I originally posted this at the gaming forum that I'm a moderator of, but I wanted to copy/paste it here to hear your thoughts.
We're nearly 9 months into the Wii release, and while we've seen some interesting/decently fun things being released or announced (Wii Fit, SSB, et al) I have a much longer list of criticisms about the console than I originally thought I would. Why would I post this as a standalone thread instead of in the official wii thread? Because 1) I don't want this post to get lost in the shuffle. 2) This thread will hopefully generate some decent discussion and debate.
Now lets go over what I think Nintendo has done well:
1. Price point.
Comparatively speaking, the Wii isn't as hardcore of an investment as a 360 or PS3. Hell at 250 dollars it is almost in 'impulse buy' territory. Non-gamers are much more willing to take a chance on a 250 dollar console than a 500 dollar one, for sure. And as we're painfully finding out, the casual gamer is the exact demographic Nintendo is shooting for this generation. Another good byproduct of the price point is that us hardcore gamers don't feel THAT bad when we get home with it and realize that as of now our wants are being ignored.
2. PR.
The media absolutely loves this thing. To them the Wii is the apparent video game equivalent of the second coming of Christ.
3. The Virtual Console.
A lot of you may be miffed that Nintendo isn't releasing all their grade-A titles on the front end. But why would Nintendo want to 'blow their load' at the very beginning of the cycle? Release your good games along with a couple of stragglers every week, so people are more likely to drop a dime on those lesser-known titles.
4. The footprint.
This console isn't very hard to fit in your current setup.
5. Excellent Gamecube backwards compatibility.
In a day and age where hardware emulation is quickly being phased out, Nintendo is standing strong by leaving a Cube chip in with the Wii (although the argument could be made that there was a cube chip in there to begin with)
6. They don't break.
Not surprising since most of Nintendo's consoles have been immune to defects and were proven to be fairly tough-skinned (anyone ever see the youtube video of the gamecube being dragged down the road by a truck that still worked afterwards?) There was an occurence here and there with the Wii, but nothing like what has been seen with the 360 and to a lesser extent the PS3.
7. I find the Opera Browser to be somewhat useful.
Granted it isn't the best browser in the world, but if I want to watch youtube on my TV I generally turn my Wii on. (obviously I do not have a media center PC to speak of)
Now, the bad.
1. Games.
This will get better. At some point it has to. I think I echo everyone's sentiments when I say "ENOUGH WITH THE DAMN MINIGAMES!" Sure, a handful of minigame-based titles is fine. But come on, a whole slew of them? In less than a year? It's almost like Nintendo couldn't find any other way to utilize the Wii remote (a point expounded upon later in this post). Sure we've got Metroid coming out, and SSB hitting before the end of the year, but the pickins' have been slim thus far. We're seeing holdovers from the Gamecube become best-selling titles. Resident Evil 4, a game that has been released on two systems prior, is Gamespot's highest rated game for the Wii at this point (tied with Wario Ware, a damn minigame collection). Does anyone else see anything wrong with that?
The third party support has been pretty abysmal up to this point. Aside from Resident Evil 4, are there any true third party blockbusters on the Wii? I can't think of any.
In short, Nintendo has started out this generation by making the same mistakes as the last - Banking on their first party franchises, not attempting any true original content, and leaving third parties to give us such gems as Ice Age 2.
2. Virtual Console Pricing.
The fact that I can go out and get most of these titles in the original cartridge format for less than what is being charged in the store should be reason enough to consider a price drop. Granted some of their releases are becoming hard to find (the donkey kongs, LttP, etc), but why pay 5 bones for a copy of Mach Rider when you can most likely find a copy helping to stabilize a table leg somewhere? Some titles are worth their prices in the store, but a majority I feel are very overpriced. You might say "Well, you don't have to buy them". Well, you're right. And I'm not. To this date I have 4 VC games total on my machine, one of which I strongly regret (Toejam and Earl). I can anticipate buying a few here and there, but I can say for sure that I would buy them more often if the prices were more reasonable.
3. The Wii Remote.
A novel idea in theory. However, its almost as if Nintendo came up with the idea but didn't bother with thinking of valid ways to utilize it. The games thus far that have used a novel approach have been mediocre. Tiger 07 was almost impossible, CoD3 could have been amazing, but the Wii controls killed it, and lets not talk about Red Steel. How much of it is the inability on the developer's part to utilize the control scheme and how much of it is the limitations of the controller itself I could not tell you. Either way, the majority of the games thus far have suffered due to the controls, not made better by them. This point could be a partial explanation as to why we haven't seen many decent third-party offerings. Maybe they haven't figured the damn thing out either.
4. Wii Connect 24
Nintendo spoke sweet sweet words about delivering content to our machines every day. We were supposed to be able to wake up the next morning with our disc slot flashing blue, inviting us to endulge ourselves in the new content Nintendo so lovingly delivered to us over the previous evening. My slot hasn't blinked in the past 4-5 months, and in fact the only correspondence i've even received from Nintendo was their notifications about certain channels becoming available. What happened to those demos we were going to be able to download from the Wii to our DS'? Hell, even a message every once in a while would be tolerable. Nintendo took a feature that had the potential to be something very novel and great and is doing absolutely nothing with it.
5. No "cheap" games.
The Wii would have been the perfect platform to attempt relatively short "short spurt" games at the 20 dollar price point. In fact I believe that some of the current games should have been released at this price point (Brain Age, Wario Ware, I'm looking at you). A game can be fun and not be very long or require millions of dollars in development. And that game should be cheap.
6. The Forecast Channel is useless, and the News Channel is to a lesser extent
This is a feature I would absolutely love. I could forsee using the forecast channel daily. The downside being that my area updates twice a day. I find it a rare instance where I am interested in the current conditions from 12 hours ago. I also have very little use for news that was reported yesterday, since I have already most likely heard about it.
7. Online play/friend codes
I like to envision this happening at Nintendo.
Exec 1: You know, these gamer kids are all about this newfangled "online play"
Exec 2: Yeah, XBL has certainly provided an excellent infrastructure and interface for gamers to be able to play together.
Exec 1: We need something like that for the Wii, only not as robust, and much more complicated.
Exec 2: I've got an idea! Friend codes!
Exec 1: Yes indeed, that will surely piss off the masses!
So here we are. If we even so much as want to exchange messages we have to exchange friend codes over another medium first. And not only that, you never receive any sort of confirmation that anyone has entered your friend code in. At the very least a confirmation system ala xbl would have been nice, but no. Nintendo had to go fuck up a great idea. I understand the Friend Code system is there in part to protect children from potentially unsavory stuff, but the system is so complicated that you're going to alienate the very people you covet - the nongamer. I can't even imagine what true online play will be like in games. I imagine it will require faxing some sort of identification to a central database.
8. What happens to your VC titles if your console fails?
Everything you've downloaded from xbl is tied to your account. Not so with the Wii. What if your box goes out of warranty and breaks? Will all those VC games you ponied up cash for be refunded? Backing up is pointless, since we know that VC are only licensed for one Console. I've emailed Nintendo about this and have not received a solid reply. That scares me.
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In summary, since I own a 360 I'm nowhere near as upset as I could be. However, if this were my only console I'd be beating my head against the wall in frustration and/or saving for another console.
That's all I can think of at this point in time. I'm sure I'll have more to add as time goes on. But anyhow, do you agree? Disagree?
