Gadgetory

hey everyone I'm Jeff Bakalar for cnet.com and this is my first look review of the Nintendo Wii U now before I get going here I need to disclose that as of this recording there are a lot of features not yet accessible on the system these include we backwards compatibility Nintendo TV we - Wii U transferring a shop miiverse Wii U video chat access to the Nintendo network and all the streaming apps like Amazon and Netflix and even more stuff we're told that some of these features will be available on day one and some won't for example Nintendo TVs not going to be around until sometime in December but I will be sure to update the video and the review once they go live but for now let's talk about what we do know the Wii U comes in two models the basic and the deluxe now I definitely recommend going with the deluxe for 350 dollars because you get Nintendo land included in the box and a bigger 32 gigabyte flash storage drive plus more accessories the game in the memory are worth the extra 50 bucks alone now the Wii U console has a total of four USB 2.0 ports and an SD card slot up front there's an HDMI port and back along with slots for a component connection power and the censor bar all we games end controller accessories work with the Wii U so there's no need to buy anymore if you already have some old ones laying around the Wii U provides a unique gaming experience using a rechargeable tablet controller called the gamepad that can use motion and touch control to interact with games the battery lasts about three to five hours depending on what you're playing and it takes about two-and-a-half hours to fully charge one of the coolest and most promising gamepad features is the ability to play off TV games which place shifts all the action on to the gamepad anyone who has roommates or lives with a spouse will absolutely love this feature now not every game supports this so you have to read up beforehand on which games do at launch only a handful of them support it like new super mario brothers you Darksiders to assassin's creed 3 and call of duty black ops 2 now the range of the gamepad is good and as long as I had it within the line of sight of the console I was able to use it around 25 feet away however once you go into another room that distance drops through just one wall I was only getting it to work and around 10 feet away from the console now playing with the gamepad is a lot of fun but it's a really big and cumbersome unit this is over 10 inches wide I have monster hands so I can only imagine how a small child is gonna have to really grip this thing the gamepad only weighs about a pound but it does take up a lot of real estate there are a ton of buttons on the gamepad too so there's plenty of room for controlling almost any type of game thinkable it's a very versatile controller the gamepad is very responsive and there's absolutely no detectable latency issues at all now the Wii U's interface looks just like the 3d s's with rows of tiled icons that represent games and apps the menu screen can be swapped back and forth with the gamepad screen during most instances jumping in and out of system settings can take a little longer than you would think I've had to wait as long as 20 seconds on occasion by today's standards that's almost unacceptable the Wii U is the first Nintendo console to support HD gaming and playing mario and high def for the first time is awesome most of the games look fantastic and are just about on par with ps3 and xbox360 graphics though video files out there may spot some shortcomings with texture and frame rates there's definitely a learning curve with the gamepad and I found that I don't always know where to look there are some visual cues on-screen but some games assume that you already know what to do while Nintendo TV will allow for the combination of live TV Guide viewing content discovery and more the gamepad can only currently control your television in fact it actually does a great job with my and files box however it's probably not going to replace the Harmony remote that you might have because there doesn't seem to be any sort of activity function where the gamepad can blast a series of commands to get a device working instead you'll probably have to manually input items just like you would with a bunch of separate remote controls again we'll be updating this video review with much more information once it's pushed live so be sure to check back here very soon there's a lot more to learn about the Wii U console on all of the games you can play on it so I highly suggest reading through the in-depth review on the product page I'm Jeff Bakalar and this has been a first look at the Nintendo Wii U