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The Wii - Is the Magic Gone?
Computer And Video Games asks the tough question: is the Wii's magic gone? After the flurry of excitement around the launch, lackluster ports and a persistent inability for Nintendo to keep units on the shelves has made it hard for gamers to sustain their enthusiasm for the system. It doesn't help that most of the good games slated for this year won't be out for months. In some cases, there's doubt they'll even make it out this year: Reggie Fils-Aime appears to be backpedaling on Metroid Prime 3 by Christmas, which would be a shame. GigaGamez has additional commentary. Are you still as excited about the Wii as you were when it launched?
So the fact that they are selling so fast Nintendo can't keep them in stock is used as proof that excitement is diminishing for the Wii? This reminds me of the alleged Yogi Berra saying about a certain resturant - "It's so crowded nobody goes there any more."
--- There are two kinds of people, those who accept dogmas and know it, and those who accept dogmas and don't know it
Right now yes, it is. It's not so much in the so called "gimick", but just that it hasn't been utalized in a way that is deep. Many of the ways the wiimote is being used are cool on the surface, but lack any sort of real impact on the way we play the game. The wiimote did not add much to Zelda. Games like wiisports are fun initally, but they are so simple that you reach a level of mastery very easily. Even games like trauma center are the same way. It's cool at first, but once you get the hang of it there's nothing more to explore.
Nintendo did an excellent job speeding out a few good, solid games when the Wii launched. IMO, these games weren't intended to have an incredible lifetime, indeed, they served their purpose; to create enough hype so that the Wii would still sell in the face of other systems during the holidays. Now, as with most of the other systems, we must wait for what I'm sure will be a solid game base to flourish.
You have to think about it - developers have just been exposed to a massively, paradigm-breaking gaming concept. Give them time. Just because the hype has settled down, doesn't mean the magic's gone.
Blerg.
But "... a persistent inability for Nintendo to keep units on the shelves has made it hard for gamers to sustain their enthusiasm for the system."
Sounds like they're buying them as fast as Nintendo makes them. And its lost the thrill?
I would take "a persistent inability for Nintendo to keep units on the shelves" as a sign of continued interest.
Also, some anecdotal evidence. Yesterday when I was looking through the Best Buy ad I noticed that Wii Play had been released. I called three local Best Buys and all of them had sold out of Wii Play.
I think the steady stream of classic games like Mario Kart, and Super Mario World are helping out too.
Maybe you should educate the morons of tomorrow so they'll stop believing the leaders of tomorrow. - Dogbert
Consoles probably obey different rules than handhelds. I think that a year of downtime could be fatal for a console (sega anyone?). I also think that the most important rule is that in handhelds, nintendo rules (this has been nearly the unquestioned rule since tetris shipped with the gameboy). However, in consoles, the one that gets the most games wins. Its a self feeding cycle, the console that gets the most games, gets the most devs, who then make more games. With handhelds, while people were waiting for the ds to find it stride, they were fiddling with ipods and playing a nibbles clone on their cell phones.
Instead of buying a wii, I'm going to probably take the popular route of buying the xbox360 (not a fanboy of any system, really!), because of 3 reasons. Its affordable (bye sony), it's got the library i want, and its on the shelves (bye nintendo). Keep in mind, the last system i bought besides a ds lite was a sega dreamcast in 01 because it was 50 bucks and emulators were coming out so i could retire the nes without retiring its library.
Is it sad that I am more likely to recognize you and your posts by your sig than your name or UID?
The DS took a while before it showed its full potential. The PSP took the initial lead, but the DS has pulled far ahead now. IMHO, the breakthrough game was "Kirby: Canvas Curse", which showed off the real potential for the touchscreen, followed by Nintendogs.
I suspect the Wii will go the same way. It already has quite a few games that show its potential. There are also a fair number of games that were hyped, but were rushed out the door to meet a Christmas release and had a poor control scheme (like Red Steel). As more games start piling up, the Wii should get a solid position in this round of console wars.
Not a typewriter
A typical put-down article. Maybe the author couldn't get his own Wii and is angry, or he's being paid by MS and/or Sony. Or maybe he's just really a bit slow.
