2 years with Nintendo Wii
People who have friends buy Nintendo Wii,
who have friends on the Internet - XBox 360,
and the rest choose PlayStation 3.
(from the Internet)
Back in 2008, I became the proud owner of the Nintendo Wii game console. I already didn’t play at that time (on the computer), all the more not an option with a gamepad in front of the TV - the worries were not the same, but sometimes it became interesting to wave the remote control. I bought a prefix, several games, an additional remote with a nunchaku and several accessories. At times he played into binge, at times on the contrary - the prefix was gathering dust; She toured several times - they played in the company of friends, contacted the service a couple of times, bought and received games and accessories as a gift, and recently finally went online. In short, after much deliberation, I decided that I had something to tell about the real situation.
You can skip the next paragraph if you know what the Nintendo Wii is.
The main feature of Wii against competitors is yesterday’s hardware with tomorrow’s player interaction interface. Both the XBox 360 and the PlayStation 3 are simply modern game consoles in their classic sense. Software, sharpened for the configuration of iron, good performance, a delicious picture on the screen and a gamepad in the hands - this is the formula for happiness. In Nintendo, they decided that it is possible to take iron easier, and instead of giving a gamepad to hand the player a magic wand in their hands, and this is exactly what will be happiness. The Wii remote (Wiimote) can navigate in space and send signals about it to the console, as a result the game process is as close as possible to reality and allows the player to act on a hunch.
It should be noted that the idea is really great. Nintendo is a cut above competitors in terms of immersion in what is happening, and the level of involvement is sometimes just off scale. I will never forget the episode of one of the games: the main character rang the mobile phone, my remote control vibrated and squealed, the instructions on where to press something lit up on the TV, I pressed the button and automatically brought the remote control to my ear, which the hero of the game repeated after me. At this time, the voice of the boss of the protagonist came from the remote control ... you know, for a moment I naturally moved to the TV, because it was I who received the incoming call, not the character on the screen, and the boss gave instructions to my ear. And this happens all the time: tennis - wave a racket, boxing - with your fists, fencing - a sword bare and forward. I will say even more, often you have to play while standing and moving around the room, and not lazily sitting on the couch.
The prospects of the technology can be estimated at least by the reaction of competitors. Sony is preparing to release the Playstation Move, Microsoft promises Newton for the XBox 360. But Nintendo already has everything, including a bunch of games, it remains only to increase power to catch up with competitors quantitatively.
And I said about power for a reason, since the Wii picture is still depressing. I once killed time in Mediamarkt, examining the NFS Shift on the XBox 360. Even close to nothing to complain about, there’s a natural movie on the screen. On Nintendo, at best, you can see laconic cartoon graphics, de facto not claiming anything.
God forbid the graphics begin to claim - everything, put out the light. Square fire, sticking out a ladder of texture and miserable special effects will constantly cut the eye. In the heat of competition or battle, this is not so important, because you wave your sword, control your wheel and shoot your pistol, and do not press the colored buttons, but the picture of five years ago is still not impressive once. One lack of antialiasing is worth it.
That is why most of the games from Nintendo itself are very simple graphically. They are the most cool use the remote control, immersing the user deeper into what is happening. Strong players in the video game market are also not far behind (EA, Capcom) - everything is great in terms of interfaces and interactions. But in general, it turns out that there are catastrophically few games. Go to any theme store: if there is a pavilion of games for PS3, then for Wii there is only a stand in the corner. There are even fewer good games among this, and hits can be counted on the fingers.
All kinds of sports compilations are the most good, which can be played in extra-narrow range, and the gameplay of which is strongly tied to the remote control: bowling, darts, golf, boxing, etc., as a rule, they are a collection where everyone will find a game to their liking. Next come hits like NFS or Resident Evil - the games are well-known, well-developed, finished. They are converted for movement with the remote control, but rather benefit in the general level. There are still very decent non-sports games from Nintendo itself: usually either about Mario associates - Super Mario Galaxy, Super Mario Kart, etc., or old series like Legend of Zelda or Metroid. The rest of the games I would call weak: they seem to be tied to the capabilities of the console, but redundantly or stupidly; or it’s kind of plot, but the plots are too flat and straightforward.
Let's go back to the picture and the graph. In the kit there is only a composite cable (ordinary tulip), through which it makes sense to play except on small old TVs. On any decent monitor or something with HD nameplates, it’s better not to connect the composite cable at all, it's horrible . An HDMI interface for the console is not provided, so any buyer needs to go broke on a component cable (RGB) right away, a branded one costs 2,000 rubles, a branded one costs 500 rubles. Not only will it significantly change the picture by itself, it will also make 480p or 576i possible , which is the technological ceiling of the console. Actually, comments are redundant here.
