Yep, thats right, apparently nintendo had a Wiimote/gamepad ready for the GC's launch back in 2001. Made by gyration, it looked like a dualshock, only that you could separate the right handle and use it like you would use the wiimote today. Gyration is a company that holds most of the best motion-sensing patents. Nintendo licensed a number of those patents from Gyration in 2001, and brought the company on board that year to develop a one-handed controller. (Nintendo even became an investor in Gyration, which is now owned by Thomson.) In one of the first meetings with Nintendo's people, Gyration designers brought these animated slides to the conference room. The Gyropod used with HalfLife I've always said that nintendo could've had released the wiimote with the GC, now I can say I was right:nod: But honestly I think that nintendo did the right thing by not releasing this when it was created 6 years ago, since after all back in the day it was all about the graphics and raw power. Even today in this age of "desire for innovation" some people are starting to call the Wii a "gimmick". So one has to suppose that back in 2001 this concept would have bombed, badly... Source
awesome. very nice find. well they could have both graphics/power + this controller. it could still play as a GC controller does anyway.
It's interesting actually, the quote that they had spunked all their cash on the R&D for the Wiimote so couldn't have the Wii any more powerful would now seem like another Nintendo bullshit statement, as the groundwork had already been done with this, which I think looks better than the P.O.S Wiimote we have now.
Looking at that HL demo, I wonder if the GC had enough power to run counter strike with 8 players or more... At the time, with this controller and online play it would've been bigger than Halo (in online play).
I have never heard anyone from Nintendo say that their R&D money had been spent up. The reason for the Wii's power (or lack of) has been stated because they wanted a cheaper console: it was originally slated to launch for a $100 price point but the price increased drastically after including additional features like flash storage and wireless network hardware.
Nice find! They probably change the design because it look too much like a Playstation controller, but uglier... Anyway it's way cooler than the actual Wiimote, and I guess you wouldn't need the Classic controllers.
Very nice find never seen this posted before. The controller has a neat concept but theres many problems it would have like having to detach the right motion censer part of the controller often could mean it breaking in the long run but on the other hand its not a bad design at all.
Dunno, maybe the wiimote part of the controller was actually completely independent to the rest, having a separate wireless transmitter or cable (or a combination of both, having the pad part wired and the remote part wireless). Therefore the connection was only for confort of the player, cuz theres no electrical connections between the parts. Is the most logical solution if you ask me. What? how can 512MB and a cheapy ethernet port add $150 to the price?
Yay, bad journalism and fanboyism at it's best. Now call me Cynical but a few powerpoint slides of a CG generated joypad does not make a prototype, they are concept drawings far different from a prototype. It also does not mean that Nintendo could have released a Wiimote at the GC launch. If you read it correctly it says "In one of the first meetings with Nintendo's people, Gyration designers brought these animated slides to the conference room." and this was in 2001 which means the GC was designed, probably being built, games already written, so unless Nintendo scrapped the GC as it stood or released it as an add on product (and you know how successful those are...) there was no way that the GC could have launched with a Wiimote device. Even in best case, it would have been 2003 before they could have launched something... I mean Half Life a type of game that is famous on Nintendo consoles... As an add on device after the GC was launched, maybe. But as a launch device, not at all.
Dude you are as convincing as those creationism idiots... Seriously, "and this was in 2001 which means the GC was designed, probably being built, games already written/there was no way that the GC could have launched with a Wiimote device" ? First most GC launch games were still beta at the time of this concept, and even during E301 you could spot several differences between the ones shown there and the final editions. Second, rewritte the entire game? are you dumb or just looking for an easy rebuttal? if wii dev videos have shown anything is that the programming of movements using a remote is very easy, maybe easier than in a normal controller. And HL was just a damn example for a FPS game using the controller. After all metroid prime was an alpha at the time...
if it was that easy they d have achieved 1:1 movement till now Wiimote code was done manually until very recently, don't kid urself into thinking its easy. Hand gesture recognition is a big topic and not everyone is a specialist - so, to most developers even using the motion capture tool they have to optimize quite a few things manually.
Seeing is believing: the LiveMove demostration video I doubt it can get easier than that... About completely synchronous movement, I doubt they can solve that. They'll get close no doubt, but the delay between your movement being pick up by the remote and processed by the Wii is real and will always be there. Just becos you can reduce it doesnt means its going to disappear...
Says the person who says "Yep, thats right, apparently nintendo had a Wiimote/gamepad ready for the GC's launch back in 2001." over a couple of concept drawings. Although Gyration did have a device that could recognise the position of a controller, this does not mean it was ready to be used in a console. The Wii has had several years for the programmers to write some nice libraries so it is easier to use the Wii and the other devices. Anyway I didn't say rewrite the entire game but seriously you would be asking the programmers to either write a new game from scratch to use the controller or kludge a new control method into a game that was 80% finished and even in best case (ie they had a controller ready in early 2001 and not just some patents and some concept drawings) they would have had 6 months tops.
Also, what is so terrible about the Wii price versus GameCube? It's more powerful then Xbox. It doesn't need a memory card. It's games are 10$ cheaper. It comes with a game. It has Wi-fi. Blah blah. The Virtual Console prices are about the worst thing about it. If they put it out at the same price as GameCube it would cost more wouldn't it? Launch Cube was 200$, memory card was 15$-20$, a game is 50$. That's like....more.
