Do I get a Wii??? My Response to Nintendo’s Press Conference on the Wii.
Sep 14 '06
The Bottom Line Despite selling a system that has a limited long-term future, Wii is still undeniably going to be a hot system this Christmas break.
Nintendo’s marketing has truly succeeded in promoting a product which is nothing more than a slightly upgraded Gamecube with a gimmick controller. After watching Nintendo’s press conference I felt convinced that Nintendo was in fact going to win the console war. With incredibly smart product appeal to all ages, a seemingly smart promoting of “fun games” combined with nostalgic revival of old ones through Wii points, and the largest game launch to accompany a system release, I felt that Nintendo had single-handedly slapped Microsoft and Sony in the face by overcoming all the criticisms that the two giants had faced in their launches.
Common questions like, how many consoles will be shipped (a whopping 4 million by the end of this year), will there be good games out yet (Zelda!), and how much does the Nintendo’s online service cost (free), were all answered with pleasant responses…
But, shaking myself to my senses, I realized I could not be a victim of Nintendo’s smart marketing ploy. Because despite a nearly perfect press conference, the Wii in my opinion still faces fundamental flaws…that’s not to say I don’t think the Wii will be a great system. In fact, I think with this press conference it might have actually set itself up to be the #1 market share console if not the second. Still though, I intend on throwing out some caveats.
#1 Wii is not a next-generation console.
In general, when people buy electronics they want the latest, hottest thing out there, and typically that is the fastest, most powerful thing on the market. The Wii games graphically are not very impressive even if they may be just plain fun, as Nintendo has been promoting them to be. To argue this, I point to the games. Metroid Prime 3, despite the use of the new controller looks virtually identical to its Gamecube counterparts. The best looking games on the Wii can perhaps be the new Zelda, which is a rehash of a game intended to be on the Gamecube. So, while Nintendo has managed a very solid lineup, they are in fact selling a console that has hardware barely capable of matching Xbox 360 or PS3. If you don’t believe me though, head over to gametrailers.com and watch the Wii game footage montage. Find me a game that looks even comparable to Dead Rising or Saint’s Row, both already released Xbox 360 games, and I’ll concede my point.
Again, I am not saying this is necessarily a bad thing. Non-next generation hardware does mean Wii will be cheap, and its $249 price point is most certainly reasonable. One also could most certainly argue that the DS, with its mediocre hardware compared to PSP, easily dominated the handheld market because of the novelty of the dual screen, and the awesome selection of games, despite initial skeptic responses from the gaming community.
However, with the Wii, I can’t help but feel like, while it does provide an interesting approach to playing games with the Wii-mote, the lack of strong hardware will make it go extinct earlier in a few years. Consoles like Xbox 360 and PS3 plan on being around fro a good lifespan of maybe 10 years. A console like the Wii does not nearly have that kind of lifespan given that its current hardware is already outdated compared to the latest PC parts. That kind of outlook makes me hesitate.
#2 Wii-mote – is it fun to use???
My doubts of the Wii system mainly stem from their promotion of what I consider a gimmick, the Wii-mote. While it seems amazing to be able to play a wide variety of virtual sports from using the controller, I am still doubtful that the Wii-mote will be that successful. I have my feelings that once the novelty wears off, one is left with a partly upgraded Gamecube system and nothing more.
Added to that, I doubt the Wii-mote will really be as fun as Nintendo attempts to promote it, though there are plenty of commercials and gameplay videos they’ve released with happy white-clad gamers of all age groups enjoying the experiences of fishing, playing virtual sports, slicing and so forth.
I point to the main example of Red Steel as the main culprit and will explain why I doubt things with the Wii-mote work the way people will expect it to. I do think the tracking is accurate in the sense that if you point a gun at something, the controller will respond and track your movements. However, in regards to something like tennis, or swordplay, the Red Sword demo that was showcased at E3 does not actually translate your movement of the Wii-mote into sword movement on screen. Instead you swing the sword to produce a generic slash (equivalent of hitting a button on the Xbox 360).
