Hardcore Casual reviewed the Wii soccer game Mario Strikers Charged recently and liked it well enough to call it “a worthwhile purchase.”
I don’t have a Wii, though if I were to buy a new console in the vaguely near future, Wii might be the one. Pretty sure this particular game wouldn’t be on my to-buy list, but, as Hardcore Casual says,
As with many other Wii games, you can’t exactly point to one factor of why it’s entertaining, but it is, and you keep coming back for more.
I came across a post on the super-named Global Nerdy earlier today that caught my eye: “Feeling Ignored by Sony and Microsoft? Nintendo Loves You!”. Joey deVilla writes about the strategy that Nintendo is using, not competing with Sony and Microsoft directly, but rather going after gamer markets that have long been ill-served. Yes, gamers are not all young men with more hardware than grooming habits.
Both the XBox 360 and the upcoming PlayStation 3 are aimed at the serious gamer — typically male, single and having plenty of time to spend an increasing number of hours “grinding” on games whose virtual worlds are expanding. […] Just Cause makes you a sort of Che Guevara character and offers 21 missions and 12,000 square kilometers of banana republic to explore, and still the reviews say the gameplay is “too short”. The game vendors’ message is clear: If you’re not hardcore, we’ve got nuthin’ for you.
Nintendo, on the other hand, is taking care of the other 95% of humanity by focusing on addictive but “casual” gaming experiences.
Rather than emphasizing features like new graphics engines and processor cores, Nintendo are focusing on simplified controls, games that appeal to women and casual gamers and non-game functions such as weather and other information channels.
And baseball sims, hopefully. ;) Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against the ginormous games — God knows I’ve spent a goodly portion of my life in various virtual settings like GTA: San Andreas.
But…
Given the price difference with Sony, and the evilness difference with Microsoft, I can’t imagine myself not going with Nintendo.
I wonder how other folks will look at it.
Extensive article published today in ArsTechnica Articles/Culture, by Jeremy Reimer: “How the Wii was born”
The Nintendo Wii represents a bold new direction for the company, one that came as somewhat of a surprise. The integration of a motion-sensitive controller combined with the decision to go with a more modest technological improvement in processing power and graphics were both risky decisions, and the jury is still out on how successful these gambles will play out. Recently, Ars received a translation of an interview from a Japanese magazine with some key executives and engineers at Nintendo. The topic of discussion was the reasoning behind the company’s design decisions with the Wii, and what benefits they expected to receive from these decisions that would give them an advantage over their competitors….
Looks like lots of great details — I’m looking forward to reading it later in full.
And this, dear friends, is another reason why my next gaming console purchase will be a Nintendo:
Sword Controls For Zelda - Swing the Wiimote to control Link’s sword.
Nintendo has made some major changes to the control scheme for the Wii version of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Speaking to Japan’s monthly Nintendo Dream publication, producer Shigeru Miyamoto revealed that the game will now allow players to swing the controller for sword slashes.
At E3, players used the B button to swing Link’s sword, with Nintendo explaining at the time that players would likely get tired having to actually swing the controller. “Upon actually playing it, it’s more interesting this way,” said Miyamoto to Nintendo Dream about the new control scheme.
