As the run-up to Nintendo's latest home console, the Wii U starts to move into its final furlong (it's out in just over a fortnight's time!), the few remaining gaps in our knowledge are beginning to be filled. We now know it has a user accounts system, to tie your saves, purchases, and games together. We know you'll be able to play the vast majority of your favourite Wii games thanks to a day one system update, and we're starting to learn more about the games you'll be able to play on day one. And now, we also know that the console sadly won't be featuring a built-in achievements system.
Something like gaming marmite for many players, the staff at Everybody Play usually can't get enough of achievements. Appealing to your OCD side, achievements are basically nothing more than an icon you unlock for doing certain things in a game - whether it's finding a certain object, completing a level on a certain difficulty, or taking out a number of enemies. While Nintendo have toyed with the idea achievements in the past - the 3DS' StreetPass Plaza, for example, featured a list of "Accomplishments" you could earn, for meeting a certain number of people, or collecting a number of puzzle pieces, other consoles took things that little bit further, and built them into the system themselves. Forming part of your profile on the 360 and PS3, the achievements system became a great way of tracking your friends progress through games at the touch of a button - and let you see if you had anything else to do on a game without booting it up.
Some launch games, like Nintendo Land, will feature an in-game Achievements style system - but they won't be tied into the console directly.
Jeremiah Slaczka, co-founder and creative director of 5th Cell, who've just put the finishing touches to word-based puzzler and Wii U launch title, Scribblenauts Unlimited, recently confirmed via gaming forum NeoGAF that the Wii U will not include a global achievements system, tied to a user account. However, he did state that it was possible for developers to include a similar system in-game and his development team has done just that in the upcoming Scribblenauts Unlimited.
"There are no Wii U accomplishments that are system wide. They are up to the developers to include or not include. Scribblenauts Unlimited loosely has them in the form of "Global Starite Shards" which is like a giant checklist of global things to spawn and do in the game that aren't area specific."
So, while it looks like developers can optionally include their own accomplishments system in game if they wish, it won't be a required feature like it is on other platforms. Which is a little bit disappointing, as it's always great to be able to check your progress through a game at a glance - and the lack of a similar system ends up feeling like Nintendo's behind the pack, rather than leading the way.
There is a strong possibility that Nintendo could implement some sort of feature in a future system update, but with the odd social system Miiverse being a strong focus on the Wii U, it's entirely possible Nintendo are hoping their twitter-cum-message-board hybrid will bridge the gap.
Either way, with the Wii U launch now only a fortnight away, we'll be able to find out soon enough whether in-game achievements will be up to the task, or if we'll miss having a unified Nintendo Score.
