Nintendo Europe's Merrick Reveals Revolution Secrets

An interview with Jim Merrick, Nintendo of Europe's senior director of marketing by Spanish game website Meristation has revealed a number of interesting new details about the company’s online plans for the new Revolution console. In particular, Merrick spoke of Nintendo of Europe’s plans to have over 25,000 participating wireless hot spots across Europe, although he did not indicate whether this would be in conjunction with a prominent partner such as the recently announced deal with McDonald's in the U.S. Regarding the Revolution, Merrick apparently confirmed Nintendo’s recently announced plans to launch the new console within a very short period worldwide, though some may quibble with the definition of short. According to Merrick, launches in all major territories would occur within 14 weeks of each another. He did not indicate when the launches would begin but he did confirm that no Revolution games would be shown this calendar year. In fact Merrick, gave out a surprising amount of information on Nintendo's Revolution, indicating that there would be no significant difference between the graphical abilities of the console compared to other next generation systems. The console has, to this point, been assumed to be considerably less powerful than either the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3 and it is not clear whether Merrick’s comment reflect exactly on the abilities of the machine or merely his assumption of how its graphics will be perceived by the mass market. When speaking of the Revolution’s online features Merrick indicated that it would be possible to play games even if you do not own a copy of the title, as is currently possible with many Nintendo DS titles. The USB Wi-Fi adapter was also confirmed as being compatible with the Revolution, and users from different regions will be able to download content from around the world (an important feature for Europe, where many titles released in the U.S. have never officially been made available). Finally, Merrick indicated that Nintendo 64 games played on the Revolution would have an improved frame rate, but that there would not generally be any other significant graphical improvements.