2 years since launch, and the Wii shortages finally come to an end

[Velorath]

For now anyway.

NPD numbers for the month of October should be up in a couple days, and with a recent increase in production, sales numbers for the Wii are expected to be pretty high.  November's numbers should be astronomical.

For the first time since launch, you can go to Amazon.com and easily order a Wii.  Gamestop has a couple inexpensive bundles (one with Smash Bros., and one with Wii Play) for pre-order which will ship out to customers at the end of the week.  Walmart and Target both have bundles available online, and there are reports of Wii's being readily available in a lot of Brick & Mortar stores as well.  About a month from now we'll be seeing the sales data on how well an non-supply constrained Wii can sell during the holiday season in NA.

[Strazos]

Yeah we have 20 of them at my GS....I'm amazed when I go in and still see them sitting around.

Alas, people are stupid and will wait until the "official" start of the holiday season, and be too late to pick them up. And then they will cry like children.

[Fabricated]

I don't get how the system keeps selling since it hasn't had a game worth a shit for several months.

[mutantmagnet]

Haven't you heard? Carnival games is a killer app in North America while Sonic and Mario at the Olympics dominates Asia.

Jokes aside the way these games sell just shows how much the market is expanding. Even if the Wii hasn't catered to your tastes doesn't mean it doesn't have good games for someone else.

Frankly the only thing that irks me about the Wii right now is that there isn't a good multiplayer FPS game on it.  Treyarch dropped the ball on CoD5 by not delivering on the multiplayer options I want. Sheesh how can you leave out something as basic as capture the flag?

Conduit isn't rubbing me the right way but I'll keep an eye on it because there's nothing else to look forward to aside from possibly Red Steel 2.

[Yegolev]

Haven't you heard?

OOMA OOMAA-MAO OOMA OOMAA-MAO

[Hawkbit]

Yeah, I noticed a slew of them sitting at Target two weeks ago... and they've been in stock since. 

I don't think I've even turned mine on in six months.  Hoping Animal Crossing is fun enough to play with my almost four year old daughter for a little bit.  Otherwise, I'd sell the fucking thing. 

[BitWarrior]

My wife and I went on an absolute blitz buying games for it initially, with Super Mario Galaxy, Zelda: Twilight Princess, Mario Party 8, SSBB, Metroid, Okami, and Mario Kart Wii, but the library has definitely dried up. We were at an EB Games last weekend and noticed the stark difference in the PS3/XBox and Wii walls - the Wii wall was chalk full of the kid stuff. Between Hello Kitty, some Rescue Fighter things and other games of true child appeal, the Wii is quickly identifying itself as being a child's thing (go go Nintendo).

Does it really come down that the only people who know to design good games for Nintendo is...Nintendo? Is the rest doomed to be 7 and Up titles? I sure hope not...but the wind is definitely blowing in that direction...

[Tebonas]

I never understood the US Wii shortage anyway. Apart from the first few days after launch, they were always on stock over here.

[schild]

I never understood the US Wii shortage anyway. Apart from the first few days after launch, they were always on stock over here.

Europe has historically been the land of Sony since the PS1. It was in Nintendo's best interest to be absolutely fucking sure Europe always had stock, lo and behold, that strategy worked out for them.

I have no fucking clue at this point who doesn't have a Wii and who actually wants one now, which is probably why there's enough stock everywhere. They'll probably sell 2M at Christmas though. Who are these people? I don't know.

[FatuousTwat]

My wife and I went on an absolute blitz buying games for it initially, with Super Mario Galaxy, Zelda: Twilight Princess, Mario Party 8, SSBB, Metroid, Okami, and Mario Kart Wii, but the library has definitely dried up. We were at an EB Games last weekend and noticed the stark difference in the PS3/XBox and Wii walls - the Wii wall was chalk full of the kid stuff. Between Hello Kitty, some Rescue Fighter things and other games of true child appeal, the Wii is quickly identifying itself as being a child's thing (go go Nintendo).

Does it really come down that the only people who know to design good games for Nintendo is...Nintendo? Is the rest doomed to be 7 and Up titles? I sure hope not...but the wind is definitely blowing in that direction...

I haven't bought anything since Wii Fit, and I don't think I've played anything on it since about a week after I bought that.

Shouldn't have bothered with it, I thought it was a gimmick from the minute I saw it.

[Phire]

Considering the 360 is now cheaper than the Wii I have no clue why people buy that useless paper weight.

A little piece of me dies every time a Wii is sold instead of a 360...

[BitWarrior]

Considering the 360 is now cheaper than the Wii I have no clue why people buy that useless paper weight.

A little piece of me dies every time a Wii is sold instead of a 360...

Pretty obvious fanboi-ism right here, but being that Mr. XBox Lover here mentioned price, I decided to look it up. The only cheaper version of the XBox 360 is the one without a hard drive, and correct me if I'm wrong, but are not a few gaming companies expressing that XBox sans a hard drive is not going to work well for their games, plus that new XBox version of Mii thing will require a one? Additionally does not all those downloadable features (demos, media, movies, DLC content and updates for games) require a HD as well? It seems like the "arcade version" of the XBox (apparently what they're calling it) is really a very striped down and feature limited version of the platform. Amirite?

