Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Video Games: Nintendo Jogs it's Memory




We only had to wait a paltry 2 1/2 years but the days of cleaning out the fridge are over. 
Because at the Game Developer's Conference in San Francisco Nintendo unveiled (and launched) their new SD card interface titled System Menu 4.0.  This update will, in some way, solve the storage problems that comes from the Wii only have 512mb of internal memory by unlocking that SD slot on the front of your console.  You can now transfer and even download  your Virtual Console and WiiWare titles to the card and play them right from there, sort of.  You don't actually run them off the SD card. When you choose a game, say Super Metroid, the Wii actually transfers a virtual copy of the game onto an allotted space on the system's internal memory.  So, if you have a full console you still won't be able to play said game.  But never fear Samus fans the big N has created contingency called Auto Manager that will give you the option of moving files to the card so you can free up some space.

The update also allows you to use mega sized 32GB  SD cards which should make the space issue a non starter.  However, in true Nintendo fashion, the update is not without it's quandaries.  You can still not run save data from the card.  Because using memory cards, something we've been doing for a better part of 15 years, is a little out of Nintendo's depth. That gripe aside with Wii Speak and now this we finally have a fully functioning console!

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