Perri

I actually have this...

It's not horrible, the single charge isn't ideal but I was really aching for a recharger and since the nyko ones are so limited, I settled for this. The stickers that came on it are TERRIBLE. It was such a pain to get all the glue off, I'm talking a good half hour of scrubbing with a damp and soapy rag. Besides that tho, it isn't too bad. As a battery solution it works, taking the batteries off to charge isn't too inconvenient, but the battery life doesn't seem too long at all... I was told it was average for them to last 6 -10 hours? hope that eb guy didn't BS me when I said I thought it was malfunctioning...

I'd get the nyko one if you had a choice, but this isn't something that you can't live with.

I didn't know Chris Farley had a daughter...

I thought you could snap the remote into some slots on the back?? I hope so anyways...

I have to say that my expectations were incredibly high, built up during the 2yrs of secrecy...But Nintendo has exceeded my expectations. Wii Sports is far better than I had ever thought, everything feels great once you get the hang of the Remote, I haven't had any problems with Boxing or baseball (as some ppl have reported) but baseball is boring (I guess thats pretty realistic though) Me and my friends played for a total of 11hrs yesterday and Wii sports took up about 6 of them, we were completely impressed. Zelda is the best in the series, I am blown away by the improvement in story telling since windwaker, it is a very Cinematic game, but does not take away from gameplay. The dialogue is the best ever in a Zelda game and thus far the story seems far darker, and much more enthralling than ever before. I have to say the controls take a couple minutes to get comfortable with but after that they are great! Its really a lot of fun the play with the Wii remote, Aiming is far more intuitive and sword play is pretty cool. I haven't gotten too far (the opening had me and my friends stumped as we couldn't really fish too well - one thing that could have been explained better) but the game is gorgeous for what it is, and plays near flawlessly.

The hardware is even better than expected, the Remote is the PERFECT size, even makes reaching 1 and 2 easy, I was sure these buttons would never be used unless holding it sideways, but they're pretty nice secondary buttons. The Lanyard is a very smart inclusion, a few times I 'forgot' The controller was in 2 pieces and would drop the remote to do something, I was thanking Nintendo for that strap often, very nice. The Wii has a great heft to it, solid feel. The Nunchuck is very light, feels very natural to hold.

Something I had neveer thought of before playing Wii was just how liberating it was to hold two pieces. No longer are my hands together in that classic gamer position, I can lounge comfortably on my couch, its beautiful.

The Wii Channels are pretty slick too, I was really impressed with the photo channel, its simple but really great and works really well. They put a lot of thought into the mario paint section too (fun!) really cool to play around with. Miis were a blast, thats all I have to say about that. I'm not online so I can't say anything about those channels, but I love the interface and interaction with the Wii remote was great fun, far easier than I though it would be.

Like I said my high expectations have been exceeded, Nintendo did an amazing job with Wii, I can't even believe its possible. Nice to hear such positive news of a launch.

Heres what I don't understand...Whenever people think about their experience on Wii they think, well I'm going to have that great control, but the graphics suck hard. This is not true. The graphics are quite nice, they aren't up with the PS3 or 360 but I'm sure eventually it will be able to produce visuals comprable to first gen 360 games. Nintendo has said its atleast twice as powerful as the gamecube, thats good enough for me. You guys complain about physcics? Go look at Elebits and tell me those physics are not amazing. Go look at Red Steel and you'll see a game that is actually grasping the hardwares power, there are MANY launch games that aren't taking advantage of the power and I don't know why (probably GC games that were moved to Wii after they got word, and early dev was done on gamecubes right?) after the first gen games have gone, we'll see noticable differences like we do with Red Steel, Mario, Metroid, and so on. I'm not sure what the final version of Twilight Princess looks like, I don't expect it to look vastly different from the GC game, but you know what, the artistic direction in that game allows it to compete with any 360 game visually.

People see Wii and they jump to this conclusion that we're playing on N64s again, it is STILL a step foreeward, not in the same direction as Msoft and Sony , but a step just as big. Graphics don't make a game unplayable, the controls do, and from what I hear theres no need to worry about the Wii controller.

Games will not be ugly on Wii.

Joystiq needs to find some news, so they can stop complaining about everything! Wii packaging is ugly, PS3 packaging is ugly, DS packaging is too plastic and not environmentally friendly. Ya, you know what, make my Wii controller out of origami because I wouldn't want Nintendo to provide me with a durable product (as they always do)

Lets face it Joystiq. If they had originally been made out of cardboard you would have shun them for staying in the past, afraid to move foreward, and providing the consumer with a box that wasn't durable, easily lost, and not waterproof.