[Yegolev]

People who buy the 360 Arcade are too dumb to buy a Wii.

[shiznitz]

I never understood the US Wii shortage anyway. Apart from the first few days after launch, they were always on stock over here.

Europe has historically been the land of Sony since the PS1. It was in Nintendo's best interest to be absolutely fucking sure Europe always had stock, lo and behold, that strategy worked out for them.

I have no fucking clue at this point who doesn't have a Wii and who actually wants one now, which is probably why there's enough stock everywhere. They'll probably sell 2M at Christmas though. Who are these people? I don't know.

As far as my personal Wii anecdotes, all the incremental (adult) buyers I know are getting it for the Wii Fit and not for their kids.

[Merusk]

We still regularly play and love it.  You all are just jaded fun haters too sad to realize you're not the target market anymore. 

[Yegolev]

My anecdote was eaten by the Internet.  Let's try again.

My wife's mother wanted a Wii and now has one.  I don't know why she wanted one, maybe for Wii Fit but right now she just plays bowling with the boy.  I suspect it's due to her conformity gland, which is hyperactive.  She even complained about how complicated it was, and that was before she did anything other than point at the screen.  This is also the woman that doesn't understand "right-click for a context menu" or "don't save over the template".  Baffling.

I don't hate my Wii, I just hate the complaints and ridicule I get whenever I play anything on it.  I'm even ashamed to mention one of the games I like here, and I already mentioned I'm in the Hello Kitty Online beta.

[schild]

I don't hate my Wii, I just hate the complaints and ridicule I get whenever I play anything on it.  I'm even ashamed to mention one of the games I like here, and I already mentioned I'm in the Hello Kitty Online beta.

You get nothing but praise for being in the Hello Kitty Online Beta. I'm in it also, just haven't gotten around to it.

[BitWarrior]

You get nothing but praise for being in the Hello Kitty Online Beta. I'm in it also, just haven't gotten around to it.

Defend yourself. Why the hell would you be interested in playing Hello Kitty Online? Correct me if I'm wrong, but the target audience are...girls aged 7+ and Japanese school girls? After reading a bit about the Hello Kitty product line, it appears to be a modern reinvention of the Barbie doll marketplace (selling dolls, stickers, accessories, and school supplies).

That is, unless I'm totally unaware of some obvious joke going on, in which case I need to update Firefox's sarcasm detection addon.

[Phire]

Considering the 360 is now cheaper than the Wii I have no clue why people buy that useless paper weight.

A little piece of me dies every time a Wii is sold instead of a 360...

Pretty obvious fanboi-ism right here, but being that Mr. XBox Lover here mentioned price, I decided to look it up. The only cheaper version of the XBox 360 is the one without a hard drive, and correct me if I'm wrong, but are not a few gaming companies expressing that XBox sans a hard drive is not going to work well for their games, plus that new XBox version of Mii thing will require a one? Additionally does not all those downloadable features (demos, media, movies, DLC content and updates for games) require a HD as well? It seems like the "arcade version" of the XBox (apparently what they're calling it) is really a very striped down and feature limited version of the platform. Amirite?

A Pro console in Canada with 20Gb Hard drive can be found for $199.

Even without the ability to download demos it is still a steal for the average consumer who would not use the online portion of the system. And as for the new update, it is really small and does not require a hard drive. I don't think Microsoft would be selling Arcade units if you were not able to upgrade the firmware on it.

[schild]

You get nothing but praise for being in the Hello Kitty Online Beta. I'm in it also, just haven't gotten around to it.

Defend yourself. Why the hell would you be interested in playing Hello Kitty Online? Correct me if I'm wrong, but the target audience are...girls aged 7+ and Japanese school girls? After reading a bit about the Hello Kitty product line, it appears to be a modern reinvention of the Barbie doll marketplace (selling dolls, stickers, accessories, and school supplies).

That is, unless I'm totally unaware of some obvious joke going on, in which case I need to update Firefox's sarcasm detection addon.

Because I play everything in an effort to learn. Do you know how to design a game for a 7 year old girl? Because I don't. In nearly every game, there's a good idea or two worth looking at. _Every_Game_. Or at least, I'd like to think so.

[BitWarrior]

Because I play everything in an effort to learn. Do you know how to design a game for a 7 year old girl? Because I don't. In nearly every game, there's a good idea or two worth looking at. _Every_Game_. Or at least, I'd like to think so.

Well, fair enough. I'm glad I asked. I assume you take your findings and apply it to a career in game design and development?

[schild]

Because I play everything in an effort to learn. Do you know how to design a game for a 7 year old girl? Because I don't. In nearly every game, there's a good idea or two worth looking at. _Every_Game_. Or at least, I'd like to think so.

Well, fair enough. I'm glad I asked. I assume you take your findings and apply it to a career in game design and development?

Actually I store it in the vault so I can lord it over people when they say something stupid.

Really though, it's more the expansion of learning. You should try Wizard 101.

