Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION The Anywhere Machine Wii !!!!!!!

Okay, I know there's already a "PlayStation3 and Wii" thread, but I figured that the Wii had come into its own enough by this point to warrant its own thread separate from the PS3....

Yes, I know, grey area at best.

The fact is, I haven't been posting as much in the last month or so, and I just wanted to take a moment and tell y'all why, as well as pimp my latest obsession...

WII ! WII ! WII ! WII ! WII ! WII ! WII !

It just rocks.

About a month ago, I was at the video game store, and there was this little girl who piped up shyly to the guy at the counter, "Um, how much are the Wii systems?" He replied, "249.99," but by that time, the little skid marks on the carpet from my heels' abrupt stop had already been planted. I looked at him incredulously.

"Do you HAVE a Wii?" I asked, unbelievingly.

He answered, "Yeah, we have ONE."

Barely able to keep from yelling a blue streak in triumph, I said with a quiet, intense ferocity and sincerity, "I'LL TAKE IT."

And then I heard the quiet little gasp at my feet, as I saw the earnest face of the little girl next to me starting to fall. I looked up to see the store clerk's face beginning to turn ashen, probably expecting a rumble between the little girl's mom and me.

I quickly amended, "Umm... if this girl doesn't want it, of course." The clerk's face brightened. The girl went running to Mom, begging "Can we get the Wii? Can we get the Wii? Can we get the Wii???"

Mom said no.

1 minute later, I was bouncing up and down in the video game store like Tigger. I must have been a sight to behold. I've probably logged 80-100 hours on the system since then, and I can say without a doubt that there are only three times I have felt like this playing a brand new system, and that was the Atari 2600, the original NES, and now, the Wii. This new way to play really is nothing short of revolutionary, and once developers get caught up with the new controller's potential...

Well, it's going to be something.

I'm going to try to get back to posting more, but you'll have to excuse me so that I can play some more Zelda...

So what your saying is you need a vacation from it right? Send it over here.

Tell us the truth, KP... the little girl kicked your @$$ and the mom took pity and let you buy it, lest you press charges...

ok KP i don't know if you've seen this yet but it's a trip.

Wii sex
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=07QwZYWvDQs

Wii sexpt.2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IhNsyJl0JFU

I have not yet been tempted to get the Wii.

But sooner than later, there will be a Wii Star Wars game, and I will succumb. For the lightsaber fighting alone.

I'm still enjoying my Sega Genesis, thank you very much...

Oooh, lightsabers. That would be extremely cool.

I'm sticking with my GameCube for now, maybe by next Christmas I can upgrade.

Zelda + Wii sword slashing + Grass = joygasm

I'm posting this from my Wii right now! I'm surprised, the browsing experience is actually very quick.

Seriously? You can get online with a Wii??

The Wii online interactivity:

The Wii online experience is set up through channels, which you select off the title page when the Wii is powered up.

Internet access through your TV. Browsing with the Wiimote is actually a very elegant experience. As far as multimedia, it only supports Flash right now, but there's talk of them adding Java and/or QuickTime support with the next browser update, which is going to be in April. Also, the browser is free through June. After that, it will cost you $5.

There is also a persistent Weather Channel and a News Channel. The News Channel is kind of neat, you have a map of the globe and you use the Wiimote to select and zoom where you want to see the news. So, if you wanted to see what was going on today in, I don't know, Kenya, you could!

There is also the Everybody Votes channel, which offers up a new poll question once a week for everyone to vote on. It's neat, as it gives you results by gender, and results by state. Fun little feature.

And then my favorite: the Virtual Console.

On the Virtual Console, you can download games from the original NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Sega Genesis, and TurboGrafx. Thus far, I have downloaded: Super Mario Bros. (The original!), Excitebike, Gunstar Heroes, R-Type III, Donkey Kong Country, and Super Mario 64. There are something like 70 games currently available from the 5 consoles supported on Virtual Console, and more get released every week. (I'm waiting for Goonies II, R.C. Pro-Am, and Blades of Steel, myself.)

Also, there is talk of Sega Saturn titles being available sometime in the future.

I love the Wii!

I've heard nothing but good things about the Wii. When I finally get my own apartment, it will be my first purchase!
Just wondering KP, is Final Fantasy 3 (or 6 as it numbered in Japan) - My all time favorite game - available on the Virtual console?

Unfortunately, no. I'm sure it will be, eventually. However, they just released a version for the Game Boy Advance (which I own, and it rules) so I'm sure Square will want to milk as money off of that before they release for Virtual Console. However, Square IS one of the publishers who support VC, so I'm sure it will be released eventually.

Cool, thanks for the info!

So, who's Wii'd in bed?

KP, you gotta get one of these. A WiiHelm . Just the thing to put gaming back on the couch where it belongs.

Wow, that's nuts!

There must be a way to apply rhis tech to porn...

Dude!!! that's just shear laziness!!! WTF?!?!?

If you guys didn't get it, that was an April Fool's joke pulled by the guys at Think Geek. The tech doesn't exist. Although, if I know Pov, he'll find a way to make it work with porn.

I've got a regular XBox that I admittedly haven't played a bunch with despite having a pretty good selection of games. I'm going to get an XBox 360 because there are some games for that I really want to play ...

But on the other hand, I'm also thinking that I might like to have a Wii in order to play some "simpler" games. (And it'd be cool to have Super Mario 64 again! )


Given my general lack of coordination where a controller is concerned, I'm wondering in particular about the Wiimote ... how well does that work and what about the batteries it needs? Can you get a recharger for it or would I spend a fortune on AA's?