Nintendo's "inability to keep units on the shelves" is a good one. They're sold-out is what it really means. And not thanks to artificial shortage, Nintendo has shipped a lot of these machines.
Is the excitement still there? Not as in the first few days, which is natural. But I'm still enjoying it a lot, and so does everyone I've had over to play a game or three. It isn't the cure to cancer, but it's a great living-room gaming system, and I'm still proud of owning one.
Now, someone please send the poor author of TFA one so he can stop being all stuffed up.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I just spent my second weekend playing with friends I introduced to the Wii during New Years. None of them are "gamers" as we think of them. They play poker and that's about as close as it gets.
One actually went out and got a Wii and is very happy with the graphics. Non-gamers may see it as "good enough." You and I of course know that the other systems are far more powerful graphicly, but my friend wasn't about to go out and spend $700 to get a PS3 as his first game system. We had a new friend over as well. Another non-gamer. Even after I had gone to bed, they were up to 3am, playing Wii Sports Golf.
Nintendo has hit the nail on the head I think. We might see the hype die off, but the hype that goes on is word of mouth. You know, plain old conversation in real life. Not everyone's primary mode of contact is email or web bulletin boards. I think this kind of "hype" goes far further in expanding the video gaming population than any ad campaign could.
"Wii is trying to be the iPod of consoles but how can you really when the market when your competitors iPods are just/if not more capable and the only difference is the peripherals?"
Have you actually looked at the iPod competitors? Almost all of them pack in more features at a lower cost. I'm not saying Wii will become the iPod of the console world, but most powerful hardware is hardly a prerequisite.
Nintendo is targeting a more "causual" crowd with the Wii, and based on news reports and the folks I know who own one, they are succeeding.
My family and friends are still having fun playing Wii Sports, Rayman, and other games we purchased MAYBE 45 DAYS AGO at most!!!! I would worry more if I paid $50 for a game that only lasted me a week (or less).
Not everyone is a hardcore gamer who needs GameFly to feed their rabid consumption. The Wii seems to fail mostly in the eyes of that particular crowd.
Am I looking forward to Mario Party 8, Mario Galaxy, Metroid? Sure. Am I lamenting my Wii because those games are not available today? Not at all.
We're too busy enjoying/playing our Wii to lament what we don't have.
This sig was generated randomly by one million monkeys with Speak 'n Spells. . .
The magic is there, the mass media (NOT video game specific media) simply set their expectations HIGHER than hardcore gamers. The Wii had by far one of the best video game launches in history, thats a fact. Video game consoles suffer from a "drought" of games between 3~12 months (depending on who you ask) after its initial release, thats a fact. The Wii is just over 3 months old, thats a fact. When you compare the outstanding launch (Zelda + Wii Sports pack-in = Profit!) to the current lack of games (Warioware and Elebits are fun but they aren't Metroid or Super Smash Bros), of course you'll be extremely disappointed.
There is a foot of snow outside, topped with an inch-thick layer of ice, and the temperature is 0 degrees Fahrenheit with a wind chill of -20. School is cancelled. Can the kid go out and play? Sure, but once they start getting frostbite/etc from the cold, then they want to come in and move around to get the blood going, and this beats indoor soccer in terms of preservation of assets.
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A lot of this commentary is still focused on Nintendo's old core "hardcore" fanbase. Metroid Prime? Super Smash Bros? Even Super Mario Galaxy ... these are not games that are going to be consumed by the new casual owners of the Wii (folks like your parents and even grandparents). So what if the only game your parents play is Wii Sports, and they only turn it on to entertain their friends/family/guests? Your father is not suddenly going to be a hardcore player of Zelda, nor should that expectation be there. The next title they will pick up might be Wii Play. Critics will complain, "Wii Play is just more of the same Wii Sports type of action", and they'll be right. So yeah, it's not that great for typical hardcore gamers that want 10+ hours of content in their games ... but it's perfect for mom and pop which still consume the Wii casually. And that's the point.
