Nintendo Working On Football Controller 123
Siliconera found patent filings from Nintendo for a football controller addon that will work with the Wii. After tucking the Wii Remote into a lateral slot on the football, you slip your hand through a strap so that your fingers touch the Remote's buttons. Then you mimic running and throwing, which is interpreted by the accelerometer. 'The pitch angle and force of the throw determines the trajectory arc of the throw. Side to side motion determines the yaw angle. Pressing buttons on the Wii remote can adjust other options.' The device is described as 'squishy,' so your TV is probably safe, but I'd try it at a friend's house first.
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MotionPlus (Score:2)
I frankly don't see this working out too well without the MotionPlus' accuracy.
As a european... (Score:5, Insightful)
As a european my first thought was "that sounds really dangerous", then I read the whole summary and realized that they were talking about what some people like to refer to as a "handegg" and not an actual football.
/Mikael
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As an American... (Score:5, Insightful)
I used to read European news sites and blogs, and wonder why they would write the word "football" when they meant "soccer." Then I reminded myself that I was reading a European news site or blog, and I would feel really, really foolish. But that was years ago, and I've become much more cosmopolitan now.
Re:As an American... (Score:4, Informative)
It's called "football" in the entire world. Only people from the USA call it "soccer".
Understanding etymology? You fail it! [blogspot.com]
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Wow, you really haven't traveled much.
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What happens in your little corner does not equal the entire world.
Soccer is commonly used in countries with more than one code of football to distinguish it.
In Ireland we use soccer most of the time as football could mean soccer or gaelic football.
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They probably wrote football because they were talking about a game where the predominant contact with the ball is with the foot ;)
I followed the link from the front page to the summary wondering how they'd managed to do a real football controller, started reading the description and wondered how that would work ("insert controller in ball then hold strap while still touching buttons"? that's a long way to stretch and an uncomfortable position). Then they said throwing and I realised they meant they'd made
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I just find it funny that people around the world still like to argue about 'soccer' vs. 'football'. If the British want to call 'American soccer' football, let them.
Slightly different, the differences between rugby and American football. I don't know how well rugby players are paid across the world, but I would guess that American football pays better (well according to http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_is_the_average_income_of_a_professional_rugby_player [answers.com] is roughly US$120K, and http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Wh [answers.com]
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So why not try and get a job in the NFL for such an 'easy job' at 6X the pay for a year or 2?
Because after you get hit enough times in the head while not wearing a helmet, you get addled to the point where you're lucky to remember your own name, let alone what career path to follow.
Y'see, American football players wear helmets not because they are "pussies," but BECAUSE THEY CAN!
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But try explaining that to the Brits or Aussies...
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As a Brit who could never stand soccerball or the country's obsession with it, I suspect, following events in London this week, that Nintendo's best bet for putting out a simulation of that on the Wii is basically to start developing it as a Madworld mod. Only it'd need to be more violent.
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I thought it was an American in the UK that came up with "Soccer".
My understanding of it all (as someone who only watches football for the post game riots) -
Football - Generic term used many moons ago for 100s of different sets of rules.
Soccer - 100s of rules make it difficult to make money from. So an American takes the most watchable set of rules and formalises them and names this Soccer.
American Football - No idea. From what I've seen you only kick the ball a few times. I know as a Brit I should say some
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My first thought was some sort of way to attach controlers to your feet/shoes/ankles. Didn't realize they were talking about american football instead of the type of football the rest of the world plays.
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I think you got that backwards, Americans refer to american football as football and they refer to actual football as soccer.
/Mikael
slip your hand? (Score:5, Funny)
someone needs to let them know you're not supposed to touch the football with your hands
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Except in EA Goalkeeper 2010.
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You people play that pussy sport SOCCER. You don't have big well protected men slamming into one another.
WELL NOW, I'm a LOUD European.. [wikipedia.org]
You people play that pussy sport AMERICAN-FOOTBALL. You must have very well protected men slamming into each other for short, paused time periods.
Disclaimer: I am actually not an European, although I am trying to pass as one of them while living there.
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Foot, pound, energy (Score:2)
A foot pound is a unit of energy, not force.
When a thug pounds his foot into your head, your skull and spine absorb the energy from the shock. If this causes structural failure, you won't care about dimensional analysis.
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You people play that pussy sport SOCCER. You don't have big well protected men slamming into one another.
LOL. Why is this flamebait. It's friggin hilarious.
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Actually, rugby players don't have all those protection, figure-, and crotch-enhancing paraphernalia.
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Actually, rugby players don't have all those protection, figure-, and crotch-enhancing paraphernalia.
