Earlier this week GameInformer.com reported that third-party developers contacted by the outlet possess feelings of "annoyance and betrayal" regarding the new Wii MotionPlus controller add-on. The complaint is that developers found about the add-on that enables 1:1 motion control only when it was announced at E3. The site reports:
None of [the developers] said they had any advance notice about the peripheral, and we were told that they were as surprised as everyone else when Nintendo revealed its existence on stage. That lack of prior notice means that, aside from Nintendo’s own roster of games, users won’t likely see any support for the device for at least six to nine months.
Those responses don't quite align with what Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime told me during my interview with him at E3 last week, during which we had the following exchange...
Multiplayer: The motion-plus accessory -- you talked about not talking about things too far out in advance, but this is not coming out until the spring. So what was the idea about why you talked about this at E3?
Fils-Aime: The reason we talked about it now is because we want third-party support. We want to see other games that take advantage of this accessory. And for developers they really need that now, so SDKs are going out into the marketplace. They'll have the capability to build that into their spring games. That's why we need to announce that now.
Multiplayer: And are those development kits out now? Or are they about to go out?
Fils-Aime: They're about to go out.
Multiplayer: But third parties were learning about it when we learned about it.
Fils-Aime: They learned about it a little earlier.
Multiplayer: Do you feel that eventually leads the way toward a refined Wii remote that incorporates all that technology into itself?
Fiils-Aime: It could. It certainly could. We recognize that the adapter initially is not the most elegant way to have that, but it's the best way given that we have so many millions of remotes out in the marketplace.
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The bottom line from Reggie appears to be that some developers may have known it was coming. But the fact that development kits are just going out now makes Game Informer's timeline for when third-party games will include the feature seem pretty close to the mark.
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