Rumour: New App Store in Development for Wii U

Angry Birds! Haha no, I'm kidding.

Is Nintendo finally taking online seriously? I hope so.

"hich could conceivably include services such as digital magazines, varied video streaming options and practical lifestyle apps. There are plenty of possibilities, with rumours also suggesting that these apps may work as standalone entities on the Wii U controller."

Would be nice.

That would be AWESOME!

Here's to hoping that all important criticism from players and devs will be adressed with the WiiU's digital store.
And it’s a great idea to offer all kinds of apps you have on smartphones as well as ones that will feel special and unique on the WiiU. Its tablet controller is just perfect for these. And it’s better suited to a social experience than the more personal 3DS.
This Christmas my parents _{(both 46 years old)} and grandparents _{(71 years old)} have first seen a smartphone in action and have been wowed by the barcode scanning app especially. I highly doubt that they would ever invest in the monthly fees for it since they wouldn’t use it a lot outside though. Add in the potential of the WiiU to make these apps more social by streaming to _{or interacting with} your TV and you’ve got some serious appeal here.

It’s hard for me to imagine how the interactivity between TV screen and controller will really work on the WiiU. What they showed during this year’s E3 sure looked promising though.
I desperately hope the WiiU will be able to play videos on youtube since that seems to be the most mainstream idea from the E3 footage. Having some form of Flipnote on the WiiU is also a must imo.

As long as it doesn't go app crazy. Apps are awesome, but I want it to mainly be a gaming platform. :3

Also, is the Wii U using Friend Codes? Or is it using something else this time?

I agree that there should be lifestyle-helping apps that are unique to the Wii U. I don't have any specific ideas, but I'm sure there are several things that could happen with the Wii U.

unlike #1, I say in all seriousness: Angry Birds, it's a cash cow, and would help get sales rolling for such an online store

YouTube, Nintendo Life, Chase Mii, Battle Mii, Club Nintendo, and Demos for games in early development.

-Leap Frog games, a touch pad, mic & speakers + on-line to interact with family that are out of town, don't skip on this idea.
-Paint & music apps (as in Mario Paint,& Mario Artist).
-A new "Nintendo channel" that's powered with by Nintendo Power columnist's artificial's & interviews.

i hope that maybe they'll turn some of the tech demos from e3 to apps that would be cool

@YashaTheSlayer

Angry Birds was also ported to the PS Minis service for PSP and PS3, yet that did nothing to boost their sales.

Does this mean Nintendo is FINALLY taking online features SERIOUSLY? If not I'm not even going to speculate.

This makes the whole Wii U thing a lot more interesting.

A SwapNote / LetterBox should fit the WiiU very nicely too.

@6 - It's not entirely clear what kind of ID system Nintendo will use for the Wii U. There was even a rumour that EA would handle the entire online servers on behalf of Nintendo!

Personally, I hope Nintendo adopt the 'account' system like Sony and Microsoft. I don't like the idea of having all my purchases dependent on one console...i.e, if it breaks, say goodbye to everything.

I wonder if they will add a Virtual Console service only to abandon it 3 years later.

Makes sense to me, there is a tablet controller why not give the ability to tweet and post of facebook with it.

I hate to repeat myself but after reading Kage_88 (16.)'s comment i can't help it.
Having access to a lot of your games on the 3DS and WiiU _{like Sony is doing with its DLC games} would attract a lot more harcore gamers imo. (I know it won't work for games that heavily rely on the Wii's motion controls and some (3)DS games that make a lot of use of the dual screens but it sounds too sweet to not want it.)

To be honest, this all sounds great, but if Wii U doesn't utilise Nintendo eShop then Nintendo will really have missed a trick. Nintendo eShop would be a fantastic cross-platform service and there's no reason it couldn't provide 'apps' on Wii U. What was the point of giving eShop a non-specific name if it wasn't going to be cross-platform? They might as well have called it Nintendo 3DS Shop or something like.

Not that I want it to be anything like the App Store or the Android Market, mind you. It should be a purely gaming storefront if Nintendo really wants to make Wii U a proper hardcore console, which, from what I've seen of it so far, they do.

Colors! This needs to happen.

