Nintendo secures new network partnership

Nintendo has inked a deal with MultiTerm to bring furthered online gaming to its power-handbag, the GameCube.

The deal involves the licensing of MassPlayer, a multiplayer gaming utility for future online GameCube shenanigans. MultiTerm will begin to roll out its technologies to licensed GameCube developers with immediate effect, enabling easier implementation of online play systems for the console.

Nintendo is widely thought to have made this standardisation move to cope with pressure from Microsoft and its all-singing, all dancing Xbox Live system, thought to be the most developer and publisher-friendly generic online play system ever created.

This news also follows Sony’s courting of MultiTerm for similar technological support, a move also thought to be triggered by the gearing up of the Xbox.

This has triggered follow-on rumours that Nintendo and Sony may be planning on working together to enable third-party developers to easily put into place cross-platform gaming between the two machines.

More on all this as it breaks.