I just wanted to relay my own personal story with the Wii this holiday season.
I didn't want to get the Wii, I played my friends unit on multiple occasions, trying Wii Sports and Zelda, and I didn't think it was worth it. I wanted to play Zelda, but with enough games to keep me occupied for the immediate future (Gears of War, FFXII) I didn't see a need to rush out and get a Wii.
My wife on the other hand, did. And so I had to try and get a Wii. On one hand, I was sort of happy about it. I did want to play Zelda and Wii sports was somewhat fun, just not fun enough to make ME personally go out and say "WOW I NEED THIS".
I tried my damnedest to nail one. Last Sunday was the straw that broke the camels back. My friend (who works at Gamestop) told me about the store holding Wii's to sell till Sunday. Get there early, no one knows, and get a Wii.
Every Gamestop, EB, and Circuit City within about 20 miles had people lined up. I hit every non-mall EB and Gamestop that I could early sunday morning, almost all of them had people lined up outside to get the Wii (most of whom slept there overnight to get their spot in line). At least the stores were nice enough to put up signs that said "We only have Six Systems, don't bother camping if you're #7 in line".
Broken and disheartened (and seriously pissed off that we couldn't find a system that should be easy as hell to manufacture, unlike a PS3) we continued throughout the day hanging out with our friends like any other Sunday. A friend brought his copy of Zelda for GC. I played some of it and I can say this with 100% honesty: I liked the controls better on the GameCube version. And I've played the Wii Zelda more times than I have the GC version.
After some discussion my wife and I decided that we're getting the GC version of Zelda because of the controls.
That left a really big question of why we'd be getting the Wii. Wii Sports was the only other thing remotely interesting to us, and we both didn't think it was worth the $250 + $60 for more controllers.
So now I'm not buying a Wii till they put something out on it that I think makes the system worth owning (possibly Mario or Smash Bros, but I'm trying before I buy). Problem is with the release list being the way it is, it doesn't look like I'll be getting one any time soon.
On the plus side, I managed to snag a copy of GC Zelda:TP yesterday in an incredible find as every normal store you'd go to for the game has been sold out. Seems like another hearty middle finger from Nintendo. When stuff like Halo 2 or Madden comes out it's not impossible to find copies of the game. Big Sellers like that generally get a lot of games produced. But what do I see in stores? No Wii's, but plenty of Wii Zelda's and no GC Zeldas. In fact from every friend and employee I've talked to from Gamestop and EB tells me that they didn't even get enough GC Zeldas to fill their pre-orders.
I'm not one to attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by stupidity, but I'll be damned if it doesn't look like Nintendo purposefully made the GC Zelda a little scarce around XMas in order to help ensure that the Wii gets sold.
So in the end, screw the Wii. I'll be having a Merry XMas with my 360 and a GC copy of Twilight Princess. The saddest part in my opinion was that if I could have found a Wii between Launch and Last Sunday, I'd have bought one. As it is now, I'm not going to be getting one for a good long time.
And that's assuming that Nintendo manages to make Mario and Smash Brothers worth playing with the Wii controller, which IMO they didn't do with Zelda.
I didn't want to get the Wii, I played my friends unit on multiple occasions, trying Wii Sports and Zelda, and I didn't think it was worth it. I wanted to play Zelda, but with enough games to keep me occupied for the immediate future (Gears of War, FFXII) I didn't see a need to rush out and get a Wii.
My wife on the other hand, did. And so I had to try and get a Wii. On one hand, I was sort of happy about it. I did want to play Zelda and Wii sports was somewhat fun, just not fun enough to make ME personally go out and say "WOW I NEED THIS".
I tried my damnedest to nail one. Last Sunday was the straw that broke the camels back. My friend (who works at Gamestop) told me about the store holding Wii's to sell till Sunday. Get there early, no one knows, and get a Wii.
Every Gamestop, EB, and Circuit City within about 20 miles had people lined up. I hit every non-mall EB and Gamestop that I could early sunday morning, almost all of them had people lined up outside to get the Wii (most of whom slept there overnight to get their spot in line). At least the stores were nice enough to put up signs that said "We only have Six Systems, don't bother camping if you're #7 in line".
Broken and disheartened (and seriously pissed off that we couldn't find a system that should be easy as hell to manufacture, unlike a PS3) we continued throughout the day hanging out with our friends like any other Sunday. A friend brought his copy of Zelda for GC. I played some of it and I can say this with 100% honesty: I liked the controls better on the GameCube version. And I've played the Wii Zelda more times than I have the GC version.
After some discussion my wife and I decided that we're getting the GC version of Zelda because of the controls.
That left a really big question of why we'd be getting the Wii. Wii Sports was the only other thing remotely interesting to us, and we both didn't think it was worth the $250 + $60 for more controllers.
So now I'm not buying a Wii till they put something out on it that I think makes the system worth owning (possibly Mario or Smash Bros, but I'm trying before I buy). Problem is with the release list being the way it is, it doesn't look like I'll be getting one any time soon.
On the plus side, I managed to snag a copy of GC Zelda:TP yesterday in an incredible find as every normal store you'd go to for the game has been sold out. Seems like another hearty middle finger from Nintendo. When stuff like Halo 2 or Madden comes out it's not impossible to find copies of the game. Big Sellers like that generally get a lot of games produced. But what do I see in stores? No Wii's, but plenty of Wii Zelda's and no GC Zeldas. In fact from every friend and employee I've talked to from Gamestop and EB tells me that they didn't even get enough GC Zeldas to fill their pre-orders.
I'm not one to attribute to malice what can adequately be explained by stupidity, but I'll be damned if it doesn't look like Nintendo purposefully made the GC Zelda a little scarce around XMas in order to help ensure that the Wii gets sold.
So in the end, screw the Wii. I'll be having a Merry XMas with my 360 and a GC copy of Twilight Princess. The saddest part in my opinion was that if I could have found a Wii between Launch and Last Sunday, I'd have bought one. As it is now, I'm not going to be getting one for a good long time.
And that's assuming that Nintendo manages to make Mario and Smash Brothers worth playing with the Wii controller, which IMO they didn't do with Zelda.
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