I hope some of these days Nintendo realizes that it's a huge waste of time and resources to develop a new shop for digital purchases every time they introduce a new console. What they need is a general-purpose online-store that can manage downloadable software for all of their platforms. That would also go hand in hand with the concept of unified user accounts vs. the stupidity of tying digital purchases to the hardware. It just seems so much more efficient to maintain and extend one shop over time, than to reinvent the wheel with each new console.

NOA's new Wii home page is similarly eye-brow raising... http://www.nintendo.com/wii "Wii is more than a game machine." Oh? It plays Netflix, yes, but I thought Nintendo was always about Games And Just Games. That's why the 'Cube didn't have a DVD player (ok, and Ninty didn't want to pay licensing fees) and why their focused approach has appealed to me more than Sony's "Here's Everything Ever!" with PS3. If WiiU really does bring in Apps, Etc., I just hope they don't spread their resources too thin and forget about what butters their bread: fun games you can't get anywhere else.

Make more good games for 3DSware, and make the wii u store better than the eshop. But im not getting the wii u for years after its release anyway

I don't care what this thing does other than playing native 1080p 3D Nintendo games.

IF it does this, then shouldn't the eShop also be updated to match it?

@17:
This is probably one of the top things i'm worried about.

i'm thinking with this app store it will have the virtual console (hopefully), wii U ware, as well as full facebook, twitter integration and perhaps you can link your 3DS to it and other apps.

as for the friend codes thing, it would be better without it.

I want my digital purchases AND save files in the cloud. My wii broke down on me once, which made me put another 524 hours in mh tri. Oh, and I still need toon link in brawl back in action.

I do think Nintendo is holding so many VC releases for WiiU. That way, it'll still "live" in the next generation. VC is dead for now, but it's inevitable it's going to be revived. That, along with a potential App store? Well, I hope it is true. I would love to make my first game on WiiU

makes sense. i didn't like the set up of the virtual console, too many bland lists. the apple app store is organized, easy to use, and looks great. it also makes great sense with the tablet controller...developers could easily publish the same apps on the Wii U as the apple/android phones & tablets. i just hope the Wii U doesn't suffer from too much shovelware and casual crap that causes it's reputation to plunder in the hardcore audience, as was the case with the Wii. Remember folks, the Wii U is trying to be a serious contender in the hardcore gaming market.
So long as a lot of the shovelware retail games we saw with the wii move to being apps as opposed to full retail discs, and the full retail discs in the stores are our nintendo favorites alongside 3rd party hardcore games, i think the Wii U will succeed in being a system for both casual and hardcore gamers. So i think this app store and a strong online infrastructure will strengthen both ends of the market.

Something just dawned on me. I think there is a reason why Nintendo went with the seemingly-weird decision of having circle pads instead of full blown sticks....They plan on letting the Wii U tablet function as its own entity. It wouldn't be very comfortable to carry around a tablet with analog sticks slapped on it. Perhaps it will have an SD card slot for expanding its memory? I just got a little more hyped for Wii U!

@bboy2970
It's unlikely that the Wii U tablet will work independently outside the home. Nintendo has already said as much at 2011 E3. While it will let you play games on it, all that is run through the Wii U console, relying on it's processing power to do all the work and the tablet just to have enough power to stream to it.

If they did decide to make the tablet independent of the console, this would cause severe financial burden on both Nintendo and the consumer, as it would have to have enough internal power to run anything worthwhile.

"New App Store in Development for Wii U"

No, REALLY?! I am speechless!!

The idea of a full-blown app store on the Wii U sounds very interesting. It may be a rumor for now but I hope that this one does end up being true. Something like this could definitely benefit Nintendo. It sure has me eager and excited for more information about the Wii U.

yeah, right. It can never be a contender with those others if the price points for Wiiware "apps" stay like they are now. No one would touch it since we all already have the cheaper devices. there better be a lot of freebies and at least a drop to the $3 range or it's dead in the water. We can always dream, though.

What I want to know is if they plan to re-release all the Virtual Console games again in HD, and will they provide a free upgrade for those who already have the standard definition versions.

I'd like to see something like 3D classics but instead of 3D, HD.

I'm with the people who want a unified "Nintendo eShop" for all digital purchases. One type of card that can be used on any Nintendo console and games that can be downloaded on more than one console through a unified account. Don't worry about keeping our credit card information, just store a list of the games we've downloaded so that we can download them again.

