Nintendo Wii Review

"Wow I never knew playing videogames would be this much fun," says Ana Bertand mother of two daughters and owner of pet dog Tano. Fun is exactly what Nintendo had in mind when they created their new video game console the Wii (pronounced wee) which has been released just in time for the holiday rush. It was named Wii to be universally appealing, fun and easy for any dialect across the globe to pronounce. The Wii has revolutionized what people have traditionally thought of videogames - pushing buttons and squeezing triggers. Nintendo has recognized that the gaming audience needs to be expanded and more inclusive and is proactively pursuing that audience. "Many people have sort of drifted away [from games] because it's too complicated", says George Harrison, Sr. Vice-President Nintendo.

Being a gamer myself, there are some games that involve too much of my time to play and in some cases way too many joystick combinations to remember. Don't get me wrong the Nintendo Wii can satisfy a more sophisticated gamer, but more impressive is its new approach to how you interact with its games. This new style of gameplay is breaking down the barriers between gamers and non-gamers. It almost starts to remind you of the days when family and friends would spend hours playing board games like Monopoly and Life? Back then it seems families had a lot more fun playing games and most importantly board and card games were easy enough for everyone to play. Fastforward several years and some would tell you that the videogames of today have eroded the ease-of-play like the board games of the past. Until now!

The new Nintendo Wii is not your typical videogame system; to me it's much more revolutionary. The most interesting feature is the Wii's motion-detecting wireless handset, which in your hand feels and looks like a wireless television remote. You prance around swinging or moving the remote in front of the tv and the on-screen virtual character mimics your real word moves. For example, when you are playing tennis you actually swing your arm to hit the ball, when you play bowling you treat the remote like it's a bowling ball in your hand and you gesture to roll the ball down the lane. This interactive gameplay has families across the globe in search of a store with a Wii in-stock. Not to mention its $250 price tag which is $150.00 less than the next lowest-price game system the Xbox 360.

I remember getting a sneak peek of this device earlier this year in May at the world's largest videogame convention called E3. And at that time I felt that the Wii would change the way we view and play videogames, I even went as far as to say that I think it can potentially bring families a little closer together in the name of fun.

I'm certainly not a genius and don't want to say I have a "crystal ball" for tech predictions but the Wii's popularity has certainly picked up tremendously and as more people begin to play and hear about the Wii they will realize that it is a great family-oriented video game system. As a technology reviewer I have had the opportunity to play the Nintendo Wii, the Playstation 3 and the Xbox 360 at length (disclaimer, I own a Wii and Xbox 360) I enjoy my Xbox but if I had to judge for pure fun - the Wii wins hands down.

To make sure I wasn't sipping too much of the Wii kool-aid, I put the Wii to the test. I invited several friends and family members over to the house for Thanksgiving to see how non-gamers and people of all ages (4-74) would react, it was my little Wii social experiment. My brother Sean, a non-gamer was totally shocked, "the bowling game was a lot of fun, and at times I really felt like I was in a bowling alley, especially with all the high-fiving and celebratory dancing after every strike." Even the spectators enjoyed watching other people play. Marc Dehaney a friend and holiday visitor says "this type of game allows a lot more people to play". Not only were people having fun playing active games we were also using the main Wii interface which contains a variety of channels that connect you to other entertainment and information. One channel we explored was the photo channel. This feature allows you to take your SD (secure-digital memory card, the kind found in many digital cameras) card and slide it into a dedicated slot on the Wii. Then you can have the images from your card on-screen. The Wii offers fun activities to interact with your images. You could create a photo slide show with music or make pictures into jigsaw puzzles that you interactively try to solve by moving pieces around on the screen to put the photo back together or you can take an image and doodle right on the image. This kept people engaged and had everyone laughing and having a great time.

So it wasn't just me, people were actually having fun, socializing around the game. And apparently that theme has continued outside of my little experiment. Nintendo has stated that they have sold over 600,000 units since the Nov. 19th launch date and are on track to shipping 4 million Wii systems globally through the end of this year.

Now before you think this is a totally biased review I do have a few gripes. I wish the system could play DVD's like the other consoles and I would like to upload my own digital music as background for the Wii sports games - especially bowling which is a lot of fun and exciting but the music is pretty dull and doesn't match the fun mood.

As for my Wii home experiment with family and relatives, my problem now is getting people to stay out of my home. Many of the non-gamer relatives were personally inviting themselves to my house for the weekend to play more.

It might be Harrison who explains it best, "because in the end you're not going to always remember what the nature of the game was all you'll remember was that you had fun and that's Wii and if we can bring that back a lot more people will come back to [gaming]."

Pros

Wii Sports a collection of five sports games comes with the system

33 new Wii games will be available before the end of the year

Download some of your favorite arcade classics

The wireless controller has a built-in speaker which adds to the experience

Creating your own Mii characters is a lot of fun

Cons

Does not play DVD movies

Wii Sports characters are not graphically amazing (you don't play Wii sports for graphics)

Mario Armstrong is a technology talk show host, writer, consultant and public speaker that explores how technology impacts the way we work, live and play. He is heard on NPR and XM radio and seen on WMAR-ABC2 TV.