Probably because they're not colliding head-on at full speed and sliding across an artificial surface.
What's the point (Score:5, Insightful)
Why are they doing all of this and still leaving behind the single best application of the wiimote - swordfights. That's the only place where I can see a benefit from doing sports electronically since it's a lot friendlier to slash at your friends with an electronic sword rather than a real one.
What's next? Everyone wears a Wiimote-shirt that can read smashing into other players so it can translate said readings into electronic caricatures of the game?
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Ok this is getting rather ridiculous. What's the point of having such a controller? If you're doing all that running around and stuff anyway, why not just go out and ... you know, do some actual sports?
But that's dangerous, you could hurt yourself doing real sports.
It's much safer to run around inside of your home playing virtual sports.
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But wouldn't be even safer to run around inside your virtual home playing virtual sports?
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I know you are being flippant about it but I want to run with your original point.
It IS very dangerous to play real football. Full stop. Science is just starting to reveal what the long term effects of concussions are, and frankly I think many people including myself were horrified about how potentially dangerous it really is. Not to mention ligament damage and broken bones that can easily happen as a hazard.
As a hocker player and boxer I think I can weigh in and say "Yes, some sports unless yo/// EVEN if y
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In wii sports/resort bowling you can put a spin on the ball and it's pretty accurate.
Maybe in resort bowling. In Wii sports bowling the control is shit. Four of us stood around throwing bowling balls and not really knowing what was working and what wasn't, because throws which felt like we did the same thing produced entirely different results. Maybe my problem is that I've actually bowled, though.
In mario cart you can of course use it as a steering wheel.
Any steering wheel without force feedback is inferior to a joystick, it takes more effort for very little return.
This stuff requires real skill. You cant just point a thumb stick somewhere and hit a button.
You can, however, just twitch your wrist in most games.
There are arguments to be ma
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Maybe in resort bowling. In Wii sports bowling the control is shit. Four of us stood around throwing bowling balls and not really knowing what was working and what wasn't, because throws which felt like we did the same thing produced entirely different results. Maybe my problem is that I've actually bowled, though.
Worked fine for us all. I think it reacts to how you hold and turn the remote during the swing.
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A couple of different games have already tried swordfights, and done a pretty miserable job of it. Maybe the motion will help, but I wonder if anyone else is going to bother.
Wii Sports Resort - Swordplay (Score:5, Informative)
There's a popular new game called Wii Sports Resort that uses a position-sensitive controller add-on to simulate several sports. One of them is Swordplay. You can jab, slice, and block your friend or computer characters. There's even a Nerf sword you can stick the controller into if you want to feel a little more dorky.
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There's even a Nerf sword you can stick the controller into if you want to feel a little more dorky.
I think that should be the next big Wii title: "Feel a Little More Dorky"
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Why don't you just come out and call it by its real name - a dildo !
LOL. Why don't you just come out and admit that you've either never seen a dildo, or never seen anything Nerf.
Just fyi: foam makes for a really bad dildo, and swinging around a "sword" of latex rubber is a good way to hurt people.
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Are you really that short-sighted? The point is that finding 20 people to play football with in mid-January on a moment's notice is not very easy. Growing up, I used to play pickup games all the time with friends. As we age, I almost never get to do that. All my current sporting activity is organized. This gives me a way to play something exactly when I want, without the extra hours of setting it up and traveling. Oh, and the games are usually a bit more whimsical than the real thing. It's a lot more
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Ok this is getting rather ridiculous. What's the point of having such a controller? If you're doing all that running around and stuff anyway, why not just go out and ... you know, do some actual sports
Because it's hard to find a place and friends to play at night after my kid has gone to bed. Also it is hard to see the leather football after dark.
Why are they doing all of this and still leaving behind the single best application of the wiimote - swordfights
Because it would suck. What happens when you slash, but your opponent blocks? Now your hands are pointing at the ground because it didn't physically stop YOU... but in the game your sword is at chest level. There are other issues as well.
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Because it would suck. What happens when you slash, but your opponent blocks? Now your hands are pointing at the ground because it didn't physically stop YOU... but in the game your sword is at chest level. There are other issues as well.
One word: gyros. If they can keep a segway up, they can block a sword.
Interesting patent, but... (Score:5, Interesting)
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im worried that if this does get a patent Nintendo will have a recall like they did for the early Wii remote arm straps because ppl were throwing them into their TVs. (and breaking them)
What's funny here... (Score:3, Insightful)
Is all the defensive Americans marking as Troll anything that highlights the ridiculousness of calling this particular game "Football". As a European, I had exactly the same reaction as another poster: that putting the Wiim-mote inside a football would be dangerous.
