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Iwata Asks: Wii U Chat

H

Hobby

Member
Watanabe: So as the development of Wii U was moving along, and we began talking about adding a camera, we began to look into communication technology with NTD5 and Vidyo6 an American company that specialized in video conferencing systems. And then around the end of last year, we concluded that we might be able to make it work.
Click to expand...

Watanabe: With Vidyo's technology, their communication method is capable of monitoring the connection status in real time and dynamically adjusts the signal to the optimum bitrate so there are minimum amount of interruptions. Because of this, when there's a problem with the network, the resolution is lowered slightly, but you can still watch the video without noticing much of a difference. I think that's a huge thing.
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Iwata: That's right. I had received notification from NOA (Nintendo of America) that a team at NLG (Next Level Games)9 whom we had close connection with, had an open line. They asked if there was anything we could do with it, and we were just investigating, "Maybe we could do built-in video chat?" It fit with the project, so we decided to pursue it officially.
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Iwata: The Nintendo Zone Viewer was actually developed in collaboration with an overseas company, right?

Tamiya: Yes. We developed it with the Project Engineering Department, which was one of the departments at NOA.
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Iwata: Previously, when developing software for hardware at the same time with hardware development, departments within Nintendo Japan were in charge of the majority of development, but leveraging Tamiya-san's previous experience, we are now able to work together with a lot of teams like this on what used to be handled with just the internal teams. By the way, Watanabe-san, were you able to smoothly integrate Vidyo's technology into Wii U?
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Tamiya: Right. So we wanted Wii U Chat to be something that those people could use without any trouble, which meant that we wanted to make the process as simple as we could. Within the development team, we call it the "2 Step Connection."

Tamiya: First, when you boot up Wii U Chat, you'll see a list of all the Mii characters you have registered as a friend. Step one, you pick the friend you want to talk to. Step two, push the Call button, and then you're connected!
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Iwata: How do the Mii characters show up?

Tamiya: The Mii characters are listed in order of video chat frequency. A Mii character of the person you video chat with often will display up front, so when connecting to those kinds of people, you don't even need to scroll around to look for that person's Mii.
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Tamiya: Takeda-san said, "I want this to be a console that brings a family happiness." And he continued to say two other things, which were "Since this is being made by Nintendo, there has to be some element of play", and " I want everybody to be able to use this from day one."
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Iwata: That makes sense. By the way, I can imagine all sorts of possible situations, like what if the other person is playing Wii U? Or what if they aren't using their Wii U? What happens in those cases?

Tamiya: First, when the other person is online with Wii U, and you call them, their Home Button will flash to let them know a call is coming in. If they open the Menu, they'll get a message telling them they have an in-coming call, and if they answer it, the Wii U Chat session begins.

Iwata: But they have to end the game they were playing, right?

Tamiya: Yes, they will have to end the game.

Iwata: There must be technical hurdles involved, but I hope this is an area that we can improve on in the future. What if the other person's Wii U isn't turned on, or if they aren't logged in?

Tamiya: They wouldn't be able to tell from the Wii U, but you can leave a message that appears in the messages list on Wii U Chat, and also through a message on Miiverse.
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Tamiya: Yes. We wanted something you could do while you were chatting to make conversations more fun. You can use the Wii U GamePad to draw and write, so this was an idea that kind of came up naturally. It's actually a lot more fun than you'd think. You're not often able to doodle on someone's face in real life, but you might have the urge to try. When we tried it, it broke the ice, and it spurred conversation. Normally you can never doodle on your bosses face, but we were able to do so during development. In fact, when you're doodled on, it actually makes you happy.
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Tamiya: During development when we were in a serious conversation with NLG, the mood became unpleasant. It became difficult to cut in during middle of a conversation, but by doodling quick snippets of something on the screen by hand, the mood eased down, and we were able to become more forgiving. This was something that actually happened.
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Iwata: Are there any other tools, besides drawing?

Tamiya: Actually, we had all sorts of ideas from people inside and outside the company, but in the end we decided not to add any of them. We tried out all sorts of different ideas, but it would have actually taken away the simplicity and how it's so easy to understand.
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http://iwataasks.nintendo.com/interviews/#/wiiu/wii-u-chat/0/0
 
A

axisofweevils

Holy crap! Today's real megaton is that more than two people can have the same first name.
This made me laugh.

Tamiya: ....You're not often able to doodle on someone's face in real life, but you might have the urge to try. When we tried it, it broke the ice, and it spurred conversation. Normally you can never doodle on your bosses face, but we were able to do so during development. In fact, when you're doodled on, it actually makes you happy.
Click to expand...
 
A

AndTAR

Member
I wonder why the game session has to end, as Wii U Chat seems to be an OS-level app. Needing to consume application RAM in addition to the system RAM? CPU capacity occupied by a game, even when it's paused?

Edit: Oh wait, scumbag brain swapped the TVii button for a chat one. Real one sits on the app grid, makes perfect sense then of course.
 
@

@MUWANdo

Banned
AndTAR said:
I wonder why the game session has to end, as Wii U Chat seems to be an OS-level app. Needing to consume application RAM in addition to the system RAM? CPU capacity occupied by a game, even when it's paused?
Click to expand...

It's not an OS-level app--those are clearly identifiable on the dash as little coloured icons, similar to the ones on 3DS.
 