If I were to compare the state of the Wii to anything right now, it would be the first year of the DS. Developers are still trying to figure out how to use the wiimote. There are some very interesting games coming up, however. But first, the wiimote itself:

It's pretty cool. It works both as a pointer and/or a motion capture device. First, let's talk the morion-sensing capabilities. It has within it accelerometers which can record your gestures and translate them to events which your in-game character then accomplishes.

Pros: You throw a punch, your character throws a punch. You mimic swinging a golf club or a tennis racket, your character does the same. You swing a sword, your character swings a sword. When it works, it's both immediately gratifying and way cool. Nothing like it in the industry. It rocks.

Cons: That is, when it works. At this point, developers are all over the place with this. They're having a hard time getting the console to consistently recognize your movements. Part of ths problem is the fact that the wiimote can register movement in all three dimensions, as well as twisting motions. There is so much information that comes across that the developers are having a hard time filtering out unwanted movements. However, there are games that do a brilliant job with this (Legend of Zelda, Wario Ware, Rayman Raving Rabbids, Wii Sports, Godfather, SSX Blur-even though it is insanely hard, Madden) and more are on the way. My thoughts on this is that we are still very early in the development life cycle of the system and once the companies get some experience under their belts, things will be awesome. It's just gonna take another six months or so.

And now, the pointer. It allows you to point at the screen and shoot things or do other things that would allow you selecting something on the screen. This works very well. It allows you to do things like aim Link's bow and arrow directly, shoot directly at the screen, and the combination of the pointer and the motion control aspects allow you to do things like pick up 3-dimensional objects and manipulate them. It's very, very slick.

There are third-party solutions that allow you to recharge the wiimotes directly. Basically, it's a third-party battery pack which you insert in place of the battery cover and the AA batteries, and then set into a charging dock. I also expect that Nintendo will address this very soon. I would assume about 25 hours of battery life on a pair of Duracells.

More on the games and other features later!!!

More controllers:

Currently, there is a "nunchuck" attachment which plugs into the wiimote. One comes with the console, all the others are extra. It has an analog stick and two trigger-style buttons. It also has motion-sensing capabilities like the wiimote. It is designed for games such as Zelda and GTA-type games. It feels very natural and you get used to controlling things with two hands quickly. There is also a "classic controller" attachment which plugs into the wiimote which is basically the classic dual-analog-stick-d-pad-6-button controller we all know and love. Some games support this controller, and some do not. There are also ports for 4 GameCube controllers which have basically identical functionality to the classic controller attachment. Under the hood, the console is significantly less powerful than the XBox 360. It has 256k internal flash memory and a slot for a SDRAM card.

How the wiimote-nunchuck combo handles different existing genres of games:

3'rd person "Adventure" games (Zelda, GTA, Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, etc.) - The control on these games is really quite lovely. There's a huge amount of fun in being able to aim and point Link's bow and swing his sword. And in EA's "The Godfather: Blackhand Edition", you can pick goons up, throw them, punch them out, beat them over the head with the club, etc. This seems to be a genre which is coming out of the gate pretty strong and will only continue to get better.

Fighting games - The controls are not there yet. Ultimately, what one would want would be to be able to make a gesture like an uppercut or a Street Fighter-style fireball and have your character do it. Dragonball Z: Budokai Tenkachai 2 and Mortal Combat: Armageddon both make valiant attempts, and while in these games, gesture controls often work and feel fantastic, many times they do not and you can't figure out why. I suspect this will be one of the last genres to be successful on the Wii.

First-person shooters - Not there yet also. Though they are getting pretty close, and my hope is that Metroid Prime 3 will hit a home run. The problem with first person shooters on the Wii up to this point is that developers haven't yet figured out how to make movement feel natural. The shooting part works really well.

Puzzle/Party games - Awesome and getting better all the time. If you want to have friends over to play videogames, this rules.

Sports games - This could be the crowning achievement of the Wii. Madden is supposedly absolutely brilliant. Wii Sports is simple, but elegant and fun. SSX Blur is insanely hard, but really feels great once you get it down. EA is setting themselves up to engineer a sports renaissance on the Wii.

Racing/Driving games - also not there yet. Frankly, control for driving games on Wii right now is pretty lousy. However, there is rampant speculation that the next controller add-on will be some sort of driving controller which will probably rule. Nintendo is going to announce Mario Cart Wii at this year's E3, and it is assumed that the driving controller may be bundled with it. Of course, this is all speculation...

1'st person Adventure/Exploration (Myst) games - Obviously, the system is perfect for this type of control. Expect great things for this 'dead' genre that could see a huge revival. Expect games such as Sam and Max and Grim Fandango to make a resurgence.

Platformers - Super Mario Galaxy looks (and I emphasize LOOKS, since no one has played it yet) like it's going to be the game that pushes platformers into the future the same way Mario 64 did. It looks brilliant.

Real-Time Strategy - Battalion Wars II will tell the tale. Still too early to tell.

Simulation games - this could be the control scheme that actually makes sim games work on a console. Lots of them coming down the pipe (The Sims, Space Station Tycoon, and Spore rumored).

Basically, there's a lot of potential but to be honest, developers are not living up to it yet.

Virtual Console:

Downloading classic NES, Super NES, Nintendo 64, Sega Genesis, and Turbografx games rules. It really really really rules. I cannot emphasize how much it rules. Also rumored is that Nintendo is going to announce an external hard drive for the Wii, which will (fingers crossed) also make available Sega Saturn and Dreamcast games for download.

There is nothing quite like the experience of downloading Punch-Out and fighting King Hippo and Bald Bull again. There are 100 games currently available on VC and more coming every week.