WiiWare: Over 100 Games In Development

In the same show that Microsoft has announced details of its plans to allow open distribution of Xbox Live games made with its XNA tools, Nintendo has been piping up about WiiWare, which opens up its console to small developers. Nintendo has boasted that there are already around 100 WiiWare titles in development for the North American market.

Speaking in an interview, Nintendo of America's project development senior officer, Tom Prata, said, “There are about 100 projects that are under development which are coming to the North American market, and we're going to spend time with them [the developers] to find out what their schedule is because once again we're not requiring a particular type of product.”

There Nintendo goes again, telling us that it isn't driving what kind of content finds its way onto the service, much as Chris Satchell, the head of Microsoft's game development studio, has said of Microsoft's hand in controlling the content of XNA-developed games. But how far does that go? Prata's message was slightly mixed.

“We do a quick check of the content to make sure there are no red flags, but once again we're not judging the content--that's really for the consumer to decide”, he said. The phrase “red flags” raised... a red flag with SPOnG. Namely, is Nintendo saying, 'developers can do whatever they want, so long as we like it and it isn't controversial'?

Apparently not. Asked, “What about content that's violent or overtly sexual?”, Prata said, “Again we're not putting those types of restrictions on. The developer will be required to secure the appropriate rating from the ESRB, and we will abide by the ESRB's rating policy.” OK, so far so good... but, of course, the ESRB (Entertainment Software Rating Board) is only relevant in the USA.

Clarifying exactly what restrictions Nintendo will put in place, Prata said that Nintendo will have the final say “To some extent”. He goes on to point out “we're not in a position that we're judging the idea. We want the developer to come up with the idea. So we have only made a few restrictions--not content restrictions, but we're not supporting an in-game advertising model, and we're not supporting the developer retrieval of consumer data.”

Prata also confirmed that games' creators will retain ownership of their intellectual property.

He then addressed the fact that, while Nintendo claims that WiiWare is for smaller indie studios, one of the most publicised titles for the service is from publishing giant Square Enix. “Eighty percent of the games we're seeing are coming from entities which haven't published on Nintendo platforms before. That said, there are still major publishers that are participating”, Prata said. “The bulk of the content in the early stages will probably come from more independent-type companies”, he went on.

SPOnG, for one, is glad to see the initiative and hopes to see it bringing more games like, for example, the PlayStation Network titles, flOw and Everyday Shooter, to the market. As we told you yesterday, however, there is still no confirmation of when we will see WiiWare in Europe.

^{Source: Gamespot}