Wii U

How did it feel when the Internet Browser got up and running?

To be honest, the first time I used it, I felt like, "I guess this is the best we can do." But after we got together with the team who had finished the Nintendo 3DS, and I took a look at the Internet Browser six months later after it had been fined tuned, it was so easy to use that it was like a completely different thing. I was honestly surprised, thinking, "Wow, they've achieved this much on a gaming console!?"

It's got a really good frame rate¹¹ then. 11. Frame rate: The number of times in one second that the image on the screen is refreshed.

Yes. Because WebKit is open source¹² technology, the technology is...how should I put it? It's very rough. All the products out there worked hard, individually to make it more stable, which means that the UI needs complicated tuning. 12. Open source: When the source code, or blueprint, for software is made public so it can be freely upgraded or redistributed.

WebKit doesn't come with a UI, which you must make yourself. You need all sorts of things to make a browser, like the image library that renders images through HTML, and JavaScript. WebKit really only comes with a tiny part of what you need to make a browser, right?

Yes. WebKit has a lot of things that haven't been fine-tuned, for example, the answers to questions like: "How should it create images separated in layers, and then how should they be combined, what size should it be, and does it scroll nicely?" So putting that all together and tuning it in a way that works well is extremely important, and that's where the engineers at HAL Laboratory really came through.

That wasn't possible simply because Wii U has a much more powerful CPU and more memory compared to Nintendo 3DS?

Of course that helped us a lot, but it's actually a result of implementing numerous optimization techniques. For example, by improving on the desynchronization¹³ between the UI and browser that we learned with the 3DS, we were able to have the browser run almost at 60 frames per seconds consistently. We were also able to add effects fit for a video game console where it acts responsively to feedback to touch control, and when going back and forth between webpages. 13. Desynchronization: A method to allow interventions of necessary processes like user input at certain timings without having to wait for a process that is taking a long time to finish such as image rendering.

On a side note, a little while ago when some people from our overseas subsidiary came to visit our Kyoto office the other day, we showed them various software that were in development. When we were chatting together at that time, I asked them, "What were you most excited by?" And one of them said, "The Wii U Internet Browser."

Is that so? (laughs)

He said, "I'd never think this was part of a game console. It's a really useful browser." I've been doing this job a long time, but I found the fact that, even though many of the games for Wii U were far from completion at the time and we weren't able to show any new games due to some circumstances, that one of the staff said, "This Internet Browser made the biggest impression on me" to be really surprising, it was new to me.

I'm really happy to hear that, though.

But in order to make that happen didn't it require an unprecedented amount of hard work?

In the programming world there are a lot of cases where you would first build a program without considering its operating speed as a priority. But with this browser project, however, we thought about ways of increasing its operating speed from the beginning. I think what was effective, was how we visited and observed behaviors of websites in the real world one by one, and pinpointing areas that had issues or slow load times and addressed them as they were discovered. We kept going like that addressing issues as we found them one at a time, saying things like "why is this site slow?" and "why is this site so slow responding to touch?" A really large factor was how each of the partner companies were able to go above and beyond their assigned duties so we could address these problems as a single group.

Was there anything that you ended up making changes to as you built the specs, Tsuda-san?

Yes. One thing was a task that (Shigeru) Miyamoto-san brought up before last year's (2011) E3¹⁴ which was, "Is it possible to take small text on the TV and show that text enlarged on the screen on the Wii U GamePad, and move it like a magnifying glass?" At the time, we hadn't done much with the actual console, and it was hard to get a feel for it from the computer. 14. E3 (Electronic Entertainment Expo): A video game trade show usually held in Los Angeles.

When it comes to such functionalities as the ones utilizing gyro sensor¹⁵ capabilities, it's hard to get a feel unless you're using the actual equipment, isn't it? 15. Gyro sensor: The sensor built into the Wii GamePad controller, which measures rotation.

Yes. Afterwards, when the actual console arrived, we tried it out, but Sasaki-san and other senior developers kept saying, "There's still something missing." So one day, Sasaki-san said, "Maybe you should take away the freedom of movement and set some limits." So I limited it to vertical scrolling.

You could say that pages on the Internet where you have to keep scrolling to the side are poorly designed.

Exactly. (laughs) Once we set it to vertical scrolling, there was a dramatic improvement in functionality, and we created the gyro scroll mode, which allows you to scroll by pointing the Wii U GamePad up or down. I think the ability to not just use a touch screen, but to use the actual console for a simpler experience is very suited to the Wii U, and it turned out quite well.

If you can only use the touch screen, you have to keep moving your fingers, but in taking that step away and just tilting the Wii U GamePad, it's much more direct. I like that.

That part was changed several times during development.

When it comes to things like that, there are a lot of advantages with using Wii U as a browser.

That's true. There's a screen you can manipulate in your hands, and a screen made just for viewing things that's set a bit farther away from you, and I think the compatibility is a perfect match.

What do you think, Sasaki-san?

Related to our discussion of video, there are two separate types of content on the Internet: Things that are perfect for viewing on a computer or smart devices, and things that you want to see on a larger screen. And the Wii U Internet browser is perfect for both types of content.

Do you mean that we've just happened to be entering that kind of an era?

Yes. To put it another way, I think that up until now, the Internet wasn't really suited to being viewed on TV.

A television isn't very good for reading, inputting text or pointing to something. Screens closer to your eyes have the advantage over TV for these activities. But when it comes to watching video, there's nothing more comfortable than the TV, and you can watch with a large group of people. And if you have the Wii U, you can use it to write and read, and point, and of course watch it on a big screen TV. Putting the two together creates something really interesting that people can enjoy together.

That's right. The idea behind it all is that it's not something that you can only do alone.

In a sense, browsing is a personal activity, but you get the idea that people will be coming and going through the room. When I first saw the curtain function, it made a huge impression on me. I walked around with it all over the company saying, "They've really come up with something amazing!" (laughs)

Thank you. (laughs)

It's not just about the idea of hiding things, but I thought the idea of having a curtain to do so was really interesting. But why did you decide on a curtain, anyway?

When I thought about the idea of hiding the TV, it made me remember those old CRT televisions.

Huh? That's...going a while back, there! (laughs) It was during my childhood when people thought of the television as a piece of furniture.

That's right. (laughs) I wanted to bring back that old atmosphere, back when the TV was stored away behind a curtain or a cabinet with drawers.

Isn't that before you were born? I wouldn't expect a man of your generation to think of that.

(laughs)

But I feel like that curtain presentation will inspire all kinds of interesting things in living rooms all over. I think this will show the strengths of having both a screen in your hands, and another screen on the other side of the room.