Wii U Won't Get Twitch Streaming Because It's "Not Fun," Says Nintendo

[Xman490]

The "fun" of Twitch streams is not merely inherent in the game itself or even the game and the "Joe Blow" playing it. There is also the community build around that. It's fun to joke or inquire about what the streamer said or what the game showed in multiple occasions, throwing in "Kappa" faces and other emoticons. The Wii U Gamepad is great for typing up comments and thus would be good for participating in that community (though the Gamepad is not quite as good as a keyboard for typing).

 

[Shadow-Phoenix]

So not going by what Reggie is saying and more the TDF is saying is that I have to like Twitch, I have to have it on the console I want to buy because the other two don't?.

Wow it's a nice day when a it's not a company that tells me what to have, it's the people, they know what's best for me and know the perfect suitable compromise.

Everything should have Twitch just because =D, just like how everything should have everything else.

 

[Micah Weil]

...or, that's how I see it, anyway. The second I find the mic on the WiiU, I'm moving over to the "What the hell, Nintendo?" boat.

You can buy a headset for the Wii U for about $20 if you want, but there is already a microphone built into the Wii U's GamePad. Heck there's a video chat function that uses it. So the Wii U does have a mic already, you just have to buy a headset if you don't want to use the one that the console comes with.

...then I just haven't seen the mic on the pad yet. Right-o, someone move over. I'm hoppin' aboard.

 

[Roxas1359]

So not going by what Reggie is saying and more the TDF is saying is that I have to like Twitch, I have to have it on the console I want to buy because the other two don't?.

Thing is, the reason Reggie gave, while holding some truth, makes it sound like Nintendo are the deciders of what is and what isn't fun. There are many better excuses they could have use, such as the console was designed for it, but the excuse Reggie gave was not a good one. It's like when Sakurai said they wouldn't be making another Subspace Emissary for the new Smash. People weren't upset because of that, they were upset because he gave a petty reason for it instead of the other, more understandable reasons.

The console doesn't need to have Twitch integration for streaming, but the GamePad could make a great way to comment, and an App could possibly be developed to allow people to watch Twitch better as the browser for the Wii U tends to mess up on Twitch at times.

 

[Roxas1359]

...then I just haven't seen the mic on the pad yet. Right-o, someone move over. I'm hoppin' aboard.

It's where the speakers on the GamePad are located, similar to how the DS was. You have to use the mic in 3D World a few times by blowing on it to move platforms in the Captain Toad missions and in a few stages.

 

[VG_Addict]

I don't know why people are bitching about this. It's not like they're ignoring Twitch entirely. Here's another excerpt from the article:

"We want to do stuff that's going to be fun and going to be watchable," he said. "Nintendo Treehouse Live at E3 is fun and watchable. Thats the stuff we would like to continue doing with an entity like Twitch."

 

[Roxas1359]

I don't know why people are bitching about this. It's not like they're ignoring Twitch entirely. Here's another excerpt from the article:

"We want to do stuff that's going to be fun and going to be watchable," he said. "Nintendo Treehouse Live at E3 is fun and watchable. Thats the stuff we would like to continue doing with an entity like Twitch."

Then they should work with Twitch and make an App for the Wii U to watch Twitch, because Twitch screws up in the Wii U's browser. And again, people aren't upset because they aren't doing it, it's because the excuse given was terrible when there are plenty of better ones they could have used.

The only thing that would really hurt Nintendo would be if they were to try and get Twitch to implement the same policies that they got YouTube to do.

 

[Something Amyss]

If it's not fun, why are twitch streams so popular?

This seems to be more an attempt to push their own bespoke streaming than to actually be thinking of the player, but we'll see how it pans out.

It sounds like Nintendo's usual attempts to tell us what we want and how to enjoy the product.

People didn't want internet, HD, disc-based games, gamertags, or any of a number of other things Nintendo didn't do at the time.

The issue i have with this story is that all of the sites are running with the daily mail/fox news style headline rather than one that reflects the whole story (and even more people knee jerk based on reading said headline). Of course the headline comes from polygon, who have been very open with there opinions towards Nintendo, and even made up some interesting pie charts to show rubbish data at one point

Polygon is TEH BIAS against the whole industry.

At least, that's the impression I get, since people have claimed it's TEH BIAS against PC, TEH BIAS against Microsoft, TEH BIAS against Sony, and now TEH BIAS against Nintendo.

