Nintendo on Wii Sports 2 rumour

By Tom Bramwell Published 22 December, 2006

Speculation. But don't rule it out.

Nintendo has dismissed French reports that Wii Sports 2 is already in development as "pure rumour and speculation".

NGC France had reported that a second title may well be in development, perhaps even with swimming, basketball and other sports included.

The first title comes free with the Wii in both the US and Europe, while early sales figures in Japan, where it is sold separately, had it as the console's most popular title.

"We're really pleased with the reaction to Wii Sports - from people completely new to gaming to the hardcore fans everyone has taken to it straight away," a Nintendo UK spokesperson commented.

"It might just be the most popular game this Christmas in homes across the UK."

In other words, they may not be talking about a sequel yet, but with online gaming still to come to Wii and the first game's popularity already significant, don't be surprised if the tune changes in future.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (36) Latest comment 5 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • Carlo #1 5 years ago

    Wiii stag night please!

    Darts, drinking games, and 'Lust up the stripper' FTW!

  • AcidSnake #2 5 years ago

    @carlo:
    Don't forget the inevitable stealth portion of the game where you must try to sneak back into your own house whilst completely drunk...

  • nelsona #3 5 years ago

    @Carlo

    They cold have a pissing in the cupboard game as well, using the wiimote to aim at the shoes etc...

  • Muddtallica #4 5 years ago

    It wouldn't surprise me in the slightest, though it would be interesting to see what the sales would actually be like for the game when it's not a pack-in...I mean, most people who've played seem to really like it, but would people actually go out and buy it? I suppose they already did with the first one in Japan, but by the time a sequel came out, it wouldn't have the novelty value on its side any more...WS2 would certainyl need to be a more robust package to be viable, I reckon.

  • gerg #5 5 years ago

    "just rumour and speculation" means "dang it, you caught us" from Nintendo.

  • SBfistfun #6 5 years ago

    Thake that horse and flog it.

  • Pac-man-ate-my-wife #7 5 years ago

    It's inevitable and most welcome.

  • northernlights #8 5 years ago

    How about Wii Olympics - track and field version would be great. 100 metres, 110 Hurdles, Discus, Javelin, Swimming, High Jump, Long Jump etc

  • Psi #9 5 years ago

    hypersports olympics please ^ doh already said

  • Agent_Llama #10 5 years ago

    If it wasn't free with it I wouldn't have bought it. It's pointless gimmickery. Give me proper sports games using the Wiimote, ie. Everybody's Golf, Mario Tennis etc.

  • Pooley #11 5 years ago

    Daley Thompson's Decathalon!

    Where you have to pump the 'mote and nunchuck up and down instead of bashing keys or waggling the Kempston joystick.

    /retro

  • Tomo #12 5 years ago

    I would bloody love it if they did. Wii Sports is a top title.

    Javelin please, and cricket... and rowing. Hockey too please. Football... somehow!?

  • theweaze #13 5 years ago

    how about making each individual sport available on vc then you could download selected ones that appealed to you 800 points per sport or something. yeah and someone needs to make track and field wii

  • Rambaldi #14 5 years ago

    The time it takes Nintendo to develop a game, it might appear in three years time when everyone's Wii has gathered a thick layer of dust.

  • chronom4n #15 5 years ago

    i want the game... 'bitch slap' your woman. now that would be awesome by any means of the imagination.

  • pjmaybe #16 5 years ago

    Summer Games 2 / Winter games style thing please...

    Oh and ffs map the controllers with a bit more accuracy for boxing!

    Peej

  • secombe #17 5 years ago

    "TBH though I think I'd rather see a Mario Golf and Tennis before another Wii Sports. I like the game but it's frustrating in how limited it is, particularly in single player; I could play a whole game with the control mechanisms in Tennis and Golf in particular."

    Have you played against the 1800+ rated CPU players in Tennis? It's fantastic and not at all limited, in fact I'm nearly at the point where I can play any shot I like anywhere I like, great fun.

  • Artemis_Matsas #18 5 years ago

    @Pooley
    Kempston joystick interface!!!!
    Arg... you took me back 20 years and more.
    Saboteur, Atic Attack, Mickey, The way of the Exploding Fist, Carnov, Renegade and so on and so on.
    I have my Speccy 48K displayed at a place of honor on my library.

  • smelly #19 5 years ago

    "The time it takes Nintendo to develop a game, it might... "



    Erm.. it doesnt take them longer than anyone else?

