Everybody Votes! Nintendo secretly adds new Wii channel

OK. So this is awesome. But WTF Nintendo, What does WiiConnect24 do, everytime I get on to anything online it takes forever. Now granted this channel is brand new, and Wii News does do pretty well.

But I hate all of these waiting screens. Make it seem instant. And then have the system send my vote in later in the background. Make it smooth. Make it so we can turn on the Wii and 3 seconds later be voting on something and then 5 seconds later be running from Browser on a VC game.

I know as a programmer this is tricky. But from my understanding of WiiConnect24 it is possible. And that's what you guys made it sound like WiiConnect24 would do. Make online and offline seem the same. (Well not for net browsing...you can't download the internet)

I see the fun from this coming from competing with my roommates to get the most predictions right.

"I like how everyone makes fun of me for pointing out the bullshit Nintendo said before releasing the Wii.

People make fun of the PS3 for not having the games when neither does the Wii. People make fun of Sony for saying the stupid shit they do and never point out the lies Nintendo says.

Now you will say I'm pro Sony and anti Nintendo fanboy. Yet another examble of how many of you are assholes that don't know shit."

I wasn't around when you "pointed out shit" so I don't have anything against you. Not that I would if I were around anyways.

I, personally, don't make fun of the PS3. Why should I? People pay for it and enjoy it. Mainly, I poke fun of what industry people who say silly things.

And then there's your self-contradicting quote.

How can you argue that asking owner's feedback doesn't have to do with their videogames? Why? Isn't it a good thing for customer feedback?

I'll use this feature everyday!



...as long as Nintendo pay me for the data they are collecting from me. But I trust they will.

Video of the channel:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8cLuQ0ei8Ao

Making fun of the PS3 is dumb, it's just a box with a bunch of expensive electronics in it. It's not something worth mocking.

Now Sony, on the other hand, is REALLY fun to ridicule. They make it SOOOOO easy.

On topic: This is pretty cute. Not worth a bullet point on the box or an expectation of equivalent services from the competition, but it's certainly cute. And as many people pointed out, they could use it to find out what sort of VC games they should be concentrating on, or other useful things. A nice addition.

Wii60 or PSWii! Everyone spam that question so they put it up. I want to see the results lol. My vote PSWii!

@9: Opera can read RSS feeds.

21 has it right. and I do want an RSS reader, and a damn music player would be pretty simple, as would a dvd player.

Next tuesday 'skipping rope' channel.

Funny, I don't see it.

This is awesome. Sometimes I just sit down floating around the Wii playing with the built in apps. Great that they've added a new one to sap away another 5-7 minutes of my day.

Good going Nintendo. It's actually pretty clever. The act of expressing ones opinion can be very addictive, look at MySpace and all these blogs nowadays. People want to express themselves and now their Wii has let them do it on their TV.

I like how everyone is submitting rhetorical questions and expecting that they'll have some sort of effect (or that they'll even get posted). Might as well submit the questions: "How much do you want to pay for Nintendo products: nothing, or some?"

Currently, all of the questions only provide two choices. To provide any kind of real feedback, they'll need to provide more than that (Ideally something like a five tier option from strongly agree, to strongly disagree). It's really going to be dependent on if they start offering any questions that aren't quite so vanilla, but I expect they'll prefer to take submissions from 4-14 year olds, rather than 15-50 year olds (when it comes to the content of the question).

I like to hope that nintendo is going to use this new power for actual important topics like presidental elections and even more importantly, game remakes. This morning I submitted a ''would you buy a Wii remake of ocaraina of time'' question. This opens a new opertunity for fans to voice there opinions to nintendo, lets see how they use it.

Ps: I'm writing this with the wii web browser.

This seems so simple, I'm really hoping it is masking their efforts to collect an online user list, so they can eventually reveal a "surprise" improvement in online play.

I really think (hope) that is what is going on here. With this user data, they could potentially redefine the way wii users use online services with the wii and also how they INTERACT with each other (wii codes etc..)

