The Nintendo of Europe website has posted
translations of an interview between Nintendo president Satoru Iwata and the Wii design team, in which the question of account and online access for the company's next-gen console is discussed in detail.
Although the phrase “friend code” is never used, the article appears to imply that only one set of account details will be used per console, rather than having a different code for each game – as with online titles on the Nintendo DS. The example given in the interview is of buying a new game, and then being asked whether you want to tell previously registered friends that you have the game.
Nintendo designer Shinichiro Tamaki then seems to retreat from this specific example by saying, “Actually, the example I just gave is still under discussion and has not been finalized yet. But I think it gives you an idea of the kinds of things that would be possible.”
The interview also discusses using the recently announced Wii Message Board to communicate with both family members using the same console and with registered online friends. It is stated that there is purposefully no private account settings for different family members, with Nintendo wishing to avoid having individual passwords and usernames for different users.
How this will affect access to specific age-rated games and online access in general is not made clear, with many questions remaining on how open Nintendo’s online service will be, and whether it will be closer to the closed system of the Nintendo DS or the more open-ended Xbox Live service.
