I was joking, that was just the first thing that popped into my head when I could not find a major retailer that would ship it to Hawaii. You see they are extremely cautious about food brought into the islands. See our Department of Agriculture’s website. When I tried to buy my niece an ant farm I was told that we’d have to catch them ourselves and that we could not order them through the mail like you can on the mainland.
I couldn’t wait and ended up buying GH3 today. Talk about addictive. Even when I could no longer comprehend the colored circles, my fingers were cramping, and my shoulder ached, I didn’t want to stop playing.
I’m sorely tempted to get a Wii if only because it hosts some of my favourite franchises (Zelda, Metroid, Mario). I’m not particularly bothered about it being a graphical powerhouse or having conventional games on it - in fact the game that piqued my interest the most was Trauma Centre because it seemed a bit different. My mum is really into the idea of having a Wii too, so we could play party games on it. Maybe I’ll get one as present to myself in the new year.
Yeah, but all the “must play” games I’ve seen reviewed for the Xbox/PS3 are pretty violent. Call of Duty 4, Halo 3, Splinter Cell, etc., not exactly games I can play with my kids around or let them play. Or that my wife would want to play. Which means I will get nearly zero time to spend myself playing them, and I am at best a casual gamer, and FPS games make me motion sick on a large screen HDTV.
On the other hand, the Wii is a great hit with my kids. And this is even before the Mario Bros. Smash Brawl game comes out – they love the aforementioned Raving Rabbids game, another game called Elebits, and even some otherwise rather lame games play-wise in Pokemon Revolution and Rampage: Total Destruction (which I got for myself out of nostalgia for the old arcade game, only to realize that dang, this is just the same thing over and over). And my wife loves the Lego Star Wars game.
Are any of these types of games available on the Xbox/PS3? Or just not talked about?
I don’t know about that. It might amount to something like dumping your Yahoo! stock (or never buying Google).
Look at this dude’s projects. Or at his ideas for user-head-tracking (Reminds me of my stupid movements, trying to peer behind walls during deathmatches on the original Doom).
I don’t know if anyone’s following up on these ideas on Nintendo’s (or, for that matter, any game developer’s angle). But the non-obvious yet simple ideas that the remote opens up… they could open up exciting angles for games.
We played with a Wii for the first time on Boxing Day.
I thought it was quite fun. I can’t afford one (or can’t find one at a price I can afford, really. Five hundred dollars for a game system? No.)
True story: my best friend just got a Wii the day after Xmas (ironically, just as I was busy smashing my finger to purple swollen-ness while playing on my own Wii), simply by walking into a Target to exchange some busted merchandise and noticing that they had a couple on the shelves in the video game area. Incredulous, he asked if those were really Wii units for sale or just empty boxes. The rather bored clerk said, “Yeah, we’ve got a bunch more back in the storeroom too.” I guess people just didn’t think to go to Target to get a Wii, 'cause I know there were people on line starting at stupid hours of the night to get these things at Best Buy and Circuit City and Toys R Us and whatnot.
So, he bought one for MSRP, which is actually the cheapest of the game consoles out there now at about $250. And he hadn’t even really been looking for one, just sort of in the mood to get one if he saw one for list price, and what do you know, he did just that.
Well sure there are games suitable for kids. Looking at Amazon.com here’s how the game ratings break down:
XBox360
Everyone: 71
Everyone 10+: 37
Teen: 120
Mature: 85
Rating Pending: 54
Wii
Early Childhood: 1
Everyone: 123
Everyone 10+: 39
Teen: 56
Mature: 18
Rating Pending: 44
PS3
Everyone: 39
Everyone 10+: 13
Teen: 56
Mature: 33
Rating Pending: 49
The stereotypes are basically true, Nintendo games are oriented towards kids, XBox games are oriented towards teens and adults, and PS3 doesn’t have a huge number of games. The Wii seems like it would be most kid-friendly, but you can find plenty of kid games for the XBox360 as well, although many of them are sports games.
I got my Wii on Father’s Day weekend. I went into the local everything-store (Fred Meyer), and peeked into the electronics department. A clerk asked if she could help me, and I said that I was just checking for Wiis. She said “oh, we got six of them this morning, we just haven’t put them out yet.”
I had been present when the same store sold the last unit from their previous shipment, which was why I was bothering to look for them instead of thinking of them as something unobtainable.
Sorry to hijack, but I have to tell you about another game you’ll love if Monkeyball is your thing. It’s called Marble Mania, and I found it used at gamestop for like 14 bucks. It’s GREAT fun, and the boards/levels are actually even more innovative and mind-bending than Monkeyball. There’s no minigames, but the races are well worth the cost of the game.
This is true, but there are some good games for kids on 360. You are right though that the mustplays are typically violent.
According to Metacritic, Mercury Meltdown Revolution is even better, and it’s only $20 new.
Did any of you who wanted a wii do the deal where if you buy one on Dec 20 and 21 Nintendo guaranteed you would have one by January?
Oh my god. When I can afford a Wii at last, that will be the first thing I do…
The football games aren’t bad either. It takes a little while to get used to the new motions, but throwing and running are pretty fun.