Nintendo Flagging Big Announcement Today

Nintendo are gearing up to some big announcements later today, setting up a special E3 website to cover their hot news.

The revelations are likely to be centred on their new Wii motion plus controller, a dongle that attaches to the bottom of your wii-mote to provide extra 3D information to the console. We will keep Knitware readers up to date with developments as they happen. read full post »

The average age of a gamer is 31.  The increasing age of gamers has served to make gaming a mass market pass time.  Gaming is now a channel through which any age audience can be reached - Adults play casual games, young kids are playing on their DS, and families use the Wii.  But what of the teen generation?  For teens, new consoles are still expensive but their old consoles (PS2 / original Xbox) are too out of date to be of interest.  So, what are they playing?  Is gaming still a way to reach them too?  You’ll be surprised…

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The PSP is a great machine. Some people say it lacks great games but, while a few more would never hurt, I’ve played plenty. What’s weird is that, not long after PSP’s initial launch, Sony seem to have promoted it as everything but a games machine. New add-on devices have been announced to increase its non-gaming functionality, making its key strength even less clear. So, is it a games machine anymore? In fact, does it need to be? read full post »

It was announced yesterday that BBC’s iPlayer will soon be available on the Wii (having already been rolled out to iPhone and iTouch - all the iProducts sticking together).  I read the anouncement and thought “Wow”, then thought I can watch TV on my, er, TV.  So, I thought, “Hmm”, then I thought having Internet sites that deliver TV programs fed to your TV is the best place for them as they’re at the centre of your entertainment set-up at home, so I thought, “Wow”.  Then I thought, “But not many Wii’s are actually set-up to connect wirelessy compared to say over 70% of Xbox 360s and 40% of PS3s, so I thought “Hmm”.  Is this “Wow” or “Hmm”?  Help me out…

I was in Game recently looking at all the accessories you can get for the Wii: the steering wheel, golf club, tennis racquet, shotgun, crossbow, fishing rod, the list goes on… But mostly these are simple extensions of the Wiimote; they don’t actually do anything. However the ‘balance board’ is coming to the UK and proves to step up beyond the capabilities of Wiimote prosthetics.

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Wii Fit - Already sold out. MarioKart Wii - nearly already sold out. Does such palpable excitement ahead of a release remind you of anyone? read full post »

We haven’t talked much about Widgets on Knitware. Graham mentioned sharp’s latest Aquos Net widget TV, but I think they probably deserve more dues. I’ve been building a website for my wedding for some time now; I just wanted it to be a simple and easy to use site that tells people where the hotels are and how to get to our little corner of England. The problem is that I was desperately ill equipped to design a website. read full post »

I wrote a piece a while ago about how ambient interfaces were the next step in digital - being able to control computers without the rather awkward encumbrance of a keyboard and mouse. And lo and behold, the world has gone ambient interface crazy.

The Wii remote, multi-touch screens, the iPhone - these are all devices that use your body in a much more natural way to interact with devices. They are somehow more human.

Here’s a list of some other, more recent examples:

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