Revolution Controller Development Kit: Hands On

Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo’s Vice President of sales and marketing recently announced that more then 1,000 Revolution development kits have already been sent out to various software houses and development studios in order to accustom developers with the workings of the device. IGN reports to have gotten a hold of one of these kits and shared the basic workings and setup of the device.

Readers should note that the Revolution controller-specific development kits sent out to some third parties, as described by Fils-Aime, offer little insight into the horsepower of the new generation console. The initial kits that were sent out were intended only to demonstrate the controllers inner functions to potential developers. Third party developers have reported receiving updated revisions of the hardware to more reflect the final release systems.

The first thing that can be noted about the controller-based development kits is that the Revolution controller with doubtlessly act as an extension to the Revolution Controller. The initial release kits “include only a wired Revolution controller, a wired nun chuck attachment [The two shoulder buttons on the development nun chuck unit are not labeled]and a wired motion bar, which some studios have labeled the wand. So the obvious question is, how can developers possibly hope to test any of this gear out? The answer is simple: the controller and its attachments plug into existing GameCube development hardware.”

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Reggie Fils-Aime, Nintendo’s Vice President of sales and marketing recently announced that more then 1,000 Revolution development kits have already been sent out to various software houses and development studios in order to accustom developers with the workings of the device. IGN reports to have gotten a hold of one of these kits and shared the basic workings and setup of the device.

Readers should note that the Revolution controller-specific development kits sent out to some third parties, as described by Fils-Aime, offer little insight into the horsepower of the new generation console. The initial kits that were sent out were intended only to demonstrate the controllers inner functions to potential developers. Third party developers have reported receiving updated revisions of the hardware to more reflect the final release systems.

The first thing that can be noted about the controller-based development kits is that the Revolution controller with doubtlessly act as an extension to the Gamecube hardware. The initial release kits “include only a wired Revolution controller, a wired nun chuck attachment [The two shoulder buttons on the development nun chuck unit are not labeled]and a wired motion bar, which some studios have labeled the wand. So the obvious question is, how can developers possibly hope to test any of this gear out? The answer is simple: the controller and its attachments plug into existing GameCube development hardware.”

The wired Rovlution controller easily plugs into the control socket on the Gamecube. The nun chuck unit reportedly connects to the freehand-style controller via a makeshift Ethernet cable which we found to be rather amusing. The wand is then inserted into a Memory Pak slot on the Gamecube development hardware. A great way to test for any initial compatibility issues and studios have been told by Nintendo to just experiment from that point with new ideas.

Needless to say the freestyle-hand remote included with the initial development kit setup was nor well produced or in the final state by any means compared to the one in Nintendo’s photographs and it is not wireless. The grey color and flimsy design makes for the sense that it wouldn’t use batteries, however the unit is currently powered through the GCN development hardware, the final wireless controller will need batteries which will distinctly add some weight.

One of the most difficult things to picture about the controller is the size. The device is reported to feel a lot smaller then it would appear and the freehand unit is much smaller then the remote that ships with the Xbox 360 premium package. However IGN reports that the device feels very natural to hold and offers an extremely intuitive access to the A button, D-Pad and the B button which is located underneath. The buttons on the device were described as clicky, comparable to those on the Gameboy Advance SP.

The motion sensory bar, is a thin black device in the shape of a baton, similar to those you’ve seen at football games and the like. This sites on a tiny stand near or on the television. Nintendo has stated that “this bar is a prototype and therefore the unit that ships with the basic developer kit shouldn’t be considered final in any way.” The length is about a foot long and has a low profile minus the wire that extends from one side and plugs into the Dev kit’s Memory Pak slot.

While this is all very interesting the one thing we are disappointed to report was there was no report on how the software works with the development controller. While most studios still have only a small grasp on what to expect from the Revolution as far as processing power is concerned, they have quote previous projections stating that the hardware will be approximately twice as powerful as the gamecube. One interesting thing to note was that many developers who have spoken out about the Revolution seem to be more concerned about the actual power of the machine, and not the gameplay possibilities of the new controller.