    How long do you think halo 3 (for example) has been in development?? The only companies that generate games qucikly are those that make shit ones.

    (possibly why the ps... no wont say that..)

  • Beano #20 5 years ago

    "Erm.. it doesnt take them longer than anyone else? "

    It just feels long because they usually are the only ones developing quality games for their consoles :)

    I would buy a Wii Sports 2 if they really fleshed out the events and also made the games worth playing in single-player mode. The first Wii Sports is fine as a "free" (or "forced purchase" if you prefer) bundled game, but way to shallow to sell seperately.

  • Rambaldi #21 5 years ago

    No, sorry smelly, but a company with such resources needs to improve their turnaround. How many years for Zelda? How long in-between Marios? I know they also spend time on handheld games but if they want their home platforms to be more than a cheap thrill with a meagre handful of titles they need to shove a rocket up their ass!

  • Pac-man-ate-my-wife #22 5 years ago

    So a company that has The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Excite Truck, WarioWare: Smooth Moves, Wii Play, Wii Sports ready for the launch (or launch window) and has Animal Crossing, Battalion Wars 2, Disaster: Day of Crisis, DK Bongo Blast, Donkey Kong Wii, Forever Blue, Mario Party 8, Mario Strikers Charged, Metroid Prime 3: Corruption, Pokémon Battle Revolution, Project H.A.M.M.E.R., Super Mario Galaxy, Super Paper Mario, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Wii Music lined up for 2007 needs to improve it's development turnaround?!


    Edited by 1 at 23/12/06 @ 16:28

  • Rambaldi #23 5 years ago

    @frod

    I wouldn't call coupling their questionable track record with the Cube and early grumbles re: Wii, generalising, more conjecture.

    @Pac

    Unless I'm mistaken, many of those games are not developed by Nintendo. Metroid is, I believe, developed by Retro Studios and many Mario sports titles have historicaly been developed by studios such as Camelot. I'm not aware whether or not Nintendo actualy 'owns' these studios though.

    If you were to narrow that list down to those that are actually developed and not just published by Nintendo, I think you might find more credence in my original comments than you might think.

    I could be wrong though!


    Edited by 1 at 23/12/06 @ 17:22

  • Agent_Llama #24 5 years ago

    What Rambaldi says is reasonably true. Nintendo DO need to sort out their turnaround if they are to prevent the Wii going the same way as the Cube - an ace console killed off by a lack of first-party support.

    He quite rightly points out that Mario Golf is produced by Camelot, Square have made the new basketball game, a different company develops Smash Bros., Pokemon is made by Game Freak, Mario Party is handled by someone else etc etc - they didn't even do Yoshi's Island 2.

  • smelly #25 5 years ago

    >Nintendo DO need to sort out their turnaround

    How long has it been between halo games again? And note.. that's only ONE game!!!

    Oh.. or erm.. shit.. maybe we're talking about games like gran tourismo here??

    Oh.. of course.. gran tourismo has had LOADS of versions without huge waits between each one hasnt it? Sony rocks!!!

    *sigh*

  • smelly #26 5 years ago

    >Unless I'm mistaken, many of those games are not developed by Nintendo.

    But yet .. they ARE exclusive to nintendo.. which is kinda the (quite major) point...

  • Rambaldi #27 5 years ago

    Smelly, the point is that the Cube (like the N64) lacked decent 3rd party support and that Nintendo didn't pull out all the stops in order to fill that gap. Nintendo grew to power in the days where gaming was a much smaller market and 3rd party support was a niche within that! If I'm not mistaken they actively blocked/discouraged 3rd party support for the N64 and Cube as they still had their heads stuck firmly in the past. Neither did they push themsleves to come up with new IP - something, which IMHO, they desperately need to focus on as well as producing fine examples of their existing ones. Branching out further than Mario would be wise too - putting all your eggs in one basket seems a bit daft to me.

    You yourself stated that the N64 didn't even have five decent game (which is why you never bought one) and that it took you three years to get a Cube for the same reason.

    At the moment the Wii is enjoying pretty good 3rd party support but that is manifesting itself as a glut of generally average/poor titles. Who knows what the future holds, but I personaly feel that Nintendo need to try harder with their turnaround and sense of adventure (in terms of new IP) if they want to do more than make a quick buck off cheap hardware and damage their reputation as a serious contender in the process.

