posted by
girlwhowaspluggedout
on Saturday March 01 2014, @07:00AM
from the thank-you-mario-but-wireless-connectivity-is-in-another-console dept.
from the thank-you-mario-but-wireless-connectivity-is-in-another-console dept.
GungnirSniper writes:
"Nintendo has announced the discontinuation of their Wi-Fi Connection Service for the Wii, DS, and DSi systems. Over 400 titles are affected, including Mario Kart Wii. Engadget reports that the services that will keep working on the DS after May include the DSi Shop, DS Browser, and DSi Browser, while the Wii will keep Netflix, Hulu, Wii Shop Channel, Internet Channel, Pay & Play, and YouTube.
Could the slow sales of the Wii U be motivating this move? Will casual gamers be instead put off by this, and hurt the company's future sales?"
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Nintendo to Discontinue Online Play for Wii and DS
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(Score: 5, Interesting) by Debvgger on Saturday March 01 2014, @07:17AM
Thank you for reminding me why I'm switching to PC gaming.
Well, it is also because I'm developing stuff with the Rift and that's clearly the future for gaming :-)
Tragedy here is, most gamers were deterred from gaming on Nintendo systems because their online support was so weak/weird.
Also, from a developer's point of view, Nintendo policies on online stuff were so fucking retarded. The last 3DS game I worked on was rejected a ton of times at Nintendo's Lotcheck because we were trying to read stuff from the server (less than 1kb of data) more than the allowed 20 or 25 times PER FIVE MINUTES. Yeah, we needed about 20kb per five minutes and that was TOO FUCKING MUCH. We joked they were using unsold consoles to run the service and that's why it was needed to limit the number of connections. Maybe we were right. Maybe their servers were Beta.
I wonder if they will reimburse me the extra 600$ the DS dev kit cost with Wifi (yes, you had to buy it as an *expensive* option). Although that was nothing compared with the many hours trying to make it work. I have never seen C code with so many goto statements in my whole life.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by TheRaven on Saturday March 01 2014, @08:07AM
sudo mod me up
(Score: 5, Informative) by Debvgger on Saturday March 01 2014, @08:27AM
Yes, that was what I was referring to with PC gaming: To at least have the option to not to use the developer, publisher or whoever else servers if you don't want to. Anything else means soon or later the game is not going to give enough money to maintain a server and die.
This topic burns me so hard I maybe wrote too fast...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by big_e on Saturday March 01 2014, @07:40AM
I want be able to have the same gaming experience 10 years from now. With games with online components, you can't. Eventually either it will eventually shut down, or they will choose to alter the game in a matter you do not like. If you feel the need to be nostalgic and play WoW as it was before the cataclysm, you can't because Blizzard reserves the right to change the game as they see fit and the ability to experience the game as it was before is gone forever. Older games lack the kill switch. The game industry isn't exactly going to be wanting to keep old games running on an old platform they are unable to monetize as that competes against their current product. Someone playing a game they purchased 5 years ago, or worse yet used and is not generating any subscription revenue represents a lost sale to them.
Preservation of current games is going to practically impossible as more and more are dependent on a remote server for play.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Debvgger on Saturday March 01 2014, @07:54AM
Yeah, well said. But it's not only about being online or offline. I'm sad for the Xbox Halo 2 online being nuked a few years ago. But PC version is still working. The problem here is designing the games in a way that depends on you continuing offering a service or not. All games should come with the option for people to build their own servers if they want.
(Score: 3, Informative) by mashdar on Saturday March 01 2014, @12:11PM
There are private servers for classic WoW. Obviously there needs to be sufficient demand.
One would hope, if the primary server was being shut down, that a company would release a final patch allowing GUI server selection (no registry, just a text field). Unlikely, but I can dream.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by slartibartfastatp on Saturday March 01 2014, @08:50AM
There should be some way to do it in a custom server? I guess it would be a terrible amount of work.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Khyber on Saturday March 01 2014, @08:58AM
My Wii plays pretty much only offline games any ways. Charter sucks so bad that only my PC can connect to online games. PS3? Wii? Nope. Not even as the only thing attached to the cable modem (not even a router.)
Destroying Semiconductors With Style Since 2008
(Score: 5, Interesting) by dotdotdot on Saturday March 01 2014, @10:18AM
Online play always worked great for my kids. They play Mario Kart and a couple others online with family out of town. They've been doing it a lot more the last few days since I told them it was going away.
What really sucks is that it affects the game and not just the console. Even if I were to go out and buy a Wii U, which is backward compatible with Wii games, they would still not work online.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by willie3204 on Saturday March 01 2014, @10:06AM
I have modded my wii to play Japanese games and use it primarily for Karaoke Joysound Wii [wikipedia.org] and if Nintendo had whacked this service I would have dropped future Ninetndo services like a hot rock.
What costs could be associated with the wifi service that is worth alienating your customers like this? Someone do maths pls.
(Score: 1) by Abominous Salad on Sunday March 02 2014, @12:19AM
Nintendo just committed suicide.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Sunday March 02 2014, @08:24AM
Wasn't that more like when the Wii U came out, and this is more analogous to decomposition?
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Abominous Salad on Monday March 03 2014, @01:26PM
Perhaps. I know people who adore their Wii U (aside from the dearth of games). I will say this, marketing matters. You couldn't escape the Wii ads back in the day no matter where you hid. I literally never heard about the Wii U except during the trade show news cycles and even that was avoidable in the shadow of Xbox One's DRMGate.
For me personally, as an observer who admittedly buys consoles anywhere from 5-20 years after they're released (I'm still looking very much forward to Wind Waker), the Wii announcement affects me more, so it was the focus of my hyperbole :)
To a large extent I assume the Wii U hate is pure trolling from hardcore gamers who go their usual route of, there is One True Way, everything else is awful and you should feel bad for making it. The gamer trolls smelled blood in the earnings and weak marketing, and went full bully with stories that Nintendo's CEO had been told to kill himself if the Wii U failed - stories that float far and wide.
However, it definitely appears to be fact, that Nintendo's new CEO has never heard of marketing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday March 02 2014, @05:37PM
I tap that with my mouse.