Nintendo kicks off ad campaign for Wii U

With the release date of Nintendo’s next-gen console - the Wii U right around the corner, the company has finally launched an advertising campaign for the console. The new commercial, which is available on Facebook and YouTube, is titled ‘How U Will Play Next’.

The video seems to show all the different ways that you can use the console. Though, the company seems to be targeting the casual and family gaming demographics again, as opposed to its promises to focus on the hardcore gaming crowd. The commercial shows different groups of people playing party games on the Wii U, including a karaoke game, and the New Super Mario Bros. U.

Recently, Nintendo had announced its new promotional offers aimed towards boosting game downloaded for the Wii U. The promotion will grant buyers $5 for every $50 spent on the game. Potentially, this could mean a ‘free’ game after every 12 games purchased, assuming that Wii U games cost the standard console game price of $60.

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Nintendo will give you roughly ten percent of the game’s price as points. If you buy a game that costs $59.99, such as New Super Mario Bros, you would get roughly 599 points. For every 500 points, you gain $5 in credit to use on your next purchase of a Wii U title. The promotion will only last till the end of 2014 when the points of your purchases will stop accumulating.

The ad campaign seems to focus on the casual demographic

Back in September, Nintendo had officially licensed the Unity game engine for the Wii U. According to David Helgason, CEO of Unity, the deal is long term. When asked about the possibility of a Mario game made in the Unity engine, Helgason said that it may just be a few years away. Helgason told Eurogamer that Nintendo is working with Unity to optimise the engine for the Wii U.

It was announced in early September that Bayonetta will be getting a sequel in the form of Bayonetta 2, which will be exclusive to the Wii U. Along with this, Activision had announced that Black Ops II would be getting a release on the Wii U as well. The Wii U version of the game will be making full use of the system’s innovative controller, giving players the ability to check the minimap, activate kill streaks and change loadouts mid-game. Another big use of the controller will be that two people can play on the same system without having to play split-screen, with one person playing on the TV and the other playing on the controller. A solo player can also play only on the controller, allowing friends or family to do whatever they want with the TV.

Nintendo seems to be really focusing on the touchscreen on its controller for the console. Satoru Iwata, President of Nintendo hopes that the Wii U’s innovative GamePad controller with the screen will help the console be different from what Microsoft or Sony would be doing, and hopes to change the way people think about a gaming console.