Speaking as a neutral observer. I think capacitive touch is a missed opportunity. A touch screen opens up a lot of innovative control schemes, and it could act as a button multiplier. It would have added more depth to the console if players could use that screen for the allocation of hot buttons in more complex games. There are a lot of really complex PC games that require more buttons then are typically found on a game pad. Which has basically left them out of reach of console gamers, but a capacitive screen would bring them in reach. A touch screen could mimic the kind of functionality you find in a mouse and keyboard.

But have you used it?  The current gamepad touchscreen is more than capable of having on screen hotkeys for rpgs or MMOs.

The only good reason I can think of as to who Nintendo would a capacitive touchscreen would be to implement multitouch. However, I don't think it's an important feature for a device with more than enough non-touch inputs to get the job done.

lol of course not, it's expensive and unnecessary and this is nintendo we're talking about.

then use your fingers.  My point is that a compactive touch screen isn't going to improve responsiveness enough that it would be noticeable.  For gaming, developers aren't going put in the need for extreme precision, so responsiveness doesn't matter.  For menus and what not, using the stylus is easier and more effective then using your fingers.  However, if you want to use your fingers go ahead, but putting in a compactive screen isn't going to improve responsiveness enough that you would notice.  

platformmaster918 said:

you really want to pull out your stylus in the middle of a game all the time?  I would rather use my fingers.


You CAN use the fingers. Actually that's what I use playing ZombiU.

oh definitely, zombiU is meant to be played with fingers, and it works great.

A capacitive touchscreen would be a step back for the WiiU. While capacitive touchscreens have advantages, they allow only the input with fingers, while the resistive touchscreens allow both, fingers and stylus. The higher accuracy of a stylus allows better drawings, something that is currently much used in Miiverse. Some people have really great skills at that. With capacitive touchscreen your drawings would be inferior.

Also Yoshis fruitcart would be really frustrating with capacitive touch: some fruits are directly besides traps, it would be nearly impossible to solve that with fingers.

pro capacitive:
* multitouch
* better responsiveness for input with fingers

pro resistive:
* better accuracy with stylus (allowing drawings)
* allowing input from stylus AND fingers

If they added capacitance it would just as underused or even more underused as the Wii Motion Plus. Devs don't want to spend the money to support two separate input types.

For 3rd party devs the touch screen is going to very quickly become the "Menu Screen". It will be used for inventory, options, etc. and little else. Nintendo has no incentive to increase the manufacturing cost for something that would add so little to the console. At least the Wii Motion Plus added better motion controls, but so few games used it it almost wasn't needed. As a Zelda fan I'm glad I have Motion Plus for Skyward Sword so the motion controls wouldn't be as bad as Twilight Princess, but really I would have rather both games used standard controls.

It's never, ever going to happen with Wii U. Maybe with Wii U's successor. It would burn every current Wii U owner with a single-touch GamePad, of which there are nearly two million already.