The E3 week has just wrapped up, and we’ve had a bunch of major announcements, the biggest of which was Nintendo’s new console. Nintendo announced the Wii U, which will be the successor to the Wii, and will pack some powerful hardware — more powerful than the Xbox 360 or PlayStation 3.

But that’s not Wii U’s trump card: it’s the new controller. A brand new, and fairly large controller with a built in touchscreen, kinda like a tablet with input controllers. Nintendo showed how the new device will be able to offer a new way of playing, for instance, as you can see above, Nintendo showed a new Zelda game (which looked amazing), where the regular gameplay was on the big screen, while a map of the dungeon was on the controller screen.

Hardware wise, the new Wii U will support 1080p gameplay, and is built on the same type of hardware found in the Xbox 360, only more powerful. The Wii U is slated for released in 2012.