Nintendo's next home console won't offer 3D gameplay

by Steven Mostyn - Mar 30 2011, 15:10

Although Nintendo is currently swimming in cash-laden success as its groundbreaking 3DS handheld continues flying off retail shelves around the world, it would appear the Japanese gaming titan won’t be bringing 3D into the living room.

More pointedly, Nintendo of America (NoA) boss Reggie Fils-Aime has this week revealed that the successor to Nintendo’s hugely popular motion-sensing Wii console will probably not deliver 3D gameplay.

“Glasses-free [3D] is a big deal,” he told CNN. “We’ve not said publicly what the next thing for us will be in the home console space, but based on what we’ve learned on 3-D, likely, that won’t be it.”

“I think at Nintendo, we realize that any sort of goggle-type 3D technology was not going to work,” added Fils-Aime. “In order to make 3D technology viable with videogames, we thought we needed to have glasses-free 3D.” 

Based on that admission, it would appear Nintendo would only be interested in bringing 3D to its future home console hardware if it were possible to achieve such immersion without the need for expensive and cumbersome viewing glasses.

However, current screen panels capable of delivering autostereoscopic 3D are incredibly expensive—not to mention ill-equipped when it comes to the kind of viewing range and viewing angle necessary for home gaming.

This is exactly why burgeoning glasses-free technology is perfect for Nintendo’s diminutive 3D system (i.e., small screen, close viewing distance, precise viewing angle) but probably won’t be integrated into home gaming for several years, if ever.

Given the performance shortfall of the Nintendo Wii when placed alongside market rivals such as the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, it’s much more likely that Nintendo’s next home console will push HD presentation and include a markedly improved processing platform.

The new glasses-free Nintendo 3DS launched on Sunday in the United States and promptly became the fastest-selling portable product Nintendo of America has ever unveiled. The console is already selling extremely well in Japan and throughout Europe.

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