    The Wiimote is a curse as much as it is a blessing and will only suceed with focused and determined efforts from all parties concerned.

    You're right though: Sony and MS studios turnaround isn't much better but they can afford to be that way as their consoloes IMO enjoy a much greater level of diversity of IPs and thus audience and have superb 3rd party support.

    "How long has it been between halo games again? And note.. that's only ONE game!!!"

    I believe it was just over two years from Halo 1 to 2 and it will be just over three to Halo 3. Not bad considering HD level development is widely accepted to be much more time consuming and not something that Nintendo have to worry about. It took Nintendo all that time to make Twilight Princess, no?

    Lastly, can I just point out that I owned a Cube, PS2 and Xbox last gen: I'm talking business sense re: product design here, not fanboyish rants.
    Edited by 2 at 24/12/06 @ 10:35

  • kangarootoo #28 5 years ago

    @smelly

    "The only companies that generate games qucikly are those that make shit ones."

    Now come on. Lower budget games of very high quality can be made in under a year, and extremely expensive titanic'esque games can take ages and still turn out to be bobbins.

    Time != quality (I need a logic symbol for "necessarily";)

  • captain-future #29 5 years ago

    CURLING!!!! I need.

  • malloc #30 5 years ago

    They have to keep the name generic to appeal to the mass market, making it sound like a "legitimate" sporting title would kind of go against the whole point.

    BTW watching Genevieve at the moment, spiffing stuff.

  • bauhaus #31 5 years ago

    I want Para-Olympics, where you sit in a chair in front of your telly, 2 remotes one for each hand.

    Also, as a mini game, they could copy them old BBC idents where you would thrust your chair in a provocative manner in time to music

  • smelly #32 5 years ago

    So to recap from everyones comments...

    Msoft, sony and nintendo all produce 1st party games at about the same rate.. Erm.. but according to Rambaldi, if a game isnt actually developed in house by the console manufacturer, then it doesnt count (like metroid). So therefor microsoft have never had a 1st party game.

    Apparently just having lots of exclusives isnt good enough, they have to be made by the console manufacturer themselves.

    The n64 and cube had poor 3rd party support, which is bad. And having lots of games is good regardless of quality, as that means that the machine is deemed succesful... Erm.. Apart from if your the wii, in which case apparently launching with lots of 3rd party support is apparently a bad thing as all the 3rd party games apparently suck..

    And everyone is apparently in agreement that the xbox was a huge success, despite having very few exclusives, and pretty much having the same games as the ps2 (but less of them). But the cube is apparently a failure as having lots of exclusives, but a handful of the same games as the other 2 have is considered a bad thing?

    And kangaroo says that having lots of small games with quick turn arounds is good, as well as having big budget games every so often. But apparently when nintendo do that with games like wii sports, wario ware, mario party, etc.. then with big budget titles every so often like zelda and mario.. that's a bad thing?

    Also apparently having a high quality output of 1st and 2nd party games is considered a bad thing unless its supported by lots of 3rd party games which you can also get on the other 2 machines?

    Reet.. so that's everyones comments pretty much summed up.

    Seems like everyones talking bollocks to me...

  • Bates #33 5 years ago

    Wii Sports was more fun than just about anything I've played on the 360, and it was a launch title, AND it was free! I've never seen a game suck in people who usually don't give a shit about games as Wii Sports has with people I've gotten to try it.

    All they need to do is bundle another Wiimote with WS2 and it's good times all around.

  • bauhaus #34 5 years ago

    Xmas day my (65 y/old) Dad plays bowling and declares he wants to buy a Wii

  • Darren #35 5 years ago

    If Nintendo beefed up the games from Wii Sports (one-on-one tennis with optional analogue control for movement, multiple 18-hole golf courses plus a proper selection of clubs, expanded 9-innings baseball, team-based bowling, etc., etc.) then I'd pay Ł40 for it as the original is loads of fun as a multiplayer game. They should add some new games though although I'm not sure which ones exactly... table tennis maybe... darts possibly (the Super Monkey Ball Banana Blitz version is pretty neat) and perhaps a few athletic events like swimming (using the Nunchuk and Wiimote as "arms";)?

  • Rambaldi #36 5 years ago

    Been playing Wii sports over Xmas and yes, many people who would normaly shun consoles have had a go and enjoyed doing so, but I don't hear them talking about buying one. IMO it's slipping between two markets (casual and hardcore) without truly engaging either for more than a quick blast.