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Rumortoid: Nintendo working on a Wii movie service photo

While Sony and Microsoft have movie capabilities in their latest console, Nintendo's Wii is left without. But Curt Marvis, President of Digital Media for Lionsgate, feels like that could change soon.

Marvis tells Variety that he thinks that Nintendo is working on a movie service. 

"The thing that is clearly a force in digital are the game devices," he said.

"I think when we see the Wii come into the market with the ability to stream movies, which I think is maybe going to happen as soon as this year, I think that's going to be a big marketplace for digital distribution."

Is there any weight to this? I don't know, and the Lionsgate guy would know better than I. Variety does point out that Nintendo is working on a limited service for Japan. Maybe that will cross over to our neck of the woods.

Movies on the Wii! Are you excited? Yeah, me either. And as TechRadar reminds, there's still the whole storage thing to worry about.  Let's get a hard drive for this. I can get somewhat excited about that.

 

 


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25 comments | showing # 1 to 25

zombiekiller13's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:02
zombiekiller13
The fact that I rarely get a reliable connection when downloading games (and I know others that suffer the same issue) doesn't get me excited for this service.

Also, where's my hard drive?
Face's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:05
Face
I don't care about movies on systems with a hard drive and high def. so no thanks. More games please.
eternalplayer2345's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:06
eternalplayer2345
do you need a friend code for each movie?
Qraze's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:20
Qraze
no hd quality, no hard drive, 480i/p only, and streaming = fail. if i can stream hulu on my ps3 at no charge then why bother with the wii if they might charge and with the way they been doing things its highly likely. i wonder if the wii gets hulu?
Chronic Logic's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:33
Chronic Logic
Whatever happened to, you know, actual GAMING? I want a video game console that is soley dedicated to gaming. I don't want some sort of swiss army knife console machine. Are you that poor that you can't even afford a stand alone dvd movie player? I wish Sony, Microsoft and maybe Nintendo would just focus soley on gaming instead of spending resources on trivial things.
zzyzx's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:35
zzyzx
I'm guessing the thinking is that the Wii reaches a lot of households that don't have either a PS3 or 360. And a lot of those households have older TVs, so 480p isn't a deal-breaker. My Wii's internet connection is rock solid. Seriously never failed once since being connected 18 months ago.

All that said, it still seems like an idea in search of an audience.

I have no need for console streaming. Between DirecTV, Slingbox, Laptop, Hulu, etc. my video needs are more than covered.
Squirrel Pope's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:40
Squirrel Pope
I concur with Chronic. Stop making these poor consoles do so much. They make them able to do everything and then they really excel at nothing.
Holyetheline's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:41
Holyetheline
Seems like Nintendo is always stuck in the past. They should have already launched this service a year ago. haha. No I'm just giving them crap. I wouldn't use it but I bet a lot of people will.
PappaDukes's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:43
PappaDukes
I already get movies from my toaster, thank you very much.
sweetchuck's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 14:58
sweetchuck
Give me flash 9 and hulu and I'd be happy.
Tanukitsune's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 15:00
Tanukitsune
Can you even fit a movie on the Wii hard drive without deleting everything on it?
mrplow8's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 15:19
mrplow8
Movies on Wii? Next thing you know they'll start putting games on Wii.
covah's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 15:22
covah
OH YEAH! I can't wait to pay for SD movies!
John B's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 15:39
John B
As one of the few Wii supporters on Dtoid, I have to say that Nintendo is out of their fscking minds with this. I read about this a few months ago, and this make zero sense. The only way that they could do this is by streaming or loading up an SD card, which is bullshit.

Get us a hard drive first, get rid of the God-damned waggleware second, *THEN* -- maybe -- look at something like this!!

WTF, Nintendo?!!
John B's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 15:44
John B
@covah:

Tell that to the people who own a PS3 or 360 but don't have HDTVs, or use Netflix on the 360 to watch movies that aren't available in HD. They have to use SD, too.

Oh, sorry, that's right. Any opportunity to insult the little, white box...
Spelunking raccoon's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 16:35
Spelunking raccoon
Well in the UK we already have the BBC Iplayer which works fine so the wii is perfectly capable of handling streamed movies
Remo's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 16:37
Remo
Haven't Nintendo already announced a video streaming service? For japan at least.
covah's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 17:00
covah
@John b

Being that I own a Wii, I feel like I can shit on it as much as I feel like, then go back and start playing Madworld squealing with glee like a little girl. Fact of the matter is this video streaming service is too little too late but the ignorant masses will think its the next best thing since jesus.

(like you said) No hdd = big problem
Shitty internet (for the most part wireless too) connection = loading time after loading time for streaming
Nintendo won't have the media pull like Microsoft and Sony does to get all the content on it's console
etc, etc, etc. It's pointless, but Nintendo doesn't give a shit, like they normally do because HEY they're rolling around in money
John B's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 18:15
John B
And I completely agree as I said in my first post that Nintendo is being really stupid with this. What they're also playing on is that they're supposedly going to have original content that's exclusively for the Wii. I don't see how anyone with an ounce of common sense can think that such a thing is valid.

My comment was that your statement about standard definition was invalid because the PS3 and 360 have tons of SD content as well. I've watched some Netflix rentals through my 360 and I have to admit that even the SD quality was pretty darn good. In fact, it's better quality than some of Comcast's supposed "high def" channels -- not that that's saying much...

In fairness, I've watched some of the video on their Nintendo Channel and it doesn't come across too badly, even if it's somewhat compressed. If they want this model to work they need to get something more than SD cards for storage or it's going to fall even harder than I already expect it will.

And don't discount the studios from jumping on board if they think there's a market for children or family-friendly rentals on the Wii.

As for your comment about MadWorld ... that game is fucking AWESOME! I'm going to be playing that one for quite some time.
zzyzx's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 19:35
zzyzx
I'd think they'd need to go with lower compression than they use on the Ninty Channel. To get some idea of what a game looks like in action, it's okay. It gets the job done. But I wouldn't want to watch anything for more than a minute or two. And this is coming from someone who doesn't mind going back to SD now and then.
pedrovay2003's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 20:20
pedrovay2003
I'm with Remo on this one. I'm pretty sure this was announced like 2 months ago.
parrothead's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/12/2009 21:00
parrothead
SD Movies? this is more crap that Nintendo will make money off the casual fan who has no idea there are better systems out there.
Spork's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/13/2009 02:57
Spork
I got half way through the title and thought that they were making a movie about the Wii. You mislead me :(
TheToiletDuck's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/13/2009 04:25
TheToiletDuck
Hahaha, i almost forgot my Wii can't play DVD's.

:P

I'm sure this is going to be a HUGE success for Nintendo. Especially if they give it the same marketing push as the Wiiware.

haha! sarcasm.
retroNutZ's Avatar - Comment posted on 03/13/2009 14:37
retroNutZ
Something like this seems to make a whole lot more sense on a Wii HD console...
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