[Yegolev]

HKO is doing some interesting things to the Diku model.  It is, however, very asian.  It would probably work pretty well on the Wii, too.

[MisterNoisy]

Considering the 360 is now cheaper than the Wii I have no clue why people buy that useless paper weight.

A little piece of me dies every time a Wii is sold instead of a 360...

Pretty obvious fanboi-ism right here, but being that Mr. XBox Lover here mentioned price, I decided to look it up. The only cheaper version of the XBox 360 is the one without a hard drive, and correct me if I'm wrong, but are not a few gaming companies expressing that XBox sans a hard drive is not going to work well for their games, plus that new XBox version of Mii thing will require a one? Additionally does not all those downloadable features (demos, media, movies, DLC content and updates for games) require a HD as well? It seems like the "arcade version" of the XBox (apparently what they're calling it) is really a very striped down and feature limited version of the platform. Amirite?

http://www.xboxstorageupgrade.com/hh/web/home/hhauthentication.jsp

Core 360 owners can purchase a 20GB HDD for $20.  Arcade users pay $30, but also get a 3-month XBL Gold subscription.  Alternately, they'll ship you a 512MB memory card for free.  They do seem to do some checks to verify that you haven't used a HDD on the console first, but it's worth a shot regardless.

[Tebonas]

This discussion again?

The Wii is not a Gamers console. The Wii is a console for normal people, for people who hate Gamers and their consoles even.

My father, who is in my hair since I'm 8 about how I waste computers by playing with them plays Wii Bowling on my sisters Wii on Sundays. He would force feed me my Xbox360 if I dared suggest he should try it. And ridicule me for wasting yet more of my money while I choke on it. My mother who played exactly two games in her life bowls and golfs with the whole family on Sundays. Our family has exactly three Wii games, all played for the group experience.

This is not our console. Get the fuck over it.

[schild]

This is not our console. Get the fuck over it.

When companies stop pretending it is, I'll "get the fuck over it."

Wake me up when Capcom stops wasting money on Dead Rising for it and Suda stops making No More Heroes for it, and etc. etc. etc.

[Tebonas]

Companies pretend whatever they think makes them money. But the console isn't marketed that way. Of course the Wii market is a big pie and selling some games to a small subsection still makes money. Its not its selling point, though. It is sold as the family experience, pretending otherwise is dishonest.

[Velorath]

This is not our console. Get the fuck over it.

When companies stop pretending it is, I'll "get the fuck over it."

Wake me up when Capcom stops wasting money on Dead Rising for it and Suda stops making No More Heroes for it, and etc. etc. etc.

Not to mention Tatsunoko vs. Capcom, and MadWorld.

[mutantmagnet]

This discussion again?

The Wii is not a Gamers console. The Wii is a console for normal people, for people who hate Gamers and their consoles even.

Keep telling yourself that. The Wii is not exclusively an old school gamer's console. As a result I have to deal with development time invested on things that you don't commonly find on the 360. Frankly I prefer living in a world where everyone gets an option in how they want to consume.

It also helps that some of those different games turn out to be something I'm interested in buying because they are different or look back on old games that fell to the wayside.


What boggles my mind is that all this time Fight Night was not ported over to the Wii and I have yet to see a good multiplayer FPS be released. Also the near non-existence of rpgs is disturbing.

[Strazos]

And you won't see a good MP FPS on the Wii because the Wii has shitty MP functionality and is crap for shooters.

[mutantmagnet]

Agree on the former but not the latter.

[Sir T]

Why would it be crap for shooters? I reckon it would be ace for something like Time Crises.

[Strazos]

You can do Guncom stuff on better systems, and the market for that stuff is usually fairly small anyway, AFAIK.

Also, any of you play Red Steel (no Haemish please)?

[HaemishM]

/raises hand 

Look, the Wii isn't bad for shooters. It's multiplayer options, though, are dick. I haven't played the shooters that have MP yet (all what... 1 of them) but in theory the system can handle MP shooters just fine. Only no one is making them. Just like great sports games, no one is making them (MLB 2k8 is the best sports game on the system that I've played and it could stand improvement).

As always, the failure of the Wii hasn't been the system, it's been the refusal of 3rd party developers to utilize the system worth a shit. Of the number of games I've played on the system, there have been as many great 3rd party games as 1st party games. And we all know how many 1st party games there have been. Nintendo has done very well at supporting interesting non-gamer uses of the system. They have their heads up their asses when it comes to strong-arming developers into making good, non-shit non-shovelware hardcore products on the system. They have let too many developers push through shoveled over ports and refried ass on the system.

And announcing the MotionPlus attachment one month before Force Unleashed is released without giving Lucasarts time to develop a Jedi game for the accessory is probably stupidest top-down asshat decision I've ever seen.

[schild]

Counterpoint - The Wiimote will never be as precise as a Guncon and Nintendo ain't making a system that'll open up children to internet creeps and thus will never have great multiplayer FPS titles.

And Lucasarts probably know about the MotionPlus bullshit and didn't care. Why would they, kids will play fucking anything. No reason to delay it.