I’ve had a thought mulling around my brain for the past few weeks regarding the Nintendo Wii, but I thought it too crazy to bring up here. After all, I’m trying to run a somewhat legitimate blog here–or at least something better than the blogs owned by your average gaming board troll. But after running across the above release for the Wii, I think I just have to say it: The Wii’s focus on casual games rather than traditional games have led to a sad truth — the Wii is a glorified board game.
Now take note that I am not a Nintendo hater. I grew up on the NES and SNES, and have been a fan of the Wii since the name change. I covered the launch announcement of the Wii in Amherst Bytes with fanboyish enthusiasm, and my thoughts on the console remained generally favorable until I realized that Nintendo is paying considerably more attention to the casual game market than the gamers who have grown to love them.
The specific reasons why I feel the Wii is a board game are as follows:
- You generally only use it when friends come over: Nintendo made a smart move by including Wii Sports with every Wii, as most Wii owners will find themselves spinning it up whenever company comes over. Once you finish the handful of decent single-player games for the Wii, you too will find yours gathering dust until you have friends over.
- It’s being marketed as something you play with others in your living room, rather than online: It’s no secret that the Wii is the most backwards console when it comes to online play. Instead, Nintendo pushes local multiplayer in most of their PR material. Just look at the game cover above! Their inane game code system could arguably prove this point as well. They’re making online play too difficult so most people don’t even try.
- The plethora of party games available for the Wii are essentially modern board games: The Wii has seen far more party games than any other game console, all of which can arguably be considered fancy board games. This is also especially significant because we’re still in the first year of the Wii’s lifespan. Imagine what the Wii game lineup will look like in a few years if it keeps up its current pace for party game releases…
I also had a bad pun in mind regarding my board game theory and Wii Fit as another point, but I think I’ll spare you the horror.
I can’t fault Nintendo for trying to tap into a previously untouched gaming market, but when that means we get more party and casual games on the Wii than we do traditional games, I honestly have to wonder if Nintendo is forsaking real gamers. I’m sure Nintendo remembers them, after all they were the only ones who stuck with them during the dark days of the N64 and Gamecube. But seeing as how Zelda, Metroid Prime 3, and Super Paper Mario are really the only traditional games on the system worth owning, a year after launch no-less, I think it’s high time to call shenanigans.
At this point I can’t really think of any traditional Wii games, aside from Mario Galaxy of course, that I find myself looking forwards to. Is it sad that I’m more interested in Wii Fit than I am for the actual games coming out for the Wii next year?
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Ha! Me too! And even more telling, my girlfriend is more excited about WiiFit than I am about anything on the Wii. A couple weeks back I rented a Wii game from Gamefly (Korinabo or something...a marble rolling game) and I had to adjust the Wii clock for Daylight Savings Time. That's how long it'd been since I'd turned the bloody thing on.
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It's funny that you mention Gamefly, somehow I think the Wii is giving Gamefly lots of business as most of its games are decent rentals but unwise purchases...
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I was going to say "but what about Smash Bros. Brawl?". Then i realized that it too is a party game. The most awesome party game in existence, but still a party game. Kind of like Strikers Charged.
WiiFit, I am very interested in.
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Smash isn't really a party game, it's just a 4 player fighting game. By party game I mean those things like Warioware that basically consists of minigames or things like that which you can really only enjoy as a group.
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