K

Kai Dracon

Writing a dinosaur space opera symphony
Ending the game to take a call is unfortunate and unexpected. It had seemed as if it'd just pause the game and send it into the background, ala pressing the home button on the 3DS.

If they do perform an OS update for it, hopefully it would retroactively affect all games, not just newer games designed to take it into account.
 
shira

shira

Member
axisofweevils said:
Tamiya: ....You're not often able to doodle on someone's face in real life, but you might have the urge to try. When we tried it, it broke the ice, and it spurred conversation. Normally you can never doodle on your bosses face, but we were able to do so during development. In fact, when you're doodled on, it actually makes you happy.
Click to expand...
I hope that penis filter shield is working day 1
 
F

Flame Lord

Member
Tamiya: First, when the other person is online with Wii U, and you call them, their Home Button will flash to let them know a call is coming in. If they open the Menu, they'll get a message telling them they have an in-coming call, and if they answer it, the Wii U Chat session begins.

Iwata: But they have to end the game they were playing, right?

Tamiya: Yes, they will have to end the game.
Click to expand...

Of course.
 
P

Pharros

Member
Medalion said:
Not OS level but software level
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I can't wait for the OT to go up just so I can get an idea of what is even included. So many basic functions seem to be... non existent or have confusion surrounding them. I hope Nintendo is proactive when it comes to system updates.
 
M

Medalion

Banned
Pharros said:
I can't wait for the OT to go up just so I can get an idea of what is even included. So many basic functions seem to be... non existent or have confusion surrounding them. I hope Nintendo is proactive when it comes to system updates.
Click to expand...
There is chat in Miiverse but they have to be added as a mutual friend from what I understand, no random "chatrooms" per se.

Voice chat during a game is coded per game, not as a basic OS level function yet... meanwhile ya got Video Chat, so I dunno.
 
P

Pharros

Member
Medalion said:
There is chat in Miiverse but they have to be added as a mutual friend from what I understand, no random "chatrooms" per se.

Voice chat during a game is coded per game, not as a basic OS level function yet... meanwhile ya got Video Chat, so I dunno.
Click to expand...

Holy hell how did I not know this. Damn. Now I reeeeallly hope Ninty will be on their game with OS updates...
 
Smiles and Cries

Smiles and Cries

Member
The guy at Nintendo who wanted this feature since N64 must have worked for the old Love Hotel Division. If they are not tying this into games I am not sure why you would want 1 on 1 video cha.. oh.
 
S

SolarPowered

Member
Medalion said:
There is chat in Miiverse but they have to be added as a mutual friend from what I understand, no random "chatrooms" per se.

Voice chat during a game is coded per game, not as a basic OS level function yet... meanwhile ya got Video Chat, so I dunno.
Click to expand...
I hope you are wrong. I hope with every fiber of my being. Bayonetta 2 had better be godlike cuz damn.
 
K

KittenMaster

Member
Medalion said:
There is chat in Miiverse but they have to be added as a mutual friend from what I understand, no random "chatrooms" per se.

Voice chat during a game is coded per game, not as a basic OS level function yet... meanwhile ya got Video Chat, so I dunno.
Click to expand...

Siss... That burns. I can't imagine many 3rd party developers actually bothering to implement Video Chat for their games on their own.
 
T

Terrell

Member
metalslimer said:
huh?

Anyway with a freaking GB of RAM there should be no need for ending a game. That's the kind of compromise you have to make when you have limitations.
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CPU/GPU usage ain't free. Neither is it 100% predictable.

I think we could use a clarification on what they mean by "end", though, before this thread goes into a nit-picking tailspin of fightin' words.

KittenMaster said:
Siss... That burns. I can't imagine many 3rd party developers actually bothering to implement Video Chat for their games on their own.
Click to expand...

It's my understanding that video chat wasn't developed in with the intent to use it in games.
 
E

ElFly

Member
Why the fuck did they reserve 1 GB of RAM for the OS if you cannot have it run all its functionality alongside a game.

wtf.
 
M

Medalion

Banned
Nintendo aren't Microsoft

They are gonna have to take time to figure out what can work, and future firmware updates may address these but not right away
 
D

deviljho

Member
Well, it's obvious that they can provide updates to all this after launch. Let's see what we can do in a year.

Medalion said:
Nintendo aren't Microsoft. They are gonna have to take time to figure out what can work, and future firmware updates may address these but not right away
Click to expand...

Beaten. At least Iwata mentioned that publicly he would like to see this one thing changed.
 
E

ElFly

Member
Terrell said:
CPU/GPU usage ain't free. Neither is it 100% predictable.

I think we could use a clarification on what they mean by "end", though, before this thread goes into a nit-picking tailspin of fightin' words.



It's my understanding that video chat wasn't developed in with the intent to use it in games.
Click to expand...

It's predictable. If the game isn't running, its cpu/gpu usage should be zero.
 
M

madmackem

Member
No system level audio chat? who in the fuck told ninty that people wanted video chat, i have like five devices that do that and ive done it maybe twice in all the time.
 
Q

qq more

Member
madmackem said:
No system level audio chat? who in the fuck told ninty that people wanted video chat, i have like five devices that do that and ive done it maybe twice in all the time.
Click to expand...

I guess you could put something to cover the camera and pretend its a voice chat.
 
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