All you need to do is take a look at the DS to see where Nintendo is going with the Wii. You've got a ton of light, casual content, in the form of brain training, casual sims (Nintendogs) and light puzzlers. Plus in Japan, there are all sorts of "non-games" (cookbooks, dictionaries, etc.). In the meantime, because the userbase is there and so large, there's plenty of traditional "hardcore" content as well (Castlevania, RPGs, etc.) to keep the main fanbase pleased.
I think it's a bloody smart business model to adopt. However, it's going to take a while for it to take shape on the Wii, just like it took a year to develop for the DS. Just be patient, gamers. In the meantime, there are all sorts of other games to play on "those other consoles", if you prefer the traditional hardcore games.
-- jchenx
Don't forget that there is also the typical launch problem that all game consoles have ...
... I suspect that Nintendo will have some amazing properties and many third party developers will be producing things we wouldn't have expected.
Most game consoles launch in Q3 or Q4 of a given year and end up with a decent supply of games (for being new systems) because there is value in being the only game of a certain type on a system; its a great opportunity to create a new franchise because far more people will pay attention to 'Red Steel' when it launches with the system as compared to it launching at some arbitrary later date.
Q1-Q2 of the following year launch systems have a great deal of difficulty getting a decent supply of games; it is the typical slow part of a year and there are too few systems released (being that it is a new system) for most developers to release a game.
I would (personally) wait until E3 before I determined whether the Wii was having any problems
Yes, but I don't think its the console's fault, but the games that are being released for it. Looking through the recent issue of Game Informer, I managed to get excited about a ton of upcoming releases, but none of them were for the Wii, the only real Wii game featured was some cooking game. Quirky? I'm sure it will be, and quirky is good, but the Wii already has a glut of perky games, but none of the staples.
Perhaps when Fire Emblem, Metroid Prime 3, and Super Smash Bros. come out. It needs real games too, established genres. I do like looking like an idiot playing Wario Ware, but I'd also like some regular gaming action, I want a decent FPS, and some decent RPGs, and a good fighter. These are the first games I generally acquire for any console, and the games that keep me playing them. I still break out the "obsolete" consoles to play these types of games, the Wii is lacking them completely except for TP. Yes its a new console, and these will come, but this leads to another worry.
One thing I didn't here many people talking about is how the Wii lack of power will cause people to stop porting to it. Looking through that Game Informer you can see many multi-platformers coming out, but they're all PS3/360, with a conspicuous lack of Wii support. I'm going to have to buy a 360 to get my hot Conan action, and my steamy Star Wars force fix. Thinking about this, I guess the GC had the same problem, but it DID have the staple genres, even if light on the RPG front.
Anyone who goes through my post-history will notice that I was pimping the Wii pretty hard, but now I'm starting to worry.
A patriot must always be ready to defend his country against his government. -edward abbey
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Seriously, if Nintendo went and added real arcade games to their virtual console section, it could boost sales from all those oldschool gamers.
R-Type on TurboGrafx-16 was probably the best arcade port of this game. However it's still not the real thing. And most arcade ports just plain suck, why play the SEGA Genesis version of Golden Axe or Altered Beast when the arcade version was much better.
There's also the fact that some games never had ports either, or on other older consoles. Such as Raiden Project on the Playstation. Or Slapfight/A.L.C.O.N. which was only released on C64 AFAIK.
And last, how about letting us play the virtual games on our Nintendo DS? They already have the emulator for the NES (I'm guessing, with all the GBA ports), we know that even the GBA is powerful enough (emulators exist), so why not let us play at least the NES virtual games on our DS? It can already download demos from stations in game stores, so we know it's possible.
Well, maybe. They claim that they've ramped manufacturing up to a million a month. They've left the PS3 in the dust and they're shipping units faster than Microsoft was at the same point. They are also experiencing shortages with DS's. These are selling at three times the rate as the Wii. The company's last quarterly earnings announcement could be summarized as "We're printing money". Game makers are changing their plans to include Wii releases.
I am not sure anyone really expected the Wii to be selling at the rate it is, especially when its described as "a minor upgrade over the PS2 and a reinvented light pen". I wouldn't be surprised if most games companies banked on the high graphic consoles taking the market and therefore never really included the Wii in their plans. With the way its selling, I am sure there are many companies that are revaluating their plans.
