There are a lot of interesting ideas that you could put together when everyone has a private screen. I wrote up the cons and pros of having such a system and where the innovation will come from when I was looking at tablets as the controllers:

https://github.com/icefox/tablet_tv_games

The Gamecube already had private screens with GBA adapters.

In Crystal Chronicles each player had their own menu, a secret competitive challenge (in an otherwise cooperative game), and a unique view of the area (one gets a map, one gets a dot for every monster, one gets a dot for every chest, one gets information on monster attributes).

Four Swords also used the GBA screen, but it was basically just so you could go in a dungeon and wander off without splitting the screen on the TV or making you stay together.

There were probably more games that used GBAs for private screens or other multiplayer gameplay, but I cannot recall them off the top of my head.

A high resolution version of what the dreamcast had? Seems a bit odd to me.

I'm still very sceptical about how genuine those are.

Nintendo is still strongly focussed on making an inclusive family environment, and I can't imagine how each person having a separate screen would help that. Those controllers are almost as big as the Wii itself. You're not going to give that controller to your grandmother as you all sit on the sofa at Christmas. Also, the controller invades on the 3DS's territory a little too much.

It's good news if they do make the most developer-friendly console though, considering their current consoles have the most developer-unfriendly dev process. Hopefully that will extend to their 3rd party developer relations too.

There's no reason a normal controller can't act as a pointer. It would eliminate the normal complaints (extra cost for the joystick attachment, limited applications) while maintaining it for those rare games that work best with a pointer.

There's also no reason a coffee cup can't be used as a pointer, but the physical affordance doesn't work well.

The Wii pointer worked because it had the right shape to be held in a hand and pointed. If this new leaked picture is the actual controller, how are you supposed to hold it in one hand and point? Or are you going to use two hands now?

they could use both. why not release this as a controller, and set up a kinect like motion controller for the whole body as well?

Betcha the patents would have something to say about that. :)

http://www.cultofmac.com/how-apple-almost-got-microsofts-kin...

They could simply get a PrimeSense license. I see no reason why they wouldn't get one.

I'm admittedly not Microsoft, but if I were Microsoft, I'd pay through the nose to ensure PrimeSense keeps this stuff away from my direct competitors.

That would get them a license for the 3d sensor HW, but MS has most of the body tracking patents, as the software was developed by MS.