Reggie confirms Wii microtransactions are possible, Nintendo won't commit

by James Ransom-Wiley { Jun 27th 2006 at 1:25PM }

Speaking with Game Informer, Nintendo of America President Reggie Fils-Aime confirmed that Wii would be equipped to process microtransactions.

Whoopty-freakin-do. What else is new? Well, it's interesting to note that Nintendo hasn't committed itself to microtransactions*, rather, it's placed the ultimate decision in the hands of 3rd-party publishers. "If our licensee partners want to go in that direction, it's certainly possible in our system," Reggie told GI. Whereas Microsoft was gung-ho all along about microtransactions, Nintendo seems to be on the fence.

Is leaving the decision up to 3rd-parties a sign that Nintendo is struggling to keep up with modern trends? Or is it just Reggie skillfully deflecting negativity towards the impending microtransaction standard?

*Virtual Console downloads/subscriptions are not considered microtransactions.

Tags: download, downloadable content, DownloadableContent, microtransaction

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Blink @ Jun 27th 2006 1:34PM

Actually, this makes it sound a lot more like Nintendo's going to make all their Wii Connect24 updates absolutely free. It makes a lot of sense that way, actually, because they wanted you to wake up to a suprise update in the morning that's already been downloaded and applied. I just hope we don't get another case of bad tulips...

BenDoverx @ Jun 27th 2006 1:38PM

I would say that gamers should pay a monthly subscription to download as many games as you want, whenever you want. I mean, paying $5 or whatever the prices will be for NES, SNES, N64, Genesis, and Tubro Grafx games can really get costly. I could just easily download the roms for these games and not use the wii at all for the virtual console.

-B

P.S. Just to save my ass, I have only downloaded roms of games that I have owned for backup purposes..thank you.

Wien @ Jun 27th 2006 1:40PM

Leaving it up to the 3rd party will make it easier for companies to promote their games without being forced to scare away consumers (casual consumers, that is) with the prospect of additional fees. If capcom wants to update Ryu's movelist for free, that will certainly draw more positive responses (and, theoretically, more sells) than Oblivion's Horse Armor crap.

vidGuy @ Jun 27th 2006 1:43PM

Microtransactions allowing further play of a complete game are good. Pushing out a crippled game, then requiring purchase of content that should have been there is, obviously, bad.

For example:

Say Super Smash Bros Brawl comes with 32 characters. That's plenty to be considered a full game, but of course certain characters will be left out. Nintendo could then provide these new characters for $1-$5. A new character available for purchase every 3-6 months would easily extend the life of the game, as long as consumers would be willing to purchase said characters.

Conversely, imagine that SSBB releases with 6 characters. That is so under expectations that it would be a crippled game. Requiring users to individually purchase the remaining 30+ characters would completely kill the game.

I'm in suppport of microtransactions as long as they are done fairly.

I think it's best for Nintendo to play quiet about this because, while the microtransaction model is far form well-established, it certainly seems to be a double-edged sword in gamers' minds, at least right now.

MosquitoControl @ Jun 27th 2006 1:56PM

SSBB allowing us to purchase more characters, levels, and pokemon?

Mario Kart allowing us to purchase new levels?

I'd be for it.
My biggest annoyance about the GC is that they *didn't* milk the franchises. I would have killed for a Mario Kart booster disc with new levels, if only because we stopped playing it a ways back having grown tired of it.
I'd kill for new Smash Brothers content, even though we haven't stopped playing, it would still be nice to have something new.

Nicholas @ Jun 27th 2006 2:01PM

Huh? It's fairly clear to me that Nintendo is anti-microtransactions. That's precisely why they were so late to get on the online bandwagon.

Nintendo will provide microcontent for free, but they also leave it up to do 3rd party developers to do whatever they want... Of course, it's going to be hard to not follow Nintendo's business model.

Besides, microtransactions = stealing from consumers pockets. There's no such thing as a microtansaction. Either it's a full fledged transaction, and the consumer gets something of value for their money... or it's not a transaction at all.

Shannon @ Jun 27th 2006 2:03PM

What about wiitransactions?

Martin @ Jun 27th 2006 2:36PM

"2.

P.S. Just to save my ass, I have only downloaded roms of games that I have owned for backup purposes..thank you."

FYI, it doesn't save your ass at all, it is still illegal, if you own the game or not!!!

Jay @ Jun 27th 2006 2:43PM

Why can't Microtransactions actually be micro? you know, like £1 or whatever.

very misleading.

Bored @ Jun 27th 2006 3:40PM

Gasp....Heaven forbid Nintendo would offer something like this. Seriously, did Nintendo officially give every console owner a percentage share in the company because a lot of their fans sure act like they aren't some super rich company looking to make money.

Peter S. @ Jun 27th 2006 4:12PM

"8. "2.

