I predict that Capcom will be the first to charge voice chat as DLC in Super Street Fighter 4 Arcade Edition Home Edition.

I don't think they're paying for voice chat on a dev-by-dev basis, otherwise all those indie games made by teams of two people on PSN/Live would not have that functionality.

But you're right we're just speculating. All we know is the present situation; Nintendo handle it differently, it is standard and OS level on other systems, and now that one game on Wii U straight up won't have it. I'm just drawing what I see is the most likely conclusion.

I suspect Nintendo may make it a standard tool in future, just as PSN/Trophies/XMB functionality etc were all in flux and hastily revised on the PS3. I remember Insomniac's reason that their first R&C game never got a trophy patch after release was because they had to code some crazy workarounds to get the game functional with PSN features (just PSN messaging being accessible in-game or something) and that going back in to tinker with the code might just flat out break it, whereas later on all that functiionality was standard and available for every game without having to code something on your own. I think this is the same sort of situation. 

Or, even simpler, MiiVerse = Cross Game Chat

Which is what i've been saying since this whole non-issue even became a thing.

PS Vita has cross-game chat and PSN is free. 

It's a system feature for the console, devs can only implement things in their games, they can't implement a system wide funcionality.

Anyway, I think that the achievents/cross-game chat discussion regarding Wii U is becoming full of lack of information. Nobody knows exactly if this things will be on Wii U. In the end, we'll have to wait until november and see what happens. And even then, Nintendo coul implement some features latter using firmware upgrades (PS3 didn't have trophies at launch).

that does make a lot sense and a lot cheaper.  =X

While I think they should have included VOIP/CHAT as OS level service... they have it in the social service that is MiiVerse.

I'm betting they just said... hey chat is part of social services and belongs in miiverse... without actually considering cross game chat.

What i'm thinking is that Miiverse is the OS, or at least they plan for it to be.

I think MiiVerse is simply the social layer of the OS and something that a dev doesn't even have to implement. Since its optional, you can't say voice chat is guaranteed to be there and therefore you lose cross-game chat.

That optional inclusion is also why Nintendo has said the "Accomplishments" are not defined by Nintendo like they are in Live/PSN. Instead its part of the developers design in their usage of MiiVerse, if at all.

Its how Nintendo always likes to do it... leave that stuff up to developers. However, just like Wii's online structure, it may end up biting them in the ass as there is no consistency and it simply becomes sub-par. Nintendo should of made certain aspects of social gaming a core OS feature to be utilized accross all games.

Of course this is all speculation and we won't know until Nov18th.

I am glad they do not support that feature. Why would I want to talk to weird people over my WiiU?

Makes perfect sense to me. It may be that devs can't use it because it would cost them internally. It may be that Miiverse chat already exists, so why re-invent the wheel, it may be that they will offer it as a service in the future. But even if they didn't, I wouldn't blame them.

However, I would agree that what Microsoft is offering is more appealing, but that is MS' business decision, with their considered constraints.

If Nintendo wanted to offer it as a service to devs, I agree that it would be more convenient for devs in the end. So I agree that Nintendo's solution isn't as open as people seem to be spinning it. Rather on the contrary maybe MS' is more open, in that devs have the choice to either piggyback on MS' infrastructure, or use their own 3rd party infrastructure if they see fit.

This was interesting.