Mini games app? we saw that tic tac toe game being played on the Wii U controller during the e3 presentation, there's bound to be alot more of that to come. Or even a board game app, where you could buy classic virtual board games to play on the controller with friends. Hmm that's pretty good actually, families will like it;)

this is AWESOME! finally they take online seriously

I just want them to price 3rd party games reasonably compared to PSN/Apple. Ninty has the best controller for retro games, but it's hard to justify paying 2-10 as much to get a game on 3DS or Wii. Everyone loses out on sales!

Facebook App, Netflix App, Youtube App, ... basically what I would like to see on the Wii U is developer freedom to create anything... not just games... that's what's so awesome and appealing about the iPhone's app store... I can check email on an app, i can play an app game and then watch a youtube vid on an app... ... if someone is making something for the iPad... there's no reason why it shouldn't be made for the Wii U as well...

ARE U KIDDING ME!? I just got my Wii and they come out with this. Aint this a about a.... Hopefully there are some free ones in the app store. If not its not worth buying.:/

Just think, the Apple and Android devices started as simple as tic tak toe, similar to what they showed at the wii u demonstration at e3 2011. If the wii u tablet turns into somthing like those then this console (and the tablet) is gonna be a hit.

Also; Downloadable Movies Please!!!

Well, I would hope that whatever this new shop is will include content currently available in the Wii shop since there's supposedly backwards compatibility. I also hope for some kind of account for easier console replacement. Nintendo really missed a trick there as I suspect they could have had people buying new Wiis just for a colour swap if that was the case.

Despite the foibles of the Apple ID, it does mean I don't feel any hesitation about upgrading my hardware whether it's my Mac Mini, iPhone or eventual iPad - the device is merely a platform for running my software which is transferable (the only limitation being the ability of the code to actually run on a current platform).

I'm planning on buying a Wii-U irrespective of software transfer service, but I hope we'll have something beyond an app-based solution like the 3DS has if so.

Why wouldn't they have this, they already have it on the Wii and the 3DS. True, the Wii "apps" are limited to Netflix and the Wii Speak Channel (maybe one other) and the 3DS app channel has 2 different Mario clock faces, but these are apps in their own app channels. Obviously not comparable to the "i" or Android selection, and I would like to see a lot more, but the precedent has been set.
The WiiU controller needs -
Facebook, Youtube, Angry Birds, Maps, Etch-a-sketch, Netflix, digital photo frame and digital clock - if my WiiU controller is going to be sitting around charging all the time anyway might as well put the screen to use. And for all that's holy in the world, a web browser that doesn't suck so miserably at being a web browser. I swear to g*d the 3DS browser is the worst piece of software ever invented. The top screen is identical in size to my iPod Touch which I use constantly, I won't even turn the 3DS browser on.

At that screen size, it'd be good for apps like Flipbook or Google Currents, where you can view aggregated web content from multiple sources in a magazine like format.

As long as they add useful and modern apps aswell like apps that are being used now a days, for example facebook app, twitter app, specially a youtube app, and as long as they bring the store to the 3ds or make it equal, of course appropriately. So far im waiting on those apps for the 3ds. They should remake a nintendo calender planner, photo clock but not really a channel but were the internet browser is at and the game notes so we can still get our street/spotpass.
P.S. What happened to hulu plus and 3d movies as promised at e3 and saints row!

A calendar really would fit well with the Wii U.

Wouldn't be surprised at all if this were true. The controller is perfect for these kinds of things and would really appeal to broad audience.

Would like to see apps on checkers, chess, reversi and backgammon. The WiiU trailer had reversi on the WiiU control tablet and with the pieces slide off with the movement of the tablet. One question Wii fans will be asking before the E3 2012 event, is will it be able to transfer current data and system files from the Wii to the WiiU (like the DSi data to 3DS), since a select few cannot be copied to a SD(HC) card.

I can't wait!

Id like to see a music app,youtube app,facebook app. Oh and maybe an app which allows us to stream movies.

@42, that's not tic tac toe....I think its called reversi

I would really love to see some of the greater Tablet games appearing on this. another thought of mine if to add portable eshop items onto this Tablet... that'd make for some very good portable games that are now easily accessible for people withought the devices or games. I'd also love to see some point and click games made for this tablet... if possible.