 Hey, this is Ross with The Verge, and we're here checking out the Nintendo Wii U reference model. This is not the final product, but it is indicative of the experience you're going to have playing with it. So what you have here is a 6.2 inch single touch screen, it's resistive. Going around the center you have two analog sliders, you have D-pad, your general buttons, mic, headphone jack, what you expect, triggers over here. The other interesting aspect about this, besides the fact that it's got the accelerometer, it's got a gyroscope, the other interesting thing you have here is a front facing camera, and this bar here actually acts as a Wii remote sensor, just like it does for the Wii. So you can use this to use the Wii remote in tandem. One of the things they showed off at E3 was them actually putting it down like this, grabbing a Wii remote and kind of playing golf, and it would detect your swing. But right now we're going to go take a look at four demos, these are the same demos they showed at E3. So what we're looking at here is Chase Me. Chase Me is one of the Wii U experiences Nintendo wants to show off to basically showcase the new tablet controller. What you do here is, it's basically a glorified hide and seek. So here's me, so I'm going to have this top down view right here, and I've got 15 seconds basically to get out of their line of sight. Now if you look at the screen real quick, you can see everyone's got this kind of first person perspective of what's going on. Everyone else is controlling with the Wii remote, the exact same Wii remote you use with the Nintendo Wii. I'm the only one with a tablet. I'm going to be lookout in the tower. He's coming down red, middle of red. Oh what? Get him! Oh! With three seconds, who got the tackle? Alright, so what we're looking at now is Battle Me, in which our little Samus Arans fight a giant spaceship, which is going to be played this time by me, seeing as last time I got sadly defeated over and over and over again. The Wii U controller, I've actually got to move the whole controller, actually quite an extreme bit. I mean my whole body is probably going to go a little bit with this as I tilt to aim. The joysticks here just serve to move the spaceship. It actually doesn't control any of the viewing. Got you, got you, got you! Stand low is helpful. Oh, nope. Got a heart piece. Oh. There you go. Got him. So one player is out now. And that makes two players out, myself being the other one. So what we're looking at now is Panorama View, which Nintendo claims was at the E3 event, but unfortunately we never got a chance to see it at that point. So this is brand new for us. In a nutshell, what you can see on the TV is just a car driving, or what we think is a car driving along the streets. And from here, you can actually get a more interactive view where you can actually just kind of rotate and see basically all sides of the street. Think of it as like a real-time Google Street View. And it goes up and it can go down. The interesting thing is, no matter how far I go down, I can never, ever see the driver in question. Also, if I actually did rotate like this in a car, I'd probably be dead at this point. So the last thing we're going to look at is the HD experience. What we're seeing here is basically an example of what the Wii U's power is going to be capable of. Whereas the Wii was decidedly more of a standard definition console, this time around Nintendo wants to emphasize it's capable of 1080p HD, true HD graphics. So what we're seeing here is a very high quality Legend of Zelda demo. It's actually basically everyone's dream. And when we first saw E3, everyone's question was, is this going to be an actual game? Nintendo won't say that, but they will let you watch the demo over and over again. We have a lot of controls around. We can use the stick to adjust the camera angle ever so slightly. With the camera button, we can actually completely dramatically change where the scene is happening. Additionally, with the light, we can change the entire thing from night into day. Remember, all of this is happening in real time. You can see, especially in the night time, you can see how the light is bouncing off everything, especially Navi, kind of flying around there. The last thing to show around where you can see is where the camera, where Link and where the boss is. If we hit this button here, we'll actually take the entire video feed and we'll move it here. What you see on screen, they moved the map on the screen as well, but they're also showing both videos at the same time. You can see it's the exact same picture being output. No change in the frame rate. It's also very smooth. Lighting is gorgeous. And there you have it. Let's give Link a break. So that's the Wii U controller in a nutshell. Again, this is not the final product, but it does give a good idea what the experience you're going to go for.
 Hey, this is Ross with The Verge, and we're here checking out the Nintendo Wii U reference
 model.
 This is not the final product, but it is indicative of the experience you're going to have playing
 with it.
 So what you have here is a 6.2 inch single touch screen, it's resistive.