I imagine the same to be that of tennis game. While the Wii hardware is probably capable of imagining a trajectory for the ball so that if you get a high volley you must in fact reach up to hit it, I doubt it will in fact work that way. What I think is more like, if the ball comes toward you, you can virtually swing anywhere (low, high) and you will hit the ball so long as you time it properly. My belief is that the motions that the Wii-mote records are probably more similar to hitting a button than actually interacting with a virtual object.
Still while I am skeptical, again I’m not saying I can’t imagine this as not being fun, I honestly think Wii Sports will be a hit initially. However, I’m not discounting the fact that it’s a gimmick and that while people might goof around with it for a bit, eventually it’ll lose its appeal. Unlike tried and true consoles that last a long time, the Wii might be filled not so much with innovation but an initial strong following, but then a gradual decline as the hardware drives itself into extinction.
#3 Kiddy-games – the major complaint
The biggest backlash in the forums from the Wii conference was that the games, while numerous did not have the same adult appeal that the Xbox 360 and PS3 have managed to promote with games like Saint’s Row, Ridge Racer, MGS4, GTA4, DMC3, Gears of War, Halo 3, and so on.
The strongest titles that Nintendo has in its court is most definitely Zelda, as well as the typical flagship lineups such as, Mario, Metroid and Smash Bros. A few notable anime titles like One Piece and Bleach will definitely appeal to the younger anime-fan crowd, but other than that, most of the games they demonstrated seemed like those novelty mini-games they mentioned earlier. Examples (though the title names escape me because a lot of them are still in Japanese) include the virtual fishing game, the virtual cooking game, a bunch of random “simulation games” including Trauma Center. Not to say that these games won’t be fun, but Trauma Center seems not too different from its DS counterpart, just instead of a stylus, you’ve got a Wii-mote in hand as a scalpel.
Ok, so despite my skeptic response, here’s why I think Wii will either dominate the market or easily get 2nd place next console wars.
#1 – It’s really freaking well-marketed.
With a $249 price point that makes the other consoles seem ridiculously expensive, Wii has placed itself to be product of this year. While PS3 and Xbox 360 are definitely more setup to be long-term machines, Wii has shown that while it is not the latest, greatest technology, it will be fun and provide some original gameplay that the family can enjoy.
That’s just it, it’s a console designed for all age groups to get a little bit of a kick out of. While I don’t believe Nintendo will managed to make gamers of folks who don’t normally play games as they proposed in their press conference, I can imagine my mom for example, picking up a Wii game, toying around with it with some initial amusement, but never really touching it after a week or so. I definitely can imagine that happening with a lot of people…
It’s partly also the reason why the DS can sell like hot cakes…it appeals to a huge consumer base of even non-gamers who are interested in just playing Sudoku on the road or something, and bam, Nintendo sells DS machines left and right.
#2 – Wii Channels!
Wii Channels are smart and make Xbox Live look narrow minded. Live is definitely designed for competitive gaming, with accomplishment ratings, profiles that are based on rankings, and so on. Wii has internet functionality, the ability to view camera pictures and do other wacky little things that have nothing to do with gaming, such as making your own virtual person for use in Wii sports appeal to a much broader consumer base and also make the Wii seem a lot more like a household technological hub.
In addition, the ability to buy old Nintendo games that can be played is nice…my only hesitation there is that it’s too expensive. No one in their right mind would pay $10 for an SNES classic when you can just get ZSNES and emulate the game on a PC. Even if it does not quite match up to the experience, it isn’t too hard to buy a controller to connect to the PC. I’m not really advocating emulation or piracy, but the price that Nintendo has in mind is a bit too high.
Conclusion:
The Wii has broad consumer support and definitely seemed like a very hot item from the way Nintendo pitched it. The wide variety of cute gimmicks from being able to do scrambled picture puzzles and surfing the web on a TV, will make the Wii more than a game console, which is surprising.
However, before we all parade over to the Nintendo fan-club I have one more caveat.
One smart question raised at the conference was how much will controllers cost? $40 for the Wii-mote, and $20 for the nunchuku. That’s $60 for each additional player, and so if you wanted to play Wii tennis with 4 people, that’s an extra $180 for the “family fun” that Nintendo is promoting. $180 + $250 = $430 and suddenly Nintendo’s cute console isn’t looking like such a bargain anymore.
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