Will the Wii U’s online experience be better than Nintendo’s current systems? Yes. But Miyamoto is warning fans not to expect something as good as Xbox Live.
Over the past years, Nintendo consoles have become notorious for having an incredibly underwhelming online play experience. As a result, a lot of questions have been raised about the online capabilities of the upcoming Wii U, which Nintendo has kept mum on. However, Shigeru Miyamoto has revealed a couple of (very vague) details about its online capabilities.
Speaking to MTV, Miyamoto was quick to explain that Nintendo doesn’t consider itself in competition with companies like Sony or Microsoft when it comes to delivering an online play experience:
“We’re not going to sit here and say that our goal is to become the number one online gaming company, because that’s not our goal.
“But, understanding that the types of experiences our consumers like to play do often contain elements to them that can be improved or may even require an online connection and also knowing that the system is going to have a browser I think suggests that obviously internet and internet connectivity is going to be very important for the system.”
Miyamoto also said that “local, same-room multiplayer” might be expanded to work via an internet connection, meaning that split-screen play could be included when playing online. He also said that there was a possibility that the Wii U’s online experience would allow players to see what games their friends are playing (as well as what TV shows/movies they happen to be watching).