"Does anyone understand the point of this?"

Cheap market research?

To anybody having problems with slow downloads or slow VC interface:

Change the channel on your wireless router to broadcast on a channel other than 6. Channel 6 is the default channel to broadcast for almost every 2.4 ghz device, and as such, is full of noise. This causes interference when connecting to nintendo, probably because they are strict on dropped packets and the like.

On topic:

I saw my Wii glowing this morning at was like WTF? Cool something new! Didn't know it was a poll channel. Lets seriously hope nintendo listens to the fanbase on these poll questions.

I think the first one I'm going to submit is: Do you want a GB/GBC/GBA/DS addon for your Wii?

The second will be: Do you want to be able to use 3rd party USB HDD's for external storage?

What's with all the dupe comments?

I think it is cool and I think we need to keep making our one suggested question a day along the lines of gaming, and price of the VC. I have NOT bought one VC game because I think they are over-priced by twice the amount it should be.

They should drop the price on VC games that have been out on the console for more than 3 months. Like with regular games that drop in price after time.

Suggest these questions:
1. Are the Virtual Console games priced too high? Yes, No.
2. Have you bought any Virtual Console games? Yes, No.
3. Do you want to play games with friends online? Yes, No.

Come on Nintendo, where is my online play? It's cool having friends over for Wii Sports and other games, but I'd play more if I could do it ONLINE! I might have to get another console for online play if you don't get something soon.

i'm at work and I miss my wii :(

that's pretty sad, and awesome at the same time. I've never been this attached to a console before. This thing is simply amazing. GG NINTENDO!

I think most people are missing the point of this feature. This is not meant to be some polling or feedback system for Nintendo. It is supposed to be like one of those mindless little fun quizzes and surveys that people take and put up on their Myspace or Facebook pages. You have to think of this from a Non-Gamers perspective, and from a Non-Gamers perspective people love these fun mindless polls, and sharing them with their friends. This is exactly what it is.

Coke or Pepsi?
What is your current mood?
Cat or Dog
Etc.

Chances are high that this thing is censored by Nintendo, so you are probably not going to be seeing your hardcore gamer questions like "Do friend codes suck?" and so forth. First, those are negative in their connotation, and second most casual gamers could care less.

Most people are voyeuristic one way or another. Hence the popularity of the social networks and the amazing things people post on there, and this is a way too feed that voyeurism. By letting people see what their friends and other people around them think about things. I am sure all who tried this made sure that your vote was shared online right? Case in point.

Are VC games too expensive? What an uninteresting question. Why bother to ask when you know what the gamers are going to say, and most people don't care especially when they know what the answer is going to be.

Now something like "What type of pizza do you prefer?" Chicago Style or New York Style, is a little more interesting, and fun.

@66
"Suggest these questions:
1. Are the Virtual Console games priced too high? Yes, No.
2. Have you bought any Virtual Console games? Yes, No.
3. Do you want to play games with friends online? Yes, No."

This is exactly what I'm talking about regarding rhetorical questions.
1.If someone asks you directly if you think they're charging too much for one of their products, regardless of what you really feel the value is you'll probably say yes in the hopes they lower the price.
2.Nintendo already knows exactly who has purchased virtual console games and what games have been purchased.
3.Of course most people want to play games with friends on-line. In fact, lots of people would like to play games with STRANGERS on-line. Nintendo still obviously hasn't figured out how they want to do it and maintain the kind of safety measures they want. Friend codes are seemingly about protecting children who might use the system from exposure to random perverts on the internet.

Regardless, all of these yes/no questions provide no intrinsic value to Nintendo. If someone asks you if you want more features out of their product (such as original content, faster weather updates, cheaper VC prices, and most of the other proposed questions) of course most people are going to say yes. The only thing that would provide value to Nintendo would be a matter of preference between two choices, e.g. What would you rather have: Original Content on the VC, or more frequent VC releases? This provides feedback as to what should be the higher priority for them.