Russification spoils everything at all. The console itself with all its interfaces does not know the Russian language in principle. As far as games are concerned, the maximum that I saw is a Russian-language cover and a Russian-language booklet inside with instructions on which buttons to press, the games themselves are completely English-language with options for switching to German, French and other European languages. For tennis, this may not be important, and it will be difficult to pass a semantic quest. And if some even rejoice at the original voice acting or the ability to pump up English, then most simply will not be able to penetrate, and therefore they will not be able to play.
In our country, the English language is familiar (in one form or another) to about 7 million people ( from the census for 2002)) Is a few percent. Although this number has increased in recent years, let’s even add knowledgeable French or German, it still runs 10% on the most optimistic estimates. What does it mean? This means that only one out of ten of our compatriots can understand the console or the game. Thus, the family (and it is positioned this way) prefix in Russia is very, very conditional.
However, in the settings it is possible to specify the country - Russia. Guess what it gives? Do not guess, this will rob you of the WiiConnect24 online service under the pretext of the lack of web services in the specified region. Want web services? Have to pretend to be a resident of the United Kingdom or, for example, New Zealand. The weather channel will offer to select a city within the specified country. But there is nothing to be upset because ...
The WiiShop web service is generally miserable. Firstly, there is little content, absolutely everything can be viewed in 15-20 minutes. Secondly, everything is expensive, for an old Super Mario they want about 500 rubles. The price range for games: from 600 to 1000 points, to count in rubles roughly divide in half (prices for a resident of the UK). There are no free games or demos at all, and all descriptions are so monosyllabic that there is practically no desire to buy an unfamiliar game. In terms of software, everything is even worse, there is only a free browser based on the Opera and a few used software softinks . Residents of foggy Albion have the opportunity to download the BBC iPlayer , but the player will not show us anything, referring to the geography of our stay. Perhaps a local proxy would solve this problem, but I have not found one yet.
In short, the Internet makes it possible to update firmware and play games that can do this over the network. And even the browser is stupid, and besides poking, checking out is good for nothing, even not playing flash.
Now about the officers that are represented by the company "New Disc". This winter, I found that the Wii Sports CD that came with the console was scratched. It is not for sale in stores, but the games on it are top-notch. He wrote off with support mail, they said that they would change it for me for inexpensive. In fact, they changed it for free and in just 5 minutes, which is nice and right. Most recently (during thunderstorms in Moscow) I discovered a prefix lifeless, I thought that the power supply had burned down. I wrote a letter to those. support, after 2 minutes (!) I received the answer: “Let the unit rest for 10 minutes and plug it back into the network.” To the letter “Thank you, it helped”, after 4 minutes (!) They explained that the protective mechanism is so arranged, which is not written anywhere in the manual.
Thus, there are absolutely no complaints about the service. True, there were no serious problems either.
But the same “New Disk” dictates all prices, and the prices of games and the entire periphery have only one plus - they are the same everywhere, and you can not look for and do not wait for what will be cheaper. A console costs 2 thousand, a LAN adapter costs 2 thousand (buy a Wi-Fi router), games also generally cost one and a half to two thousand and almost do not get cheaper. Everything is very expensive! There is a variant of chipovka prefixes, but I do not see much sense for myself. Those five good games that are good, I already buy, and the remaining 25 stupid I do not need for nothing.
If someone was too lazy to read from the beginning, then start here :-)
Results.
Nintendo Wii is a very successful prefix, which is qualitatively ahead of competitors by a generation or two, but quantitatively lagging behind competitors in much more mundane things than gameplay: picture, output interfaces, assortment of games, development of web services, software. Oil is adding fuel to the Russian market: the complete lack of Russification and web services, an awful pricing policy. For comparison: in the USA the prefix costs 200 dollars, in the UK 150 pounds, and in Russia about 12 thousand rubles.
So do I regret buying and spending money? Perhaps not. But I can’t recommend Wii to friends, except for the unique gameplay, the console has nothing in our realities in the
And, returning to the epigraph, I can safely say that with friends there is still something to play and how to spend time. But when they leave, ... it will be more pleasant to play XBox 360 or PS3, especially since soon they will also get the necessary accessories for playing in the Wii style.
PS Perhaps the post will seem depressing to you, but in fact I like the prefix. You can play the NSF or GTA on the computer by purchasing a gamepad / steering wheel. And would you see a team game of bowling, or how a person looks, turning a steering wheel in the air. And then just surprise on the faces of people who see all this for the first time. It’s worth it, I assure you!
PPS It would be extremely interesting to know the impressions of the owners of competitive consoles on these issues.