Friend Codes will rear their ugly heads on Wii U – Reggie

Following E3 and our excitement over the announcement of the MiiVerse and other Wii U related online infrastructure, Reggie Fils-Aime has dealt a rather damaging blow to our morale. The Wii U will continue to have friend codes much like the Wii and Nintendo DS/3DS do. No, wait, scratch that last bit.

Apparently, according to Fils-Aime’s recent musings to Kotaku, the Wii U will have a “different’ system for Friend Codes.

You’ll be able to still interact with all those users in the MiiVerse without actually adding them, which is both good and bad, but actually adding these people as a friend will “give you more options”. Fils-Aime also went on to elaborate that the method by which you identify yourself as a friend with another user will be a “lot simpler than what’s happening today” as well.

While the details are annoyingly scant and we’re really unsure about just how this system will work, we’re still a little bit disappointed that we’ll have to trade arbitrarily generated numbers instead of chosen usernames. How do you feel about this announcement? Does it hold Nintendo one step back in catching up with the other console manufacturers’ online infrastructure or is it just fine?