David: My Definitive Wii Post
Edit: I'm removing the "Tips". I thought it might be a fun running gag, but honestly, I'm too lazy to think them up as the "funny" part of my brain has taken the rest of the day off.
Which comes to you after about 5 hours of intermittent play yesterday.
I started unpacking and hooking things up around noon. The packaging is a little wonky, with two "drawers" inside the box. My first impression of the sensor bar is that it's a little light and flimsy. I feel like I could easily snap it in two.
I pulled out the remote and nunchuk attachment, and set these aside. Okay, I lied. I actually held them in my hands for a bit to get a feel for what they're like. Then I set them aside.
I then began the agonizing process of reaching the back of my home theatre system through the back of my "entertainment center". This involved heavy lifting, grunting, a flashlight, lots of untangling of tangled cables, and feeling around for ports.
So after about half an hour of this nonsense, I was ready to roll. I had my copy of Zelda unwrapped and ready to go.
I decided to start with Wii Sports instead. I figured if I didn't play it then, I wouldn't get to it until after I'd finished Zelda, which, with my current schedule, could be weeks from now.
But wait, I needed to set up the console first? Okay. I told it the date, time, region and all that stuff using a point and click interface with the remote. The remote makes the tiniest little rumble when you roll over something you can click, which is pretty neat.
Quickly, however, I discovered something was different than I had thought it would be, and at first I was disappointed. You see, the cursor doesn't actually appear where you are pointing on the screen. I confirmed this by looking down the top of the controller like it was a gun. Nope, the cursor was falling below the remote. What the 'eff? How will I play an FPS like this?
However, once I stopped trying to literally point at things on the screen (which gets rather tiring) and just started using the remote like a mouse (relative movement) things got better. In fact, when you drop your hands to waist level, or in your lap, it becomes second nature. This is a natural place for your hands to rest while gaming. Simple software adjustments should make FPS's work fine if they choose to use the remote as a gun.
So, anyhow, setup was a snap. I connected to my home wireless network, so now my Wii is connected to the internet 24 hours a day. (I'm quite curious to see what it may have done since I quit playing around 10:30 last night.) It then downloaded some patches and region specific tweaks.
Now I was ready to play Wii Sports. First things first, though, I had to create a Mii, which is a very simplified cartoon version of yourself (Edit: Actually, I guess it's of myself. It'd be a bit creepy if I was making Miis (or is Mii the plural as well as the singular) of you, especially since you could be any random reader of Vent blogs). I made as close of an approximation as I could in the five minutes I allowed for it, and then *finally* fired up the tennis game.
But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's talk about inserting the disc. My Macs at home have slot loading drives, but neither as sweet as this one. The discs just glide in. It doesn't fell like they're being sucked out of your hand, and yet, it doesn't feel like you're pushing them in either. They just go. I haven't inserted a Gamecube disc yet, and I'm kind of curious as to what that's going to feel like (or how the hell it even works).
Okay, so let's talk about Wii Sports. I started off with Tennis, 'cause that's the one you always hear about. It's incredibly intuitive. I just pretended I was holding a tennis racket. That's really all there is to it. I won a shutout in my first match (of course, the difficulty was quite low). Sometimes I felt that the ball should be going in a different direction, but then again, I've never played tennis in real life.
That's when I decided, maybe I should try one that I've done in real life. I've punched people before, let's try Boxing.
The Boxing game is a workout, and uses the Nunchuk extension. The best part is watching the gloves on your character move and replicate your own movements. If I put my hands in front of my face, so does my boxer. If, at this point, I lean right or left, so does he. If I jab high, I punch in the face, low, to the body. Successive hits earn combos and finishing hits.
Little Mac, eat your heart out.
I played around with golf and bowling a bit, but honestly, I couldn't stand it anymore, I had to get to Zelda. That's not to say Wii Sports isn't fun. It was the perfect choice to show off what these new controls could do.
I backed the Wii out to the main menu, and then swapped discs. The Legend of Zelda showed up in my Wii menu.
I'll not talk about the story to the game at all. I don't want to spoil it for you. I will say that I've been through one dungeon, and have a couple of the signature side weapons.
The first misgiving that I had about the game was quickly refuted; you don't have to point the remote at the screen through the entire game. I knew that, technically, this wouldn't be necessary, but my thought was, if I need ot aim my bow, slingshot, boomerang, whatever in a hurry, I'd best have that remote ready. However, if you go to use one of these items and aren't "Z-Targeted" (and, yes, it's actually the Z button!) the action pauses and the game asks you to point the remote at the screen. As soon as your remote is pointing into the play area, crosshairs appear. Aiming is INCREDIBLY intuitive. There was a target-practice session near the beginning of the game and I bullseyed every one on the first shot.
Some may say this makes games too easy. I say nonsense. I'd rather any mistakes I make be the fault of my own hands movement than trying to get a feel for the tracking speed of an analog stick. Think of playing a FPS with a mouse and keyboard, and then think of playing one with a PS2 controller. Playing with Wii feels a lot like the former, except, get this, better.
Now let's talk about swords. You don't actually swing your arm around weilding an imaginary sword. I mean, I'm sure you could, but I think it would get tiring fast. All it really takes is a little jiggle of the controller. That being said, I find that I'm still imagining using the sword on a subconcious level. When I want to thrust, a move that happens when you're locked on and tilting the analog stick towards the target, I move the controller in a thrusting motion instead of the usual shake.
Shaking the nunchuk extension performs the spin attack, which makes it MUCH easier to do in a pinch than in previous games. (Twirl the analog stick in a complete revolution and press A, anyone? This always seemed to work in 4 out of 5 tries for me.)
As for graphics. I can tell it's not on my Gamecube, but honestly, there's not a whole lot beyond that. One must remember, however, that Twilight Princess was originally designed for the Gamecube, and while it got a complete control overhaul, I'm sure the graphics makeover was less intrusive. Wii Sports sports some simple yet smooth graphics. I'm sure we'll see examples of the system's graphic abilities being pushed soon, but that's not what this system is really about. Don't expect "Next-Gen" graphics on this system, just "Next-Gen" gameplay.
That's really all I can think of to say without ruining the experience for anyone else. This shit is kind of like "The Matrix", you have to experience it for yourself.
If anyone has any specific questions, I'll answer them. Really, however, it all comes down to this being a "must-buy". If you enjoy playing video games, you'll enjoy Wii immensely.
The End. <---Fin
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