Wii

You can’t walk around the gaming blogoverse without falling over the release news for the Nintendo Wii. A few details from the New York Times and few thoughts:

• A release date of November 19
• Retail price is going to be 250 dollars
• Shipping with Wii Sports
• 25-30 launch titles, including Zelda Twilight Princess
• Games will still retail at 50$
• Retro game downloads between 5-10 dollars (30 games initially available)

The 250 dollar price tag is very reasonable but it’s a first for Nintendo. Coming out just before the holiday season is going to making getting your hands on a Wii difficult, no matter how much inventory they ship. Launching with 25 games will be nice, but I hope there are more than 30 games available for download.

Having just bought an Xbox 360, I wonder how Mrs. Buttonmasher will take to yet another video machine going under the TV. She’ll just have to learn what it’s like living with a gamer (and confessed Nintendo fan-boy). And I’ll have to figure out a way to justify a $250 purchase on top of possibly getting a new TV around Christmas time.

And in closing, I’d like to quote a Forbes.com article, reporting on the Nintendo news conference in Japan, with a quote from Satoru Iwata that is wrong on numerous levels:

‘With these new features, I believe that anybody, regardless of age or gender, will be urged to touch our Wii at least once,’ Iwata said.

Right…

Sometimes I forget that buttonmashing.com is one of the only sites people (read: my friends) visit for gaming news. Often forget to post links to exciting news I find, especially when it comes to the Nintendo Wii, because I figure most of you have already seen it somewhere else. But for those of you that don’t scour over 100+ video game blog feeds, allow me to enlighten you. I’ll be linking to a lot of cool Wii news, now that the launch is hopefully only months away. The excitement is building up fast. On to the links:

USA Today had an interview with Reginald Fils-Aime, Nintendo of America’s new president and chief operating officer, where they discussed all-things-Wii. Most important was the topic of the online system that the Wii will sport. From the article:

Q: You’re not pursuing a subscription model?

A: We view online gaming as essentially an enhanced way to enjoy the gaming experience and drive more sales of hardware and software.

Q: How do you extend your online strategy to Wii?

A: It’s the same premise. We will offer online-enabled games that the consumers will not have to pay a subscription fee for. They’ll be able to enjoy that right out of the box. The Wii console is going to be Wi-Fi enabled, so essentially, you’ll be able to plug it in and go. It won’t have hidden fees or costs.

I’ve said it before and I’ll keep on saying it — I hope and pray that Nintendo’s online service is similar to Microsoft’s. The Gamer card, the Gamer score, the Xbox Live Arcade, all of those features would be so cool to see on Wii’s online service. This is something I would pay for! Give it to me for free, if you want, but please make it worth my while. Let me play RC Pro-Am multiplayer. Let me co-op Contra with my friends. I’d love to know how my high-score on 1942 compares with the rest of the world. There is so much untapped nostalgia and potential here that it boggles my mind. I could go on forever with possibilities.

Nintendo is also starting to announce titles that will be available for the Wii. Wikipedia actually has a list of all games that have been mentioned for the Wii. Most recently, Mario Strikers Charged and Battalion Wars 2 have been announced. There is definitely going to be a tug of war between new titles and retro downloads.

Twilight Princess, the new Zelda title will sport a totally new control scheme. Swing the Wii-mote to swing Link’s sword is going to be riot. Or tire out your wimpy-birds arms. Sissy.

There’s still a lot of speculation going on with regard to the launch price for the Wii. It hovers between 170 and 250 dollars. Does it really matter? If it stays around the 250$ mark, Nintendo is going to sell every single console they manufacture. Period.

There’s more info coming out daily about the Wii, little details, hints, and snippets. It’s all very exciting. I just hope I can keep up!

… and other things that make me happy.

I don’t post a lot of the news that other sites pick up before me (I try not to blog from work too much) but when I read the announcement of Nintendo’s pricing for the Wii, I couldn’t stop smiling. I had to post something! At less than 250 bucks, Nintendo hit one out of the park. That price is the proverbial sweet spot for gamers.

I did read a rumor earlier this week, though, that Nintendo was ready to announce a $200 price point, but after Sony announced their ridiculously overpriced PS3, Nintendo held off and went with the $250 price. That’s just a rumor, but it makes sense, from a business point of view. Fricken Sony!

The only thing I’m worried about now is if the Big N can meet the demand. They say the want to sell six million units by next March, but if they had that many ready by Christmas, they would sell every single one of them. And then half of them would be on eBay the next day. I also worry about price gougers retailers bundling the Wii with all manner of unnecessary crap. It’s already being done with the DS Lite, and I after what we witnessed with the 360, I see no reason why it won’t happen again. All of this adds up to some serious frustration, come launch-day. That bothers me, because I refuse to “pre-order” and I’d rather not wait out in the cold at 11:30 at night outside of Best Buy to get my Wii.

I just want to get my Wii on, is that so wrong?

I linked a handful of the “pro” sites with information about the new revolution controller when I first blogged it. Not to discount their contribution as gamers but I wanted to take a look around the gaming blogs and see what gamers are thinking. Here are a smattering of comments I’ve found over the past few days.

Kearns, like a lot of us, wasn’t sure about it at first but concluded, “Hot, hot, hot. No doubt, this is a must by.”