Isn't it great that we have Nintendo to tell us what is and isn't fun?

How else would we know what we like? I bet Twitch dries up and dies now that we know it's not fun.

It's the same as the excuse for why the Wii didn't have DVD playback. Everyone already has a DVD player, so why spend the money and time creating a redundant feature that no one really will use. Twitch on the WiiU is basically the same thing.

Honestly, though, I get that logic for DVDs. I don't know that I agree, but I get it. With Nintendo....Well, Nintendo's games aren't DVDs. You can't simply pop them into an Xbone or PS4 and play them for the same experience.

IF you want to stream Nintendo games, you need a way to stream Nintendo games. Integrated streaming on another console doesn't render that functionality here obsolete. With the Wii, DVD functionality was almost certainly redundant, even if it might be desirable.

 

[VG_Addict]

I don't know why people are bitching about this. It's not like they're ignoring Twitch entirely. Here's another excerpt from the article:

"We want to do stuff that's going to be fun and going to be watchable," he said. "Nintendo Treehouse Live at E3 is fun and watchable. Thats the stuff we would like to continue doing with an entity like Twitch."

Then they should work with Twitch and make an App for the Wii U to watch Twitch, because Twitch screws up in the Wii U's browser. And again, people aren't upset because they aren't doing it, it's because the excuse given was terrible when there are plenty of better ones they could have used.

I agree that he should have used a better excuse. He could have admitted that the Wii U might not even be able to use streams. Though, either way, they don't exactly look good.

And just in case someone calls me a fanboy for defending Nintendo in this case, I don't defend EVERY practice by Nintendo. I admit they have made mistakes, such as using cartridges for N64 and not having a unified account system. I had to buy a new computer last October, and lost all my information. Luckily, I was still able to sign into my accounts on the forums I go to. Imagine how pissed I would have been if I had to make a new account.

Sorry for rambling.

 

[Roxas1359]

I agree that he should have used a better excuse. He could have admitted that the Wii U might not even be able to use streams. Though, either way, they don't exactly look good.

Technically speaking, I don't think the Wii U can do it even if they wanted to because streaming on a console while playing a game takes up a considerable amount of memory and processing speed. Not to mention you need a good internet connection, and while the built in Wifi is nice on the Wii U, streaming on Wifi is a terrible idea and you should always use an ethernet port. Still don't get why they didn't put one in the Wii U to begin with. :/

And I don't defend EVERY practice by Nintendo. I admit they have made mistakes, such as using cartridges for N64 and not having a unified account system.

Don't know where you got this from, as I didn't even accuse you of defending Nintendo on everything they do. I've only ever seen 2 people ever do that here, and one of them is gone. On the bright side though, they got ride of the Friend Code system. *looks at 3DS*
Well...for the most part.

 

[VG_Addict]

I agree that he should have used a better excuse. He could have admitted that the Wii U might not even be able to use streams. Though, either way, they don't exactly look good.

Technically speaking, I don't think the Wii U can do it even if they wanted to because streaming on a console while playing a game takes up a considerable amount of memory and processing speed. Not to mention you need a good internet connection, and while the built in Wifi is nice on the Wii U, streaming on Wifi is a terrible idea and you should always use an ethernet port. Still don't get why they didn't put one in the Wii U to begin with. :/

And I don't defend EVERY practice by Nintendo. I admit they have made mistakes, such as using cartridges for N64 and not having a unified account system.

Don't know where you got this from, as I didn't even accuse you of defending Nintendo on everything they do. I've only ever seen 2 people ever do that here, and one of them is gone. On the bright side though, they got ride of the Friend Code system. *looks at 3DS*
Well...for the most part.

I know you didn't accuse me, but just in case someone did.

I didn't use online on the Wii, so I don't know about Friend Codes. I heard they were a pain in the ass, though.

 

[lacktheknack]

He used an awful example. In Mario Kart's case, I want to see the WHOLE race because it lets me cheer for one player.

