Nintendo Wii

[FlipConstantine]

Anyone get their hot little hands on one?  I didn't, decided it wasn't worth waiting out in the freezing fuck*ng cold, now I'm regretting that.


Preliminary impressions?  Worth the $250?

[littlefallsmets]

If I was gonna get a new video game system, it'd definitely be the Wii... though I probably won't.

Console gaming lost me when they started adding so many goddamn buttons. Too complex.

Why would I want to use fifteen buttons to pretend I'm using a car when... I can drive a car with two pedals, a shift and a wheel? Or etcetera.

Super Nintendo was my upper limit. I'm not gonna remap my hand-to-eye coordination just to pretend blow up a pretend zombie. I can do that inside my imagination and still remember how to type afterwards. Fuckin' eight buttons, two directionals, a joystick, a trigger... really? There are people who can really do this?

Whereas the Wii appears to be... a boomerang and the button you use to raise your bed in the hospital.

I can wrap my mind around that, at least.

[theinevitable]

some guys on my floor bought a Wii.

the new Zelda game looks amazing. The comment by my good friend Mr Carl C. was "Nintendo Wii-- greatest thing invented by Man in the history of the world."

I wouldn't know, though. I was being a good boy and studying Latin. I'm sure there is some applicable Transcendental quote about me, missing out on the way of the future (something from Thoreau? I feel like he said something about people missing out on the world with their noses in books, "learning.")

[CortJstr]

The Wii's best feature appears to be the ability to load it with classic NES and SNES games for like 5 bucks a pop. That has me seriously considering my first post-SNES console (for exactly the reasons given by LFM. Plus cash-flow)

[Ben-San]

Super Nintendo was my upper limit. I'm not gonna remap my hand-to-eye coordination just to pretend blow up a pretend zombie. I can do that inside my imagination and still remember how to type afterwards. Fuckin' eight buttons, two directionals, a joystick, a trigger... really? There are people who can really do this?

"Eight buttons" counts the trigger. "Two directionals" counts the joystick.. at least on the PS2/PS3 controller, which are afaik largely identical. The Gamecube controller has fewer inputs, although their layout looks weirder (it makes ergonomic sense, though). I have no idea what the Xbox/X360 controller looks like and don't really care.

The PS controller is a slight modification to the SNES controller structure anyway. The L/R buttons are each split in two (not that most games bother getting much use out of L2/R2) and the joysticks are (in well-designed games) not used at the same time as the buttons on that side, so.. you move your thumb a little and use a joystick instead.

It may seem heinously complex, I suppose, but it's a motor skill much simpler than (and not conflicting with, as you seem to want to imply) touch-typing. I mean, you might as well ask how people memorize the positions of all those little letter buttons, and a keyboard's arrangement doesn't even have the intuitive spatial connection to what's happening onscreen that a joystick or crosspad does. I don't know, do you forget how to touch-type when you learn to play the guitar or drive a stick shift?

P.S.: The Virtual Console does indeed appear to be awesome. Once I have a reasonable accumulation of luxury-spending cash the Wii will be high on the list.

[FlipConstantine]

The Virtual Console isn't really a selling point for me because I already have seven gigs of completely legitimate rom files to which I own all the corresponding cartridges.  I'm piqued because it represents at least a bit of a new direction in game playing.  I'm hoping to be able to rope my parents into playing it at least a little while so they can finally understand why their son has spent his life huddling in small dark rooms around a glowing screen.

[Drygioni]

The Wii looks like it's going to be great, and I have three brothers which only makes it an even more completely awesome buy. Sure, we'll probably get a few injuries with four people waving the remotes around but that's part of the fun.

Really, with four young (alleged) males, this console can't fail to go down well in this house. Super Smash Bros. for the victory.

In other news, Sony's cack-handed launch has resulted in people shooting each other!

[Ben-San]

The Virtual Console isn't really a selling point for me because I already have seven gigs of completely legitimate rom files to which I own all the corresponding cartridges.

Unless you have a really ker-awesome display and a good controller peripheral, playing the games on console again is really a different experience. I thought this was bull honkey until I played Legend of Zelda on the GCN "Zelda Museum" disc. The problem in the past has usually been that Nintendo's rereleases have been twenty-dollar cartridges, which is too much for an antique piece of software. On the other hand, $8 for Kirby Superstar or Link To The Past is reasonably tempting.

[littlefallsmets]

I exaggerated for what I hoped to be comic effect, of course. Apparently I didn't get that effect across...

My point is, I suppose, that I don't want to have to put that much work into something that's supposed to be fleeting fun.

When it is that complex, it stops being a diversion and starts being more like a job for me.

Also, I was never into games that were largely about tests of reflexes or the ability to remember and reproduce large multi-button combinations anyway... and the more buttons there are and the more choices there are to make quickly, the less the games are about strategy or anything that's "fun" to me and the more that they are about reflex and memorization.

Which, again, are more like a job to me and hold little interest.

[Ben-San]

I guess my point is that it's not a memorization issue. You don't have to memorize the locations of buttons; if you play video games then the paradigm is in place and quickly learned. If as you suggest you used the SNES controller reasonably well, using the PS controller would be remarkably similar once you got used to it and allowed experiential learning rather than effortful learning to get you going.

There are some games that require memorization, and I don't generally like them much - many "advanced" fighting games have complex and non-intuitive input sequences. However, in well-designed games controlling them is a much simpler and more easily-developed motor skill than driving a car. I don't think that the claim that it requires the commitment of a job is accurate - it does, however, require the commitment of learning how to play, just as most recreations do.

My main issue with 'exaggerating for comic effect' on this point is that there are a lot of people, particularly console zealots, who will make exactly that sort of claim about their least-favorite console's controllers. If I come off as overly-touchy as a result of that, sorry. It's a bit like making a long rant about how much Mac/Windows/Linux sucks, and then later posting "c'mon, it was for comic effect": the long and stupid Holy Wars make people tired of it.

[robot_god]

there are a lot of people, particularly console zealots, who will make exactly that sort of claim about their least-favorite console's controllers.

Honestly though, the Dreamcast's controller kept me from playing that system more than two times.




I'm probably going to get the Wii in a few weeks.

[Ben-San]

Honestly though, the Dreamcast's controller kept me from playing that system more than two times.

The Dreamcast's controller problems had nothing to do with too many buttons and everything to do with the cross-pad's deadly-sharp corners. That thing would mess your thumb up something fierce. Apparently the size was also a problem for some people but I have large hands.

[Sub_Topical]

Braggart!

[CortJstr]

I big problem for me was also the move to more 3D games. I suck enough at finding items and passages when I don't have to also worry about depth.

[linnea]

... bull honkey ...

Man, I thought I was the only one who used that word! Awesome! Welcome to the bullhonky fan club.

The Wii's best feature appears to be the ability to load it with classic NES and SNES games for like 5 bucks a pop. That has me seriously considering my first post-SNES console (for exactly the reasons given by LFM. Plus cash-flow)

I was ALMOST tempted to buy a PS3, until I heard that they had "issues" with backwards compatibility. Why the fuck would I drop $500 (in a few months when it's actually feasible for me to buy one and have it shipped to rural Alaska) or $1700 on eBay for a PS3 when I can't even play Katamari Damacy on it? Fuck you, Sony.