Anubis2005X

Act disinterested so that they don't jack the price up like they did for the 3DS...

Fandango

http://www.blu-ray.com/news/?id=6194

Nintendo are said to be looking at turning the fortunes of their home console business around and are set to announce the successor to their massively successful Wii home console at E3. Sources have revealed to Blu-ray.com that Nintendo are looking at including Blu-ray as the main optical drive. This would be a natural progression from the Wii which uses DVD, but it isn't clear if Nintendo would enable BD movie playback on the new console or whether they would just use it for data as they do with DVD on the Wii. This new device could be the internal successor to the Blu-ray enabled Wii that was rumored for release in 2010.

pinata242

Obvious. If they enable movie support, I would count that as a plus in my checklist.

Supermallet

Not making the Wii a DVD player was fine, since low cost DVD players can be had anywhere. Not making the new system a Blu-ray player would be a bad move, as Blu-ray is still at a relative premium.

So, my question is, who will Nintendo be marketing this to? The reason the Wii was such a success was because it successfully tapped into the casual gaming market. What are they going to do to pull people in if they're going for something at the level of a PS3?

Fandango

I seriously doubt they would enable movie playback if they did use blu-ray. There would be no benefit to them in doing so.

Supermallet

Maybe the plan is to drop the price on the Wii and continue to sell that for casual gamers, while making this for the hardcore market.

LosingMyMind

Nintendo has some GREAT features to announce for this console. You're all in for a real treat.

NiCK Crush

Blu-ray is a possibility? Hell yea.

Deftones

There is absolutely no reason to put a blu-ray drive and not enable movie watching capability. If by chance Nintendo did, I probably wouldn't buy it out of principle.

bluetoast

This sounds like what their plan was for the GBA and the DS when the DS was first introduced. Or what they claimed their plan was, just in case the DS didn't take off...and when it did, progressively less support for GBA. I can see this as a possibility, although I would guess that they would make more of an attempt at compatibility with the Wii.

Mazje

Agreed.

mhg83

This. I mean how much more would it cost to enable playback? I dont think it would cost much if none at all. What was the reasoning behind not enabling dvd playback on wii?

slop101

My, um, sources revealed that it will be a 3D system with glasses that enable 3D video games on normal HDTVs. Prove me wrong!

Groucho

The same reason Nintendo didn't incorporate any other common sense features: because other console makers did it first.

Fandango

You have inside info or something?
As for them not enabling movie playback, Nintendo does not want to pay the licensing fees.

Michael Corvin

So if the Wii was two Gamecubes duct taped together what does that make this thing? 2 Wii's? 4 Gamecubes? 2 Gamecubes, a Wii and a Virtual Boy duct taped together?

And remember when everyone was certain Nintendo had 10+ million Wii's sitting in warehouses for launch?

Ding. Ding. Ding. For every console sold they have to pay a licensing fee to the DVD consortium. If the new console has BD they would have to do the same. So for every Wii2 sold, they would be paying Sony(and others) a fee.

Since BD hasn't exactly lit the world on fire, I expect it will be locked down for data only and no playback. Why pay Sony even a small amount for every sale?

Rob V

Ok, my interest is officially piqued.

pinata242

So there's no fee to license BD from Sony for data purposes?

Maybe Sony isn't stupid and realizes that the Wii made a significant dent in casual gaming penetration and, while unorthodox, subsidizing Nintendo's effort to keep those customers with Wii-HD will help proliferate royalties on media and increase attach rates. I could see Sony working with Nintendo to make that happen.

Michael Corvin

That's my understanding from back when the Wii was launched(in regards to DVD).

kstublen

I've been a Nintendo fan since I was old enough to play video games. I got a Wii the first day it came out, not because of the novelty of the motion controls, but because of The Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess and knowing we'd be getting new Nintendo games. I never really cared about third-party on Nintendo; just give me quality Mario, Zelda, Donkey Kong, Kirby, and Metroid games and I'm a satisfied customer. To that end, Nintendo has more than delivered for me on the Wii and I know I'll eventually pick up whatever console they offer next, provided they release more of their first-party titles.

dsa_shea

An added selling feature is benefit enough.

pinata242

As had been said, when the Wii came out, DVD was 14 years old and very widespread.

Blu-Ray will only be 6 years old when this console launches and is still struggling to break through.

Makes sense to me as a bullet point to me.

anomynous

BD =/= Sony

pinata242

Does Sony benefit if Nintendo adopts BD?

Michael Corvin

No, but they are one of many that gets a piece of the pie if Nintendo or MS adopted BD.