Kieron divides the haters and lovers into two camps – tedious luddites and Good People. Count me in with the Good People

For Tom at G-pinions, this was, “the most important news in gaming [he] can ever remember.”

Not exactly a ringing endorsement but Joseph at Space Worlder says “Revolutionary? Depends on how you look at it.”

Alice’s great Wonderland has Iwata’s speech (in note form) and says the controller is “fantastic.”

The patron saint of La Revolution thinks everything will work out just fine: “Motion sensor controllers are actually kind of… obvious. Surprised it hasn’t happened before–and since they’re basically just another way to capture directional information, this should not, as I had worried earlier, make it all that hard to port to/from Revolution… You’ll just use a joystick for the non-Revolution versions.”

From Nintedorks: “after thinking about it more, I realize how incredibly awesome this is.”

Gaming Steve has a bunch of Revolution info, including the slides to Iwata’s speech. Be careful, there’s a lot there and your head may ache afterwards.

Brinstar has good advice for nay sayers: ” We should be welcoming this direction, rather than fearing it.” (and some good links, to boot)

Press the Buttons has a bunch of Revolution stuff. I feel the same way: “All I want is to make Mario run and jump.”

For a needed dose of reality, Hello, Nintendo links to this Ars Technica article asking some questions that will surely be addressed in the coming months but are germain to the discussion notheneless.

Video Game Pundit has a lot. Just go read it.

Astarte at Utopian Hell has Nintendo’s dream scenario. Her thoughts on the Revolution? I feel like the kid I once was, eagerly awaiting the next Zelda to come out.

Everyone and their mother are linking Lost Garden, but it really is something that must be read and digested.

Lots of stuff at Infendo, too.

Wow, that went a lot longer than I originally thought it would. Of course, this isn’t everything. A quick search at Technorati reveals that this something that a lot of people are talking about. If you’ve blogged about the Revolution and I missed ya, don’t hesistate to drop me a link. (I couldn’t possibly get everyone but if you take the time to let me know what you thought, I’ll gladly link it)

Personally, after I read that there will be ports for “regular” Gamecube controllers I felt a little relieved. IGN even has a mockup of what a Revolution Wavebird would look like. Drool. That makes me feel a little better. I was worried about third party support like many others, but this will help the skittish developers ease into the Revolution. Things will get interesting when developers are comfortable with the Revolution and see the possibility of the new controller and we start seeing some really cool stuff. Sounds like the “DS” cycle all over again. The hardware/concept gets poo-poohed, then interest and intrigue grow, and finally new, fun ideas begin to emerge.

The possibility of that cycle repeating itself sounds great to me.

Update: I know there’s a lot of gamers out there who don’t exactly agree with the direction Nintendo is going with the Revolution (as if it’s their call) but it really seems to have a polarizing effect on people. Cody at PixelJunkies seems to think Kieron Gillen’s statement is “moronic. Not I, you, or her have played a single game with this. A few reviewers on the other side of the planet have played several short tech demos in a completely Nintendo controlled environment, the furthest possible thing from playing a real game in your living room, and people are already passing this off as the single most brilliant innovation ever in games.”

Sure, only a few people have used the controller so far but it doesn’t take much imagination to start contemplating the possibilities. I don’t think anyone is calling it the “most brilliant innovation ever” but it has to be one of the more ambitious innovations. Hyperbole aside, Gillen is right, I think. It really comes down to who wants to give it a chance and those who have already made up their mind that it doesn’t fit in their idea of what a video game controller should look like or how it should handle.

The only people who are currently qualified to make any form of educated opinion are those that have used the controller. And they have all been unanimously positive. Let’s leave it at that for now. Let’s see what the big N does. Let’s look at what the developers say once they start putting the Revolution through its paces. Until then, let’s just chill.

More: Of course, we could just look to what Peter Moore, the Xbox VP. He says, “I want to give kudos for Nintendo for its attempt at innovation with the new controller…”

There’s more praise out there. I’ll link to it as I come across it.

We’ve talked about the coming Nintendo Revolution and the possibility of downloading the enormous library of NES, SNES, and N64 games that will be downloadable (I wonder if they’ll make Game Boy games available, too. That would make my head asplode). Anyway, this morning I saw this over at Evil Avatar. Like the title says, this stuff keeps getting better.

“People sort of picked on us for not prematurely jumping into online or internet gaming,” he mused, going on to point out that now the company has more to offer besides online gaming. Harrison then confirmed that past-gen, Nintendo-created titles will indeed be downloadable for free.

This is fantastic news. I would imagine 75-80% of the games that will be downloaded will come from the Nintendo library. To think that by simply purchasing the Revolution that you’ll immediately have hundreds of games to choose from is amazing. Who needs solid launch titles when your console launches with Mario 64, Zelda Ocarina of Time, Super Metroid, and hundreds more. Wow.

Another side effect this wil have is this — it will free up more money for downloading 3rd party games. Not having to pay for the Nintendo titles makes the price tag of Final Fantasy III and Chrono Trigger that much cheaper (overall).

Well played, indeed.

(See Also: Nintendo and the Long Tail)

Update: Of course some we do need perspective (and context) on this story, which can be found here.

Another Update:Unfortunately, it looks lke this was all speculation and wishful thinking. Joystiq is reporting that all Nintendo’s library will not be offered for free. It looks like some will still be downloaded for free but not all of them. That’s too bad. But so often is the case, if it looks too good to be true, it probably is.