P.S. Just to save my ass, I have only downloaded roms of games that I have owned for backup purposes..thank you."

FYI, it doesn't save your ass at all, it is still illegal, if you own the game or not!!!"

I have ROMS of pretty much every SNES and NES game out there. Do I actively play them? No. I only test out games I have interest in, in which case if I find out said games are good, then I buy them. It's still illegal, but I'm surely not stealing because I'm actually buying.

So would I be pompous in saying I'm morally superior because I don't download games with the intent of never buying physical copies ever? Probably. I wouldn't say that, though. I would say I'm entirely guiltless in using my method though. In fact, I really only do it for pre-2000 games, because there are tons of resources available for modern games. I won't even download GBA roms simply because I can trust the reviews I read, movies, screenshots, word of mouth, too. So my method is exclusive to old games that "nobody makes money off of anymore" but I'm nice enough to still pay money for them. Hats off.

To me, ROMs themselves are worthless. They have no intrinsic value. Carts/discs can be held, traded, exchanged, shown. You get so much more. Growing up, consoles were the only way to play these games. Of course, I can play StarFox on a SNES emulator or Mario 64 on an N64 emulator, but it loses the magic of playing on a console. There is no instant start-up because you have to wait for the PC to boot-up. Then you have the control issue. The keyboard works fine for NES and GB games, surely. But then you move up to the SNES and ho-boy those sholder buttons can become bothersome. Let's not even talk about controlling Mario in his 64-bit adventure... (Re: horrible.) I don't want to buy a controller to PC adaptor to play as I've always played. Forget about multiplayer. (Yes, I know about the net-multiplay, but for all intents and purposes that isn't exactly straightforward.)

I imagine we'll have to wait for the Wii to load up before playing VC games, but even then it will be faster to get to your game than a PC, and even then, the use of a controller negates the short wait time. I'm entirely for a pay-per-game pricing model, because even though I can play a load of games for a flat $15 (or whatever) a month, I don't want to end up gameless if I suddenly can't make June's bill. Saving up for individual games shouldn't hurt too much. I think the companies at least deserve that. It's not too much to spew forth $5/6/7 for a VC copy of Donkey Kong Country 2 if you can have an absolute blast playing it.

"OOoh, I can get all these games for free online." Screw that, they're not supposed to be free. If so-and-so dev/publisher wants to begin reselling them, don't act shocked because they're not all 2-3 bucks like at the neighborhood flea market. People make these games and expect a return on them. If you ask me, a few bucks to relive Contra for the NES without the BS of PC emulation is worth the money.

In short:
PC emulation blows, but it's good for: testing out games you'd like to buy; taking screenshots for publication, web, etc.; making videos... Nostalgic bursts.

Otherwise, the console is the best. Hands down. I don't need save states, I don't need speed-up or slow down. Those just detract from the original playability of the game. I'm old school like that I guess.

Ben18 @ Jun 27th 2006 5:23PM

I would like to see games offer expansions in the future, whether for pay or for free. If I recall, Halo offered a map expansion set for a fee, and so on. I would love to see maybe six months after release nintendo offer a $5-10 expansion set to some of its games. Whether that be a character set for SSB or maps for Metroid, it just keeps developers committed to games, and makes gamers like me happy.

Capt. Castellanos @ Jun 27th 2006 6:09PM

i for one like the idea that if we want something extra, to pay a small fee, i'm totally fine.

but seeing the way Nintendo is, they might include free small stuff as well. just so we don't have to pay for everything.

Morder @ Jun 27th 2006 6:52PM

the trouble with the expansions is that they might as well keep parts of the actual game from the final version and just offer them as expansions. There'd be no incentive to complete a game and give you the full version as they would stand to make more money from these "expansions"

amiga_tone @ Jun 27th 2006 8:19PM

> ...allowing us to purchase more characters, levels, and pokemon?

Pokemon are not bought they are traded or caught! To "buy" a pokemon is considered immorral in the Pokemon world! ;-)

lol

epobirs @ Jun 27th 2006 8:50PM

The issue isn't whether the Wii can do microtransactions. It's a server-side issue. It's whether Nintendo will offer publishers a unified platform they can use with interoperability. If Capcom has its own Wii shopping mall with its own currency that cannot be used at the Konami shopping mall, that gets to be a hassle.

I'd want just one entity billing my credit card for all of the publishers involved so that at the end of the month, if I've spent $2.50 at each of four different publishers, I get one $10 charge on the invoice. This saves a lot of the transaction processing that stand in the way of more micropayments becoming common.

I still wish Millicent had become a reality and provided a scrip that could be used across all platforms and devices. Game consoles, PCs, PDAs, everything, to enable things credit cards just aren't delivering a decade after the complaint was raised.