As it transpires, it's not actually a football, but for some twisted reason, it's still called that.
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What else would you call the ball they use in American Football? An American Football! Despite Association Football (Soccer) being more popular worldwide than your pansy version of Rugby Football, there's an insitance in international media on calling an American Football a football and an Association Football a Soccerball (despite no-one outside the new-world colonies calling it Soccer)
*tramps back to 1830 in a huff*
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Whooooosh!
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you primarily move the ball by running with it, falling down, getting up and running with it and falling down, maybe throwing it occasionally and eventually, if you didn't do very well, there might be a kick in there.
I can see from your comment, you don't quite understand the concept of american football. Let me just expand your comment to make it more accurate.
you primarily watch halfnaked girls do splits whilst waiving pompons, move the ball by running with it, take a 5 minute break, falling down, take a 5 minute break, getting up, take a 5 minute break, and running with it, take a 5 minute break, and falling down, take a half our break and watch some pornographical half-time show, maybe throwing it and taking 5 minute breaks occasionally and eventually, after a 5 minute break, if you didn't do very well, there might be a kick in there followed by a 5 minute break and half-naked girls again.
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but you don't. you primarily move the ball by running with it, falling down, getting up and running with it and falling down, maybe throwing it occasionally and eventually, if you didn't do very well, there might be a kick in there. rugby isn't much better, but at least the game is called rugby, not football with throwing...
Running and falling down a lot is soccer, though. Also, moaning and holding your leg, not to mention getting up as soon as the referee gives you a free kick and continuing to play.
Re:What's funny here... (Score:4, Funny)
There was once, so I understand, quite an interesting ball sport played in the US. An evolved variant of all the other 'football' type games played round the world. I believe it may even still be played by a small group with just an oval ball and a bunch of shirts/cones/stones to mark out a pitch and a sense of sportsmanship.
But the commercial/educational variant of it has morphed into a mockery of a sport which exists solely as a vehicle for advertising, sportsware sales and pay-per-view.
Ah.. In fact it's just like soccer then..
Re:What's funny here... (Score:4, Insightful)
All pro sports are like that. It is most disgusting in the case of the olympics, where if you want to drink a beverage not sold on the grounds (even as an athlete) you have to cover up the label, and there are sharp restrictions on media; you cannot share any photos or video clips. Your memories belong to the olympic committee! Every time someone brings up the olympics I go off on a rant like this, which may be why I have so few friends :) But then, I don't have to hear about how amazing the fucking olympics are, either. Greece should start a new-old olympic games, but it was associated with nudity and Greece is always trying to escape its association with buttfuckery.
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Every time someone brings up the olympics I go off on a rant like this, which may be why I have so few friends :)
I can understand why that would happen. The question I have is, do you drive them away with your rants? Or would it be like if I were your friend, and I'd drive you away by always saying "Olympics!" at random times just to inspire your rants?
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Or would it be like if I were your friend, and I'd drive you away by always saying "Olympics!" at random times just to inspire your rants?
I find your ideas intriguing, and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
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Either way everyone is happy, because I don't want to hang around sycophants of modern media and they don't want to hang out with people who talk about things which make them think. It's best for us to be apart. I have few friends because I can't stand most people. Most of the people I rub the wrong way I am consciously or subconsciously trying to drive away.
I'm a gigantic dude, and one day on the bus a girl I'd thought was cute in high school but who never talked to me told me she had been afraid of me bac
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... For all I care soccer is the better term. It's close to sucker.
Brilliant! thanks :-)
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Gridiron football is descended from rugby, American football is just the particular gridiron football rules used in the US, as is Canadian football in Canada.
Rugby union and rugby league are also played in the US separately, the US even has the gold medal from the last time union was played at the olympics.
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sissified? (Score:2)
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The pads are because people were dying in football. Many, many people. President Theodore Roosevelt mandated the pads. Rugby allows interlocking formations and does not allow the forward pass. This makes it much less likely for rugby players to be involved in high speed collisions of the type in American football.
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Why's it even called American Football?
Because Canadian football (also the rules used in the few other places that pigskin football is different from American football.
Two of the major differences are that Canadian football has one less down, and that the field is measured in meters, not yards (as such our football fields are about 110yd, or 100m)
Personally I'm not a fan of football (with a pigskin), but as others have stated above, the armor is to protect a player from a bunch of 350lb guys hurling themselves at him. In rugby it's a lot easie
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What else would you call the ball they use in American Football?
Handball! Obviously
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Taken [wikipedia.org]. Even 'American handball' exists, apparently. My vote is still 'handegg'.