Joystiq opinion pieces make me sick.

brilliant design. Its simple but sophisticated. Very different from what's out there now, and MUCH more interesting. I think its a nice new frame for game art. I was getting tired of the uniform rectangular framing of the art. This is much more exciting and it is sure to pop off the shelves and grab people attention. Joystiq is far to objective these days, what happened? I suppose you think the fisher-price PS3 blu-ray boxes look good? no sharp edges mean no danger for people who are 'smart' enough to shell out 600 bucks for a lawn mower engine with HDMI. I think Nintendo's design team deserves a huge raise after this generation, and Sony's definitly deserves a court hearing...

I downloaded the high quality version from IGN and I have to say that it's stunning. I'm pretty sure they upped the graphics, even if they did just slightly, I still notice a big difference from earlier builds (ie GC version) I have to say that in spots it does challenge some 360 games right now, I'm not talking about oblivion or anything but definitly some others, ie Saints Row, maybe even Kameo. Probably going to be the best Zelda game ever, looks a lot more cinematic than any Zelda before it, and the music is epic.

Joystiq, I have lost much faith in you... It seems the you've lost your integrity. Let me get this straight though...

Your saying the PS3 has more value because Sony is selling it at a loss? so we should make all assumptions pertaining to value based on price v profit? Because I can tell you right now that when presented with an opportunity to buy Wii or the Ps3 I will buy Wii.

Wii offers what none of the competitors can, and for a MUCH cheaper price. How could you expect Wii to launch for any less than 250? As soon as they announced it would not exceed that price point, you should assume that is what it will cost.

Now that we know more about Wii it seems reasonable to me(the price) The development and research of the Wii control obviously cost a lot. Not to mention the sophisticated hardware within the controller. Then we have the hardware which is more powerful than any current-gen system, and yet smaller, quieter, and more power efficient than any console ever created. Regardless of polygon count, that is an impressive technology.

However I think the most boils down to the software included. I'm not really talking about Wii Sports (but not excluding it.) I'm talking about the operating system. The Wii channels are brilliant, there are minigames included when viewing photos, you have an online infrastructure which seems to be very intuitive, and immersive (msg boards, file sharing, email, etc...) But the biggest innovation here has to be 'Mii'

A Character creating tool included within every console which allows you to store your avatar in your controller and play as yourself at a friends house? Thats insane. Never would I have ever guessed such a feature would ever have been included on any console, and by watching the videos I can see that it is definitly very well done. A lot of work went into this operating system and to purchase something like this seperately it would probably cost about 150 dollars on it's own.

There is a ton of value going into this package, Wii sports is included, I think this is great. People will say 'I don't want Wii sports, I should have the option!' Wii sports is an essential game for Wii. Nintendo wanted a simple game to get everybody acustomed to using the controller, also, Nintendo just ASSURED that everybody now has something their parents can play with them. This is very smart. When presenting Wii to a non-gamer, they don't want to play Zelda, but playing virtual tennis or bowling...I think thats something they can get into.

Lets face it, Wii sports wouldn't have sold as a stand alone game, therefore no non-gamers would have been exposed to something inviting to them. This way, everybody has it.

I'm sure the game probably costs an additional 10 dollars or so, which isn't much (based on DS+MK bundle v. stand alone DS)

Nintendo is packing the most punch this round. Sony and Microsoft only sell at a loss because they HAVE Too. If they didn't they're products would never sell, the only demographic that could have afforded either console a cost is not one who is particularily fond of gaming.

Nintendo is being smart, undercutting the competition, delivering the most value seen in a console in years, and still making a profit - your upset about that? why, if I make something and sell it, I'd like to make some money, so would you. Nintendo is and will continue to be the most successful console maker(profit) but it isn't as if they're ripping us off to do it.

Joystiq, I doubt I'll be coming back.

I'm sure most of those graphical promises can be done on Wii aswell. I don't understand why people expect the thing to have the power of a GBA. On paper it's like 3 gamecubes, and we all know that Nintendo is very good at efficiently pumping graphics out of small systems. The Windwaker engine created a real Wind that affected all smoke, sparks, or anything else in the air. The grass moved when you walked over it. Same with MGS3, the grass moved out of your way. With the added power Wii has I'm sure it won't be hard for them to tell that grass to stay down. The Surface specific reaction for bullets is pretty cool, but nothing Wii can't handle, thats just in the programming. I really don't see anything up there that Wii shouldn't be able to do. Sure it won't look as pretty as the PS3 or 360 version, but it will look good, and its the same game, they're going to push it as far as they can to get it as close as the others.