Yoot Saito shows Wii Odama prototype

Well, it’s not the strategy/tactical war-gaming on consoles we envisioned a while back, but…

Siliconera reports that during the Japanese Media Arts Festival, Nintendo designer Yoot Saito demonstrated a Wii prototype of Odama – a voice-command pinball war-game previously on the GameCube  – running off a Wiimote control setup. Yep, you read right: for those who don’t know, Odama involves beating the enemy down with:

• a Gigantic Ball of Doom (TM), called the Odama,
• a couple of pinball flippers,
• a tiltable battlefield,
• and voice commands to tell YOUR army to get the heck out of the Odama’s way.

An image of the demo was presented in the report, courtesy of Dengeki (at least we think the logo in the corner looks like Dengeki). The one detail the report mentioned was that instead of using the GCN game’s trademark voice command capabilities, this prototype used the Wiimote‘s point-and-click and single-button controls.

Siliconera’s take: either Odama is getting a Wii makeover behind Nintendo’s walls, or there’s a probable Saito Wii project in the works. Our take: quite the quirky (if misunderstood – or difficult to play) title, at least context point-and-clicking will be a lot easier than voice commands, right? But we wonder how the flippers will work – if the flippers are in the Wii prototype, in the first place.

Nothing beats a Gigantic Pinball of Doom (TM). Except maybe an Orbital Ion Cannon (TM). Or perhaps get-in-mah-belly Kirby (TM swallowed by Kirby).

Well, it’s not the strategy/tactical war-gaming on consoles we envisioned a while back, but…

Siliconera reports that during the Japanese Media Arts Festival, Nintendo designer Yoot Saito demonstrated a Wii prototype of Odama – a voice-command pinball war-game previously on the GameCube  – running off a Wiimote control setup. Yep, you read right: for those who don’t know, Odama involves beating the enemy down with:

• a Gigantic Ball of Doom (TM), called the Odama,
• a couple of pinball flippers,
• a tiltable battlefield,
• and voice commands to tell YOUR army to get the heck out of the Odama’s way.

An image of the demo was presented in the report, courtesy of Dengeki (at least we think the logo in the corner looks like Dengeki). The one detail the report mentioned was that instead of using the GCN game’s trademark voice command capabilities, this prototype used the Wiimote‘s point-and-click and single-button controls.

Siliconera’s take: either Odama is getting a Wii makeover behind Nintendo’s walls, or there’s a probable Saito Wii project in the works. Our take: quite the quirky (if misunderstood – or difficult to play) title, at least context point-and-clicking will be a lot easier than voice commands, right? But we wonder how the flippers will work – if the flippers are in the Wii prototype, in the first place.

Nothing beats a Gigantic Pinball of Doom (TM). Except maybe an Orbital Ion Cannon (TM). Or perhaps get-in-mah-belly Kirby (TM swallowed by Kirby).