January 21, 2007
No... Wii-ly?
After the usual routines of Mass, breakfast, chores, Michelle and I decided to get out of the house with the kids this afternoon. Claire needed to look into getting a birthday present for a party coming up next month anyway. We head to The Mall of New Hampshire (as if there's only one...) in Manchester and started looking around.
When we got to the EB Games store, there was a sign mentioning that they had Nintendo Wii's. I thought, "surely this must be a bait and switch". You can't order them on Amazon. I had just checked yesterday. Perhaps they mean that they have Wii games or Wii accessories. When I went in they said that yes, they had a few left. They didn't have many extra controllers but their sister store, GameStop (also in the mall) did. Well, with tomorrow being the twins' birthday and Timothy's coming up in two weeks, we said sure and splurged.
I spent a little time reviewing the manual when we got home. Shortly after dinner I had everything hooked up and started playing. Soon I was showing Michelle and the kids. The kids played until around 8:30 and Michelle and I continued for another hour.
Yes, it is fun. The included game, Wii Sports, does not have eye popping graphics that are the envy of XBox360 or PS3 owners, but the enjoyment of playing games that don't merely require you to press buttons is hard to understate. Nonetheless, I was happy to see the little ATI logo in the corner.
The girls and I are looking forward to the upcoming release of Mario Party 8, which is a Wii-only release scheduled for March. I haven't configured the three other sets of controllers yet. I think the interaction between the kids will definitely go up when I do. We may just yet make it through the cabin fever of this year's winter. (fingers crossed...)
My kids are going to think your kids are so lucky!
Right now, Andy & Will are playing Mario Party 7 on Gamecube- no school today.
Cass is thrilled about the Bears victory- that might top a Wii for her, but I am not so sure!
For the moment the boys are so used to the whole 'move with the cross hairs and press A or B buttons' mindset that the novelty of standing up, moving the controller around, etc. is a little weird to them. The girls like it though. I got a decent sweat up yesterday when I tried the boxing.
My boys have recently started to get into the MarioParty series on the GameCube. Saturday I played a little MP7 with them when Timothy gave up in the middle of a game. One thing about the MarioParty series is that it's difficult for one person to stop in the middle of a game. The series needs a "player forfeits" option for when kids give up, need a nap, or just need to go home to dinner. Instead the game sits there waiting for them to play their turn. Very frustrating to the other players...
I forgot to mention, the incident of EB Games having Wii's was pure luck. Within half an hour of buying ours, they were all sold out. It was just a case of accidentally being at the right place at the right time. We just jumped on the chance while it was there.
Posted by: Scott at January 22, 2007 11:34 AMWhat kind of American are you? You should have bought out the store and sold them on eBay!
I'll admit, Wii is the first video game-related thing that has interested this post-midlife-crisiser since my days of pumping quarters into the Centipede arcade machine.
Posted by: Dave Brooks at February 6, 2007 02:52 PMHi Dave,
I could end up in the same situation as some PS3 early buyers. They *thought* they could turn them over on eBay for a tidy profit. Instead they are collecting dust as there is no problem buying them at the stores.
We were at the Pheasant Lane Mall this weekend and saw boxes of Nintendo Wii's available there as well. (don't recall whether it was GameStop or EB Games or ...) But I think that the backlog problem is easing.
Currently our Wii is in NY on its way towards repair. Once it comes back, you are welcome to visit and try it out. I don't recall where in Mont Vernon you are, but you can't be *that* far from our house.
Posted by: Scott at February 6, 2007 03:58 PM