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I'll join if you create a facebook group!
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Yea the image of somebody kicking a football ball in the living room, towards the TV, is weird. Then again the image of somebody having an American Football egg in his hand and doing pretend throws, isn't much better either.
I wish the Wii came with a freely accessible camera and all that spastic flailing would be broadcast online :D
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As it transpires, it's not actually a football, but for some twisted reason, it's still called that.
I was operating on the understanding that it's because the ball is a foot long.
Re:What's funny here... (Score:5, Insightful)
Good thing Slashdot is a European site...oh wait.
Re:What's funny here... (Score:4, Informative)
all the defensive Americans marking as Troll anything that highlights the ridiculousness of calling this particular game "Football"
This is a website run in America by a bunch of friends from Wisconsin. It can be expected that it will use American spellings and American terms for things.
So any post placed here complaining about the American terms used by the Americans running the site will be controversial, inflammatory, irrelevant and/or off-topic, with the inevitable result of provoking other users into an emotional or disciplinary response or of otherwise disrupting normal on-topic discussion. It turns out this is the exact definition of a Troll [wikipedia.org]
So sue the mods for definition of character.
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Is all the defensive Americans marking as Troll anything that highlights the ridiculousness of calling this particular game "Football". As a European, I had exactly the same reaction as another poster: that putting the Wiim-mote inside a football would be dangerous.
As it transpires, it's not actually a football, but for some twisted reason, it's still called that.
The Brits also invented a football game where the ball is mostly thrown and seldom kicked with the foot. It was called Rugby, which split into Rugby Union and Rugby League, but both games are still called Rugby Football.
Football games aren't so-called because of the kicking action, of the seven or so flavours of football in this world only one of them predominantly uses the foot to deliver the ball. The 'foot' in 'football' comes from the fact that these games are descended from pastimes that were played
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You know what happens when I ask a European who their favorite football team is(referring to soccer)?
They say "Oh, I don't really watch American football."
And if I ask them who their favorite soccer team is, I get "We call it football in Europe."
The Europeans are always right, and all Americans are dumb.
Fuck off!
Smart (Score:2, Interesting)
WII Motion Plus (Score:1, Insightful)
Football (Score:2)
For most of the world that's not football.
Attention, non-Americans! (Score:5, Funny)
Please replace all references to "football" in the summary with "throwball". [urbandictionary.com]
Thank you for your patience.
Now a proper footy game for the Wii, that would be interesting. Maybe they could strap a Wiimote to each leg or something.
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Please replace all references to "football" in the summary with "throwball". [urbandictionary.com]
Thank you for your patience.
Now a proper footy game for the Wii, that would be interesting. Maybe they could strap a Wiimote to each leg or something.
From your linked page:
Since the sport barely requires you to use your feet.
I wonder how do the players move, do they float or something?
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From your linked page: Since the sport barely requires you to use your feet.
I wonder how do the players move, do they float or something?
OK, they use their feet, and the sport involves a ball. This is why sports like tennis and golf should also be called "football".
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Amy: (Score:3, Funny)
"Wow! I could swear I was really playing virtual skeeball!"
Yet another (Score:2)
Useless attachment to plug onto my Wiimote for a single game that will cease to be fun after a couple of months, thus becoming a complete waste.
Seriously, The Wii was a great idea when you filled in the blanks with your wii-mote. When all you had was the nunchuck to add on and you could turn that into a rifle. Or turning that combo into a fishing rod.
It started with the Racing wheel, which I could ALMOST understand. It does make it a little easier to drive, though its not like it was difficult. But then Nin
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Don't get me wrong, I like Nintendo, this all just seems like a Cash Grab, and they've discovered they've got enough fanbase for it to work. The only things I ever want to see with a Wii are a Nun-chuck and the wii-fit board.
Yeah pretty much. They usually try to make quick bucks selling cheap add-ons, but the sheer volume is surprising and the number that fall in the nearly useless category usually reserved for 3rd parties, though at least not equally crappy. You pretty much named the two accessories that
Wrong (Score:2)
I'm not paying twice as much for a fake football that will be obsolete in a few years. Get off your fat ass, go outside, and play with a real football you lazy bastard.
At least, that's what my parent's would have said if I wanted one of these as a kid.
Explanation (Score:2, Troll)
Futbol is sport in which tiny little guys dressed in their underwear run around a field the size of the state of Connecticut kicking a balloon. Nothing EVER happens on a futbol field so the fans take it upon themselves to entertain each other by beating the crap out of each other in the stands. And in the streets. And airports. And bars. And, I assume, in their neighborhoods.
Footbal