I do think that Nintendo will come up with a similar service by then. Similar, in the sense of a unified account/friend list, at least.
WiFi Connection was built towards the limitations of the DS, a console with only a tiny, tiny amount of internal memory, and thus no space to keep profile data that could be stored between games. Wii has that memory, and in part has that function of single-account usage (through WiiConnect24), but they wanted to keep the same online network across DS and Wii, rather than build a whole new one i guess, and figured the DS experience was good enough for most users. By next time, it can be presumed that their next handheld and their next console will have a wealth of internal memory (DSi has enough to at least do what WiiConnect24 does), so they could wind up phasing out the old network and putting in something more centralized. The problem beyond that is getting around their psychology towards online play, and the artificial restrictions they impose to make the experience more sanitized. I mean, they could have a network as good as LIVE, but still ban communication in public matches, and it would be almost as bad as it is now (sans the need to input full-on friend codes, and input them multiple times)
It isn't really that far behind the PS2's setup, given that PS2's was mostly de-unified also (iirc. never had one), just that the artificial limitations imposed by Nintendo make it look worse. Plus the fact that PS2's had dedicated servers (again, iirc), while WiFi Connection sets up direct connections between the users
Monster Hunter: pissing me off since 2010.