 Going around the center you have two analog sliders, you have D-pad, your general buttons,
 mic, headphone jack, what you expect, triggers over here.
 The other interesting aspect about this, besides the fact that it's got the accelerometer,
 it's got a gyroscope, the other interesting thing you have here is a front facing camera,
 and this bar here actually acts as a Wii remote sensor, just like it does for the Wii.
 So you can use this to use the Wii remote in tandem.
 One of the things they showed off at E3 was them actually putting it down like this, grabbing
 a Wii remote and kind of playing golf, and it would detect your swing.
 But right now we're going to go take a look at four demos, these are the same demos they
 showed at E3.
 So what we're looking at here is Chase Me.
 Chase Me is one of the Wii U experiences Nintendo wants to show off to basically showcase the
 new tablet controller.
 What you do here is, it's basically a glorified hide and seek.
 So here's me, so I'm going to have this top down view right here, and I've got 15 seconds
 basically to get out of their line of sight.
 Now if you look at the screen real quick, you can see everyone's got this kind of first
 person perspective of what's going on.
 Everyone else is controlling with the Wii remote, the exact same Wii remote you use
 with the Nintendo Wii.
 I'm the only one with a tablet.
 I'm going to be lookout in the tower.
 He's coming down red, middle of red.
 Oh what?
 Get him!
 Oh!
 With three seconds, who got the tackle?
 Alright, so what we're looking at now is Battle Me, in which our little Samus Arans fight
 a giant spaceship, which is going to be played this time by me, seeing as last time I got
 sadly defeated over and over and over again.
 The Wii U controller, I've actually got to move the whole controller, actually quite
 an extreme bit.
 I mean my whole body is probably going to go a little bit with this as I tilt to aim.
 The joysticks here just serve to move the spaceship.
 It actually doesn't control any of the viewing.
 Got you, got you, got you!
 Stand low is helpful.
 Oh, nope.
 Got a heart piece.
 Oh.
 There you go.
 Got him.
 So one player is out now.
 And that makes two players out, myself being the other one.
 So what we're looking at now is Panorama View, which Nintendo claims was at the E3 event,
 but unfortunately we never got a chance to see it at that point.
 So this is brand new for us.
 In a nutshell, what you can see on the TV is just a car driving, or what we think is
 a car driving along the streets.
 And from here, you can actually get a more interactive view where you can actually just
 kind of rotate and see basically all sides of the street.
 Think of it as like a real-time Google Street View.
 And it goes up and it can go down.
 The interesting thing is, no matter how far I go down, I can never, ever see the driver
 in question.
 Also, if I actually did rotate like this in a car, I'd probably be dead at this point.
 So the last thing we're going to look at is the HD experience.
 What we're seeing here is basically an example of what the Wii U's power is going to be capable
 of.
 Whereas the Wii was decidedly more of a standard definition console, this time around Nintendo
 wants to emphasize it's capable of 1080p HD, true HD graphics.
 So what we're seeing here is a very high quality Legend of Zelda demo.
 It's actually basically everyone's dream.
 And when we first saw E3, everyone's question was, is this going to be an actual game?
 Nintendo won't say that, but they will let you watch the demo over and over again.
 We have a lot of controls around.
 We can use the stick to adjust the camera angle ever so slightly.
 With the camera button, we can actually completely dramatically change where the scene is happening.
 Additionally, with the light, we can change the entire thing from night into day.
 Remember, all of this is happening in real time.
 You can see, especially in the night time, you can see how the light is bouncing off
 everything, especially Navi, kind of flying around there.
 The last thing to show around where you can see is where the camera, where Link and where
 the boss is.
 If we hit this button here, we'll actually take the entire video feed and we'll move
 it here.
 What you see on screen, they moved the map on the screen as well, but they're also showing
 both videos at the same time.
 You can see it's the exact same picture being output.
 No change in the frame rate.
 It's also very smooth.
 Lighting is gorgeous.
 And there you have it.
 Let's give Link a break.
 So that's the Wii U controller in a nutshell.
 Again, this is not the final product, but it does give a good idea what the experience
 you're going to go for.