Aaron Lockard’s Gaming Thoughts

Well Let’s see here Nintendo likes the friend code system right. Well if you meet someone and get to talking about a game and you both have it would you rather give them your private Gamertag or a friend code. I’d give the friend code after all you just met the man you don’t actually know him not yet. So it’s better off if you just play that game together every once and awhile till you become better friends.

Many people complain about this SO this is what Nintendo could do. They could link your Wii’s system number to your Nintendo Nsider account just like Xbox Live and Xbox.com. Nintendo would then allow you to use your Nsider account as your Gamertag ID. You would be able to use your single id for both your Wii and Nintendo.com

Oh but you want a easy way to giving your good friends your account. Well see this is where you give them you Wii’s System Number. It will serve as an encrypted Gamertag. After your friends add you to their contact book you would/should be able to talk to them via the Wii. You would be able to do this by either using a headset or but using the Wiimote on an onscreen keyboard with an Instant Messenger type interface.

But you want the features of Gamertags? Well thats easily possible as well. See you’ll have a buddy list that will be accessible from the main screen or your home button on the Wiimote. On this screen you can see which of your friends is on, what games they are playing, as well as viewing their profile. The profile will be brought up in something like the Shop Channel meaning it will use Opera to load the content from Nintendo.com You will also have various profile options that are already possible on your Nsider account like avatars, mottos, and reputation.

So you achievement fans what something to work for huh. Well this wouldn’t be too difficult either but more so then what we’ve discussed up to now. Nintendo would release a dev kit to developers to allow them to create achievements for their games. These achievements would be listed on a sub domain on the Nintendo website maybe Goals.Nintendo.com or Achievements.Nintendo.com. You will also be able to view the accomplished achievements though user profiles on Nintendo.com

Now the most demanding feature lobbies. Lobbies for online games have been around for ages but Nintendo wants to be family friendly. SO i suggest that for younger children Nintendo could have a parental control feature that would disable lobbies. I would suggest also blocking everybody but friends from talking during the game. Of course this is all optional and can be enabled in the parental controls settings.

So review.

• You will have a Gamertag ID.
• Your Gamertag ID will be your Nsider account
• You will use your Wii’s system number to add friends
• You give acquaintances your friend code
• After you add your friends Wii system number you will see their Nsider Account (Gamertag ID).
• You will have a buddy list
• You will be able to easily communicate with your Wii friends via onscreen keyboard and headset
• You can see what games your friends are playing
• You can see your friends profiles
• You can invite your friends to games you are playing
• Their will be achievements/goals to accomplish
• Their will be advanced parental controls
• These parental control will block strangers from talking and talking in game lobbies.
• Kids will not be able to add friends Wii code without parental consult.

There you have it Nintendo Gamertags