What we learn from the Wii, IMHO, is that if you get the price point right and the right kind of innovation, then people will buy. While Sony will continue to sell consoles, their price point is wrong and they have the wrong kind of innovation. What I mean by the wrong sort of innovation, is that high quality graphics is already being catered for by the Xbox 360 and BluRay is a passable extra. Sony gets more points deducted for a difficult to develop for games platform, where Nintendo makes it easy by keeping it simple. Sony will probably be seeing the great games that really take advantage of the console eventually, but the graphics engines need to get there first, since few programmers truely master highly multithread develpment.
Jumpstart the tartan drive.
Off topic, I know, but:
So, let me get this straight. The same guy complaining about straw men (et al) holds the view that, because he perceives one person (coincidentally born in the north and raised in the south) to have an attitude, all southerners are like this. Is this a fine example of northern idiosyncrasy? How's that work?
I once heard a girl from South Dakota complain about having to take a Speech class. It was at my alma mater in Louisiana. Her reason? "I'm from the north, where we already talk good."
I won't even attempt to topple your argument that humans south of the Mason-Dixie line "really hate freedom, as in you support slavery," as it would be too easy to do so.
Heh.
Yeah, this is one of those annoying question-based articles, where the author takes something that's highly popular and asks a controversial, irrational question ("Is the magic gone for the game console that's so popular it's still flying off shelves?"). Framing it as a question allows them to ambiguously avoid taking a position that they would have to back with clear evidence. That makes it easier to stir up reader reaction for ad revenues.
"Sufferin' succotash."
That's strange, I am 30 and I own the Wii and a 360. I'm too old to be messing around with my PC in order to make it even run games.
So true. The danger of being inside a community of like-minded masters of the universe is that you can't see beyond the bubble you're in. Enterprise IT pundits didn't see Linux until it had already infiltrated the enterprise. They'd all been too busy talking about "soup to nuts solutions" to read the writing on the wall. The same thing is happening with games.
Hardcore gamers don't realize that their pastime is mainstream now. Just look at the term "games." When I was a teenager, "gamer" meant someone who carried the DMG, the Players Handbook, and the Monster Manual in his backpack at school. Now pencil and paper games have gone mainstream in the form of console and PC games. Adults play these games. Females play these games. It is madness! The inner sanctum has been breached!
Wii is doing great, and it will continue to rack up impressive sales, until eventually even gamer media will adapt their thinking and broaden the appeal of their own offerings.
Read the EFF's Fair Use FAQ
> but everyone wants a Wii.
Most certainly not. I, along with dozens of gamers (hardcore or not) that I know IRL, have ZERO interest in getting a Wii. The common concensus amung most of us is that the Wii as a poorly named, sub-par gaming system (processor, graphics, etc), with an admittedly novel gimmick (controller). But no matter how novel that controller is, that doesn't overcome it's other weaknesses.
So the magic isn't suddenly "gone". For many of us, it was simply never there to begin with.
P.S. This is not intended as flamebait. It's just an honest opinion that many gamers I know have regarding the Wii.
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Not that I disagree with most your points...but to say the Wii looks the same as the PS3 and 360 on normal TVs is just false. The difference is large and very easy to see. Graphics aren't everything..of course, but don't make stuff up.
Personally, I think the Wii is fine and will get one eventually. A co-worker though tried playing it and hated it because there was too much delay between the controller and the game he was playing. Clearly it isn't a problem for most people...but it is one of the more legitimate complaints I have heard about the system.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Let's get this straight - Zonk is a Microsoft fanboy, not a Nintendo fanboy.
All you are seeing is a shift in Microsoft's marketing strategy. At first Microsoft thought their primary competitor as the PS3, so they attacked the PS3 relentlessly, even going so far as to promote the Wii console in their "Wii60" campaign. They've bribed bloggers, indoctrinated many fanboys to do their marketing unwittingly, and tainted biased news sources.
Now that they've bred a culture of FUD around the PS3, they're going on to phase two of their FUD campaign - targeting the Wii.
Microsoft is great at these sort of tactics. The Iowa case documents, the Halloween documents, all have shown Microsoft as capable of these type of antics.