Hulu Plus making its way to 3DS, Wii
The addition of Hulu Plus comes just a few months after the game company brought Netflix to the 3DS portable.
Hulu Plus will be arriving on the Nintendo Wii and 3DS by the end of the year, the game company announced today.
As with other Hulu Plus integrations, Wii and 3DS owners will be able to access the streaming company's entire library of movies and television shows, including "Modern Family" and "Battlestar Galactica." In order to watch Hulu Plus content from the devices, users will need to pay the $7.99-per-month fee required to access the service.
The addition of Hulu Plus to the 3DS comes just a few months after Nintendo announced that Netflix's streaming service would be made available to the portable's owners. Both integrations are part of a broader strategy on Nintendo's part to bring more consumers into the 3DS fold.
Since its launch earlier this year, the 3DS, which allows users to play 3D games without the need for special glasses, has been plagued with the inability to show people the value of its offering.
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"The value of 3D images without the need for special glasses is hard to be understood through the existing media," Nintendo chief Satoru Iwata said at a financial results briefing earlier this year. "However, we have found that people cannot feel it just by trying out a device, rather, some might even mis-estimate it when experiencing the images in an improper fashion. This makes it more important to give people more opportunities for appropriate experiences of glassless 3D images."
Nintendo's troubles became especially concerning in the second quarter, when the company announced that it sold just 710,000 3DS units during the three-month period ended June 30. Even worse, U.S. 3DS sales only reached 110,000 units. To help address that problem, Nintendo cut the price of the 3DS from $249.99 to $169.99. With Netflix and Hulu Plus, the company is trying to make the portable a more well-rounded offering.
To further achieve that goal, Nintendo said today that it's also planning a system update for the end of November that will deliver 3D video capture to the portable. The company says that users will be able to record 3D video in ten-minute increments. The update will also enable users to create 3D stop-motion videos.
Nintendo has been doubling down on 3D video as of late. Earlier this month, the company announced that it had signed a deal with Dreamworks Animation SKG to bring Halloween-themed 3D videos featuring characters from "Monsters vs. Aliens" to its portable.