Nintendo confirms Wii successor

Andre Yoskowitz
25 Apr 2011 22:41

Nintendo has finally confirmed the successor to the Wii gaming console, two weeks after the rumor fire was set ablaze by a number of reports.
The company will reveal the system at E3 in June with a playable demo.

Nintendo says:

So I won't talk about specific details today, but it will offer a new way of playing games within the home.

For now, the rumors about the console are:

Nintendo is building the system under the codename Project Cafe and may be released very early next year as the Nintendo Stream.

Under the hood, the Stream will run on a custom-built triple-core IBM PowerPC CPU, with "much" faster clock speeds than the Xbox 360. The GPU will be a revamped AMD R700 architecture. The system will support full 1080p output alongside stereoscopic 3D.

For form factor, the system will be the same size as the first-gen Xbox 360s and will look like a "modernized" SNES.

The completely revamped controllers will have integrated touchscreens, with the ability to stream games to each controller. (Check included mockup)

While the console will begin shipping in September, but it appears that Nintendo will not release until early 2012 to ensure they have a huge amount of launch titles and large supply so there are no delays.

Perhaps most importantly, the sources expect the console to sell for $350 at launch, unless Nintendo decides to take a hit on margins and lower the price.