At this year's E3, Nintendo introduced not one but two more official peripherals. By the end of the year, the most enthusiastic of Wii owners could possess the following (accompanied by the game that introduced/utilizes it):
The Classic Controller (Virtual console games)
The Wii Balance Board (Wii Fit now, and Shaun White Snowboarding later)
The Wii Motion Plus (Unknown)
The Wii Speak Mic (Animal Crossing: City Folk)
The Wii Wheel (Mario Kart)
The Wii Zapper (Link's Crossbow Training)
Four Wii Remotes
Four Wii Nunchucks
Here is what I have for my Playstation and my Xbox:
3 controllers for each. Regular, standard controllers.
So here's the meat of what I'm talking about. Wii purports to offer a unique experience but to create each experience, they have to introduce a new piece of junk plastic to make it fun. Some of the devices such as the board, the mic, the wheel, and the zapper are each utilized by one or maybe two games currently. I have this silly pile of plastic sitting in my entertainment center full of extra crap I never use and I haven't even purchased half of those.
This isn't so much a revolution as it is a repeat. I had a light gun, a power pad, an arcade stick, and of course there was R.O.B. the robot and the legendary Power Glove for my NES. It was the same thing, a closet full of extra pieces.
The Wiis keep flying off the shelves I'll admit, but the attach rate for games on the Wii is pretty poor. People buy the Wii - which comes with Wii sports - and a Wii Play to get that extra remote and call it good. As Nintendo goes for the mainstream, they try to make things the mainstream likes - sports for everybody, music games, and alternative functionality like exercise. When each alternative function requires a separate device it stops being appealing. It's not just a cute little white box. It's a cute little white box, a board, a pile of controllers, little doodads around the television... it goes on. The limited use of each of the devices becomes apparent very quickly and none of them hold interest for very long.
Broadening that statement, I have to wonder how long people will maintain interest in all the varied accessories that come with owning a Wii and owning more than Wii sports. More and more I hear friends muttering about regretting buying the Wii, and it only grows louder as long as Nintendo continues to release toys instead of games.
The Classic Controller (Virtual console games)
The Wii Balance Board (Wii Fit now, and Shaun White Snowboarding later)
The Wii Motion Plus (Unknown)
The Wii Speak Mic (Animal Crossing: City Folk)
The Wii Wheel (Mario Kart)
The Wii Zapper (Link's Crossbow Training)
Four Wii Remotes
Four Wii Nunchucks
Here is what I have for my Playstation and my Xbox:
3 controllers for each. Regular, standard controllers.
So here's the meat of what I'm talking about. Wii purports to offer a unique experience but to create each experience, they have to introduce a new piece of junk plastic to make it fun. Some of the devices such as the board, the mic, the wheel, and the zapper are each utilized by one or maybe two games currently. I have this silly pile of plastic sitting in my entertainment center full of extra crap I never use and I haven't even purchased half of those.
This isn't so much a revolution as it is a repeat. I had a light gun, a power pad, an arcade stick, and of course there was R.O.B. the robot and the legendary Power Glove for my NES. It was the same thing, a closet full of extra pieces.
The Wiis keep flying off the shelves I'll admit, but the attach rate for games on the Wii is pretty poor. People buy the Wii - which comes with Wii sports - and a Wii Play to get that extra remote and call it good. As Nintendo goes for the mainstream, they try to make things the mainstream likes - sports for everybody, music games, and alternative functionality like exercise. When each alternative function requires a separate device it stops being appealing. It's not just a cute little white box. It's a cute little white box, a board, a pile of controllers, little doodads around the television... it goes on. The limited use of each of the devices becomes apparent very quickly and none of them hold interest for very long.
Broadening that statement, I have to wonder how long people will maintain interest in all the varied accessories that come with owning a Wii and owning more than Wii sports. More and more I hear friends muttering about regretting buying the Wii, and it only grows louder as long as Nintendo continues to release toys instead of games.
You make an excellent point about "toys vs. games"; I think that underscores the difference between what Nintendo is trying to do and what, well, every other console maker is doing. When I buy a console, the whole point of the console (in my eyes, anyway) is that I don't have to buy all this other stuff to go with it just to play a game; the console's meant to be an entity unto itself for that sake. If people had to buy accoutrements to play certain stuff for the DS, you can bet it wouldn't have sold like it did.