WiiLoaded.com - Wii Forum and News

"...Nintendo has made a very good effort to support the Wii's Virtual Console service, which has seen 7.8 million downloads by the company's own recent estimation. However, offering old titles for download is only one component of a console's online strategy.

Where we've seen the system struggle is in offering online multiplayer play through either first- or third-party titles. While it's good to see Nintendo games such as Super Smash Bros. Brawl and Mario Kart Wii contain competitive online multiplayer, when it comes to third-party offerings, it's a mixed bag.

Although games like Guitar Hero III and MX vs. ATV: Untamed allow online play for the Wii, others such as Tony Hawk's Proving Groung or LEGO Star Wars The Complete Saga offer no such option - even while allowing online play on the other next-gen systems.

But perhaps the one aspect which does the nost harm to Nintendo's online claims is that the Wii is simply missing a number of online mulitplayer opportunities because games such as Rock Band, Call of Duty 4, and Fracture - to name a few - don't even appear on the console... Until the Wii cultivates better products from its partners, the system's online strategy will continue to go unnoticed..."

The article continues on to point out how games without Wi-Fi support, that are available on other consoles, have online support, and also how some Wii games lack Wi-Fi support completley. Such as Excite Truck, which sold well, and would've sold better with Wi-Fi support.

I kind of agree with what they GI is saying. Even games with Wi-Fi support lack depth in that area. i.e. Guitar Hero III.
Guitar Hero III has online support but lacks the ability to download songs.


Written By: Felix N.

wow, the grammar is terrible in that article Nah, just kidding, I know that was a lot of stuff to write! But that was still very good FELX! I voted poor. The fact that it needs work is pretty much a given anyway and to be fair SSBB isn't changing much, it's online system is painfully basic even though people will still love it anyway. It needs a basic VoIP system to say the least as well as a decent lobby setup. And lose the damn Friend Codes.

It has alright service..BT3 is like a turn based RPG online.

They need to def work on it.

What do you mean Cloud? Is that good or bad? I've never played DBZ

Its pretty laggy for now..Atari is on the fix. But at start it was like a turn based RPG thats how bad the lag was XD

I think we've yet to see what Nintendo promised us with Wii Connected24 service or whatever it's called. It's gonna take a good Nintendo game to get the online going, because if Nintendo can't do it well with one of their games, how do we expect a 3rd party game to handle it.

Mario Strikers online ftw...except its nation locked.

by the end of 2008. the wii will be amazing. remember these words

Brawl and Mario Kart?

the only way it will help online is if it incorporates a head set and gets rid of the stupid stranger matchs that dont let u know who your versing, and if it kept a rank system for all online matchs. then ssbb online would be a good jumpstart for nintendo. I dont understand why nintendo is so bad at onlne, why cant they just copy 360.

Unless Nintendo decide to release a headset sometime soon, I don't think the Wii's online capabilites are being used properly. Although Brawl WILL be alot of fun online, mainly to play against you guys.

I had to vote bad for a reason I hardly if EVER agree with--there is no gradation here, it's straight black and white.

What I mean is, Nintendo will either allow freedom online or it won't. When I consider all of the different features I'd like to see, they can all be classified as forms of online freedom, if you will--VoIP, knowing strangers usernames, friendcodes (or, rather, lack thereof), etc.

At this point Nintendo does NOT allow online freedoms. As such, I rate their strategy as bad. When I can have the freedom to see outside of my little cage, THEN I'll think it's good.

there needs to be more online games that had a really good online set up like MSC did. that was a really great online game.

hopefully a lot more games will come out with online

btw, did BWii have a good online? im planning on renting it for part of the winter break

I voted okay but needs work. They've done some things well, and botched others (friend codes.. which isn't a huge deal to me). The best thing by far for me is that I don't have to pay to play online. If they charged, simply put, I wouldn't use it.

I agree with Harmonica...keeping the online service free is definitely a major step in the right direction. However, I hate friend codes with a passion. They need to have some sort of lobby system where I can choose who I play against and add people to a friends list (seamlessly, without entering codes). Also, I hate that they have limits in what you can play with strangers than what you can play with people on your friends list.

BWII had decent online play. It doesn't have any way to communicate (not even built-in phrases) which makes co-op difficult. I understand that all the decisions are made to protect kids from profanity, etc. but there should be a way for adults to enable/disable these protections if they would like.

Atrivis

*Fixed

Yes, but I feel these two games won't do it alone. They'll more third-party support, which has been said several times before.

Medal of Honor Heroes 2?

There really isn't any big online third party title announced for 2008 or in general other than Brawl & Mario Kart. I think we'll see and hear of more titles in the middle of the year. But Brawl is a step in the right direction in leading the way for future online Wii games. The amount of options availible online is like nothing else on Wii, of course it's not perfect, but it's Nintendo's way of showing they can do online gaming too.

You have to remember that Wii is the first system Nintendo is taking online.They're new to the whole thing and they want to see what they can do on their own and discover what works and what doesn't. Plus Nintendo's service is free, the 360's isn't. M$ isn't going to have you pay for a crap online service, then they'd have all sorts of finacial problems with it.

Team Fuzion was smart enough to say "Hey, we work for EA... why use their broken down online sytem when we have our own?"

for soem reason, its actually better too.

[actually for a lot of mild reasons]

MOH: Heroes and Mario Strikers Charged are fun as hell...more titles need to be online though