I think friend codes on the DS (and in general) were more about preventing Spammers from being able to interfere (like viral marketing, random people entering your number and sending stupid messages, etc. than "protecting the children"

I also think it has something to do with $, it being easier for a computer to track individual numbers because it forces people to have a different identity on a per-game basis, instead of having to track 1500 users across 5 different games who are all named "Sephiroth"

If Nintendo just integrated an "Online" option into their parental controls, they wouldn't need these codes, just block all Online-enabled games if you don't want your kids playing them

But this will be very good for marketing, so long as Nintendo pays attention (which they have in the past, usually)

Two points:

1) The channel's free, and I got excited when I saw my Wii glowing blue when I got home last night. Haven't played with it yet, but I certainly will. Here's to hoping that they develop it a little more.

2) Everyone's afraid of the Wii codes! I think that, unlike the DS, each game will not require you to add a new code for each of your friends. I think that this was required in the DS because the DS does not have internal memory to hold all the codes in - only the carts would. The Wii should be able to hold all the info you need. I can't wait for online play.... Metroid FTW.

Two points:

1) The channel's free, and I got excited when I saw my Wii glowing blue when I got home last night. Haven't played with it yet, but I certainly will. Here's to hoping that they develop it a little more.

2) Everyone's afraid of the Wii codes! I think that, unlike the DS, each game will not require you to add a new code for each of your friends. I think that this was required in the DS because the DS does not have internal memory to hold all the codes in - only the carts would. The Wii should be able to hold all the info you need. I can't wait for online play.... Metroid FTW.

#10

Please show me the Nintendo quote that contradicts what Nintendo is currently doing and how it negates them from being a 'video game company only'.

So is their a way to cancel the weather & the news channel. They are useless in my eyes I want more space for my classic console games (Yes I spend wayy too much money and have maxed out)

Diet - #1 if you want more space for your VC games you can always move them to a 2gig SD card under the Wii's data managment menues. #2 if you still want to remove the weather/news channels you can go to the Wii's internal menu and choose "Wii data settings" and then click "channels" and you can remove whatever channels you want. Cheers.

Submitted: "Should the Wii region coding be abolished?" No/Yes ('cause the green button matched 'yes' better) Not expecting to turn up as a poll question though...

@Myke

As far as I can see, the Weather and News Channels aren't available from that menu, meaning that you can't delete them like you can the Internet and Everybody Votes channels.

My guess is this is a result of the ways the channels were added. Weather and News were updates to the Wii system, while Internet and Everybody Votes were "purchased" from the Wii Ware Shop Channel.

Seems we are 'stuck' with channels that are provided by way of the Update system.

cool....so can I vote for President of the US without leaving my house next year?

Submitted: "Should the Wii region coding be abolished?" "no"/"yes"
Guess it's not gonna be turn up as a poll question though...

Ok, now this is awesome. I never use forecast and could really care less about photo- but this is cute time wasting fun :D.

You CANNOT delete News and Weather, those Channels (along with the Mii, Disc, Shop, and Photo Channels, and the rest of the Wii's OS) are already taking up about half of your 512 MB, and can't be removed

In reality, you only have 288 MB of space to work with, according to my calculations

Metroid Prime: online multiplayer?

I vote to change the system's name back to "Revolution"

The vote chanel is neet. The price for the Wii in comparison makes the Wii a no brainer. Online play? yeah, and at this price the wait is bearable.

I seen it suggested to move your VC games to an sd card.

I tried that on a 512mb card and was greeted with the response that the game could not be copied. I figured as much so that people would not give friends their games and thus no money for nintendo.

On other postings, I do think that the VC games are to expensive because these are old games us nintendo fans have paid for before. Convenience is nice but perhaps 2 bucks for NES 5 for SNES 8 for N64. I mean not only has Nin. sold these before and is convenient for us but what about them? It is also much more convenient for them as well. I hope they lower prices. (probly not happening)