That squares with our own reporting from before E3 and puts Nintendo in a good place to run games that fill up a single-layer 25GB Blu-Ray disc, the format used by current console king of large game discs, the PlayStation 3.
Eguchi declined to comment on our report, from the same people who told us about the 25GB, that the system’s internal flash memory is 8GB. Earlier today, a Nintendo rep explained that the new console will support external USB drives, for added storage capacity.
We’ll have tons more about Wii U, including a lot of insights from Eguchi about what makes this console special for Nintendo, in the coming days.
Jamie What?
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 10:39 AMThat’s pretty awesome.
I wonder if we can move our VC games from the Wii. Would be a definite plus for me.
Tali
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:35 AMBe good actually if it could bring over everything from our wii eg saves too or any other junk you might have on there.
solypsis
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 5:45 PMThat’s a must have for me or I aint buying it, regardless of how good mario is.
AerintheGREAT
Thursday, June 9, 2011 at 12:56 AMIf they don’t allow for this then it’s gonna be really hard for me to overlook…
Braaains
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 10:46 AMWhy not just use BluRay? Then they could add BluRay movie playback to the list of features. It’s not like BluRay drives are horrendously expensive these days, and it’d be another selling point to attract people who don’t already have a PS3 or BluRay player.
Richard Smack
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 10:53 AMBecause they don’t really want to pay money to sony….
WiseHacker
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:31 PMOr, more realistically, why would Sony license their technology to a competitor?
Seriously, the BluRay drive was touted as the main selling point of the PS3 when it launched so why level the field by letting other consoles have the drive?
JPhillips
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 5:54 PMFYI it wouldn’t be licensed by Sony as Sony does not own the Licencing in the first place.
Sony is a stake holder in the Blu-ray association and is one part of the top 9 share holders which means that at the end of the day, this boils down to either A) ethics (yeah righ!) or B) Proprietary formats result in the Wii U not having to update its standard in order to keep pace with who ever they are associated with.
B) is the most likely reason.
As for performance wise, Blu-ray will still shit all over this because as a standard it is evolving at a much faster rate and is already a fair chunk of the way into its development cycle where as this new standard will not likely ever come at higher compression rates due to Nintendo going down this road alone.
Sughly
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 10:54 AMMaybe something to do with piracy? Hasnt that been some of the purpose with proprietary stuff before?
Lone Wolf
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 10:57 AMBecause BluRay is Sony, and they’re unlikely to give a competitor a leg up when they’re in direct competition, meaning they’ll be hard pressed to get affordable drives.
Besides, a proprietry format reduces the likelyhood of piracy.
ShiggyNinty
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:05 AMMore space means more fun!
Mark Serrels
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:06 AMHahaha!
Cameron
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:59 AMThat’s what she said.
Peter Richards
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:07 AMSo does the Wii U play bluray movies, or not so much?
oggob
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:44 AMIt plays nothing, no Blu Ray, no DVD…
solypsis
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 5:47 PMand certainly not games.
So far they have anounced a grand total of 0 games for Wii U.
Epic. Fail.
Michael Verrenkamp
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:20 AMIt really most likely is just an anti piracy measure. It’s probably still a blu ray disc in the same way the Wii discs are based off DVD. Very similar with some minor changes.
As for blu ray playback, like DVD on Wii it just looks like Nintendos don’t see it as an important feature long term for the systems.
On a side note Bluray isnt entirely Sony, they are just a large share holder. The largest is Masushita/Panasonic of which Nintendo uses all the time since they build the disc drives for gamecube and Wii. It has nothing to do with them having to pay Sony.
FiveStein
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:29 AMHmm… I would have thought the next console gen would have had a serious push towards solid state media. We’re already starting to see issues with traditional rotary disks, and cloud based or downloadable media distribution is just taking off also.
Timothy Zeven
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 11:29 AMThe physical media is a single layer bluray disc, however the data format will be encrypted and proprietary.
Cameron
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:00 PMMaybe they’re using all the old HD-DVD drives sitting around.
doubleDizz
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:14 PMyea cos that’ll be sustainable in the future…
WiseHacker
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:35 PMHighly unlikely. Why they had the edge over BluRay (except for storage back in the day) the format is officially dead.
There are no manufacturers for the drives now and it is extremely unlikely Nintendo could convince anyone to even want to make drives for a dead format.
And before I get flamed – my first comment is correct *for that time*! Specifically 2007. BluRay has since caught up.
WiseHacker
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:38 PMSorry, I missed the ‘old’ part of the HD-DVD drives.
No offense meant but I would not think even the drives would exist any more. They are bound to be disposed of or even recycled by now.
Lord Bob
Wednesday, June 8, 2011 at 12:36 PMI can see one possibly good option with the ability to use external drives. On other consoles most of the time you have to buy a new unit if you want a bigger drive. What if N starts selling hdd attachments? The console is rounded so I’m imagining a hard drive with a crable on top that sits under the main console and plugs into the back with usb, maybe usb 3.0. That way if you want flash media speeds just get a flash media drive and hook it up. This is assuming they let you download to and play from external drives.