Nintendo reveals the Wii Vitality Sensor
Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009 at 9:43pm by Jake
Nintendo’s global president, Satoru Iwata, briefly announced today a new attachment for your Wii remote which brings intuitive game design to a whole new level.
As you can see from the image above, the Wii Vitality Sensor simply clamps onto your index finger. The device measures “a number of signals” emitted from the human body and sends them to the Wii through the remote. Mr. Iwata sees the Vitality Sensor as the third branch in Nintendo’s reach toward blending physical human interaction with virtual reality.
“With Brain Age, Nintendo proposed training your brain. With Wii Fit, we challenged it using balance to train your body. Today we look for the first time at the Wii Vitality Sensor.”
Mr. Iwata believes the device has much use beyond gaming such as relaxation.
At first glance you might see the sensor as another one of Nintendo’s one-time-use peripherals, but you soon begin to see the depth behind Iwata’s thinking. Imagine playing a puzzle game in which your quickening pulse alters the playing field in the game. Maybe a horror game in which the gameplay adapts to your nerves, or even a Wii channel that can help you calm down after a long day at work. The possibilities open wide beyond just a chunky piece of plastic.
Though no software or tech demos were shown you can bet Nintendo’s internal development is hard at work. Don’t expect to see anything until 2010.
The Wii is much more than a gaming console now.
What uses do you see the Vitality Sensor used for?
June 2nd, 2009 at 9:49 pm
Lame.
I want to see some TANGIBLE examples from Nintendo, not imagine this or that. And I mean more than just a pulse monitor for Wii Fit Plus or EA Fitness Game #2.
They should have had some example to show at the press conference if they were going to announce what on the surface seems like a gigantic dud.
Show me that innovation!
June 2nd, 2009 at 9:52 pm
I’ve decided to call this thing the Wii Mood Ring.
From what I gathered by Mr. Presidents speech (at least what I could understand of it), he wants to help people relax, maybe even get to sleep better. I think we are going to see something to do with that, ways to relax. Maybe a game like Endless Ocean, where your pulse helps determine what scenes you see. The slower your pulse, the more relaxing the scenes get until you are snoring away.
June 2nd, 2009 at 9:56 pm
Maybe if you have a rapid heart-beat, your character loses HP.
June 2nd, 2009 at 9:58 pm
Joshdad, this is the Wii. That thing is called the Wii Sucker. It sucks Wii. in all pictures shown so far it’s obviously been confused and have snapped on to similar…things.
June 2nd, 2009 at 10:04 pm
Nintendo had this thing (or something like it) for the N64 – it came with a Pokemon game. This device (if smaller and not in the extreme of your finger) has great potential for self-adjusting games. The first thing I though of was an Umbrella Chronicles-like game where the action and scares have their intensity controlled by how thrilled the player is.
But, of course, this will remain poorly used and have pretty much no value in the long run. Too bad. Nintendo should market all this peripherals along with the console, so it all would be standard.
Best!!
June 2nd, 2009 at 10:22 pm
As long as it’s super-cheap, I guess I’ll be OK with it. I mean, I can definitely see it being popular with the Wii Fit crowd, which is undeniably large. And I hadn’t even thought of that, I really thought the idea of the horror game that changes with your nerves sounds like a sweet idea, although I think it’d have to be pretty sensitive to pick up the changes my desensitized-to-horror mind would make.
June 2nd, 2009 at 10:29 pm
Sorry but this thing looks really lame. I will pretty shocked if anything of any substance ever comes of it.
June 2nd, 2009 at 11:17 pm
maybe you can send an electric shock through it if your health bar decreases, now health really matters eh?
Of course another crappy thing from nintendo that we will not see much use out of it(like the wii-mote) , no full potential is going to be used. The imagination is huge, but its not here is it? I hope Nintendo is not in the business of selling ideas and hopes in our brains. We want something physical here and now.
I also think the Wii peripherals are becoming stupidly vast and it is making the consumer lose his mind and focus of choice. Too many options makes the consumer lose focus on what to buy, hence he doesnt buy anything.
June 2nd, 2009 at 11:21 pm
I can’t think of a single use for this item that would make me want to buy it, especially if it costs more than $10.
June 2nd, 2009 at 11:48 pm
Another Nintendo peripheral that will probably be used once and then swiftly ignored.
June 3rd, 2009 at 12:18 am
They could use this for an Eternal Darkness style game. Reality gets more and more distorted as your pulse rises.
June 3rd, 2009 at 1:07 am
Of course another crappy thing from nintendo that we will not see much use out of it(like the wii-mote) , no full potential is going to be used. The imagination is huge, but its not here is it? I hope Nintendo is not in the business of selling ideas and hopes in our brains. We want something physical here and now.
Excellent parody of the hardcore, ladies and gentlemen!
Let’s give it up for kingmohd84!!
June 3rd, 2009 at 8:36 am
mambastic, that’s exactly what I thought of this morning. Yesterday, I was thinking this was the stupidest peripheral Nintendo has ever come out with (and they’ve produced some doozies over the years). This morning I thought of using it with Eternal Darkness or some other survival horror game. That would be pretty sweet!
Still, I still feel it’s not a very good device to pair with a game system. It will be embraced by few, if any, third-party developers and only used as a gimmick in a few Nintendo games. Years from now, we’ll look back on the Wii Vitality Sensor in the same way we do ROB the Robot and Virtual Boy. But what the hell, Nintendo can afford to make mistakes, right?
June 3rd, 2009 at 9:07 am
MORE PEREPHERALS! BRING ME MORE!
June 3rd, 2009 at 12:58 pm
im waiting for the virtual visors so you dont have to worry about split screen again each visor is a tv of its own it will be true multi player you never know where the other one is