that a lot of developers want to get their games to the ~20 Million Wii base using online incentives and such. For example, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Crystal Bearers, it is going to be crazy online (well Square would think so, and i don't see why it wouldn't). Players will pay for premium items.

Nintendo could also use this to separate "Hardcore" Wii gamers that want a full online experience compared to "casual" gamers (who i guess don't even play online), seeing as how well XBox Live has done. But im sure this goes against Nintendo's motives. And this raises other issues such as Hard Drive space (which i haven't found a problem with since Nintendo compresses their games pretty god damn well), online chat (which Nintendo said is coming!) and other online features and the removal of those crap friend codes for hardcore users.

Mario Kart Wii Trailers and Final Fantasy WiiWare Screens!

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:15:17 GMT

I'll start of with Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: The Young King and the Promised Land which is going to be a WiiWare Title:

See More Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King Various at IGN.com

See More Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King Various at IGN.com

See More Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: My Life as a King Various at IGN.com

Click Mario Kart Wii Trailer!

Source

Mario Kart Wii Trailers and Final Fantasy WiiWare Screens!

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:14:55 GMT

Detailed WiiWare News!

Thu, 21 Feb 2008 05:07:49 GMT

Another thread on WiiWare and from IGN.

IGN: As far as getting a dev kit goes, how difficult is that for a developer? The price is $2,000, but previously Nintendo wanted a ton of specifics. You needed to have a company address that was zoned industrial, and it needed to be a pure licensed developer. It isn't exactly an "open source" feeling in that sense, while it is extremely accessible for those in the position to develop already.

Prata: For non-licensed developers we're encouraging them to fill out a license application so that they can become developers for Nintendo. It is the same type of development you'll do with any retail content, but it's a different type of retail in that sense. The end result is content that will be delivered to consumers digitally, so we're also providing the confidential information in the form of SDK's and the like, so we do require that they're a licensed developer. They can always contact us fill out a developer application though.

IGN: Originally it sounded like a lot of these games were going to be submitted to Nintendo and then would be looked at very carefully internally to decide what would be coming out. Some devs would have huge lists of game concepts pushed through at a time, and only a choice few made the cut. Now it sounds like (from talking with Reggie, and from what we're hearing now) that if a game is ranked by the ESRB, you'll take it. Is that the case now?

Prata: Yes that is the case, based on your conversation with Reggie. Effectively we're leaving the content decisions directly to the developers now. We shouldn't be deciding what makes the cut and what doesn't. We should leave that to the creators of the games, and then let them bring their ideas to consumers, and let consumers decide what is valuable and entertaining to them. You're correct in saying that we're no going to sit back and judge the games before they come out, or the specific nature of the game that is going to come out. And in some ways it's very difficult to do that initially anyways. How do communicate efficiently on a piece of paper what a player is supposed to experience interactively, and to require a developer to make a demo in advance and expend a ton of energy and risk on something up front, only to have that be denied, is really putting developers in a very difficult position. Again, if they want to make it, and they have the passion to do it, Wii Ware is there for them.

IGN: Originally Nintendo had set in place a cap as to how many games a specific company could have on Wii Ware at a time, and that developers would need to swap which titles are currently on the service. Now it sounds like that is no longer the case though?

Prata: That was originally the idea, yes. We wanted to find a fair way for many different companies to participate, and we wanted to avoid the situation where a company that had a ton of intellectual properties or titles would just swamp the service with all their games at once, and shove out a newer company or original idea in the process. We were trying to be a little more democratic and say "Ok, you have a project, please submit it" and control it that way.

IGN: Are you worried that companies will start poring tons of games over at once, and just throw in IR control or tilt control and say "Hey consumers, here's a new Wii game" constantly?

Prata: Yeah. We're trying not to put restrictions on the content creators to do that, so it is possible that people can take a game that was created for another system and make it available for download on Wii now. The difference though is that the Wii remote offers a unique opportunity for designers to do something different, and more options for consumers, so in a sense all the intellectual properties that come to Wii Ware will be unique.

IGN: Based on what Nintendo has seen so far with Wii Ware, how many games can consumers expected at launch, both first party and third party?

Prata: We're still working on the launch plans, and we'll have more details on that as we move forward. We'll be talking more about specific licensors and what games you'll see at launch. There are about 100 games in the works that will be made available for the North American market when it releases, but like Virtual Console we'll be releasing those games in a more systematic fashion, and not have them all available right away. A lot of it will depend on developer schedules, so we'll be working with them to find out when they want their games to hit. Also, about 80% of games are coming from companies that have published with Nintendo, so that's certainly a wide array of talent, and we've got games from companies like Square Enix that you already know about.

Well there is definitely more information

Also check out the other Club Nintendo threads which have new information too!