 

[PoolCleaningRobot]

Given the context, I actually agree. Nintendo isn't staying they dont want streamers, they just don't think it's important for everyone and their mom to have that capability. I'm sure most of the streams we'll get out the xb1 and ps4 will be pointless just because they can. Do you really want to watch a bunch of 11 year olds play CoD? At least if people take the initiative to buy a capture card or own a pc that can game and stream at the same time and learn the software, they must be uploading with some purpose

 

[Signa]

It's the same as the excuse for why the Wii didn't have DVD playback. Everyone already has a DVD player, so why spend the money and time creating a redundant feature that no one really will use. Twitch on the WiiU is basically the same thing.

Honestly, though, I get that logic for DVDs. I don't know that I agree, but I get it. With Nintendo....Well, Nintendo's games aren't DVDs. You can't simply pop them into an Xbone or PS4 and play them for the same experience.

IF you want to stream Nintendo games, you need a way to stream Nintendo games. Integrated streaming on another console doesn't render that functionality here obsolete. With the Wii, DVD functionality was almost certainly redundant, even if it might be desirable.

You're looking at it from the opposite end of what I was saying, but yeah, you're correct. Still, as a viewer, watching streams from your WiiU sounds like a dumb idea overall. As a streamer, either you're boring and don't really deserve viewers, or you actually are entertaining to watch play, and then you have a setup to capture on your PC and stream properly. I'd make the argument to say that it shouldn't be up to Nintendo and their resources to decided if you are interesting or not, but aside from just wanting to watch my buddies play their games from the comfort of my own couch, I think the feature would be a waste of time for the majority of people that would try using it if it was there. I mean, Sony took a lot of flak for their "share" button, because it just sounded dumb, knowing that most people are boring.

 

[VG_Addict]

I think Nintendo is slowly, but surely, taking online more seriously. They unified the balance for 3DS/Wii U. They allowed voice chat in Mario Kart 8. They seem to be catering to the competitive Smash community.

 

[Darmani]

I really don't get how or why Nintendo seems to be so out of touch.

When it comes to online interaction between gamers Nintendo keep pushing against it. In the GameCube days, PS2 and Xbox were pushing on-line Nintendo is like lol no one wants to play online. Wii days oh man people actually like playing online...fine we'll allow it, but here's a stupid system of friend codes. Oh no youtubers are showing our games shut that shit down. Hey our fanbase is playing Smash Bros competitively SHUT IT DOWN. Now tell people that unless they're a well established star they should just piss off?

Seriously Nintendo stop it, you don't understand the gaming fanbase, you think you have your finger on the pulse of the gaming fanbase? Your finger is on a corpse in the graveyard halfway across town.

It's like Nintendo is becoming Japan during the Sengoku era. Isolationist and prone to infighting.

In some ways some things in Japan were more advanced that the trends were. Think of it like the entire consumer base being pc gamers and the rest of the world clamoring for xbox live gold subscriptions. Hence Friend codes "you already have three devices to always connect with friends, and this makes it so we don't have to regulate kids" Only cellphones for kids wasn't a universal so having a way to meet people with your machine made things overall convenient.

Plus heartbreak would be a drop in the bucket for computer security nightmares and incidents happening over ten years ago. As a result japanese, as a group, is very reticent about online. We love it because of the superb travel and convenience. apparently inconvenience is the order of the day. And remember online-ification came with lots of organizational disruption, go ahead self business and corporate conservative japan on that.

So that's a possible cultural reason.

Another is that its been expensive, unproven and constant money sink of liability for what seems a luxury that has, bit by bit, become a near standard. But they are catching up. And remember online is STILL rife with issues.

 

[Lunar Templar]

If it's not fun, why are twitch streams so popular?

>.>

Sure you wanna go with that? with how so many gravitates toward 'stupid' and mistakes it for quality entertainment or in worse cases, talent.

 

[V4Viewtiful]

c'mon Nintendo, there's no reason to not allow the option twitch feeds ARE fun, that's why it's popular.
What a step back.

I just noticed there's a Twitch feed going on for Destiny right now, geez.

 

[Something Amyss]

>.>

Sure you wanna go with that? with how so many gravitates toward 'stupid' and mistakes it for quality entertainment or in worse cases, talent.

Are "stupid" and "fun" mutually exclusive? Especially in the gaming world. People are watching because on some level they are entertained, it seems. It doesn't really matter if it's high brow or not.

 

[Dragonbums]

I can't even bring myself to care. Like, fuck man, if your on the Wii U right now chances are your going to be playing games. Not watching other people play your games. Save that shit for sites that can actually do it right like Twitch itself.