The Wii's life is almost over, what are your concluding thoughts?

[SomeBritishDude]

I'll always admire the Wii for how it completely blew people's expectations and changed the face of video games. I'm not sure it changed it for the better but it did change things.

As a console...It was pretty crap. The only reason I still have mine is for GameCube games and the occasional worth while exclusive. Most of the time it's spent collecting dust.

All this being said I don't think the Wii U means the end of the the Wii, if their smart Nintendo will continue to develop for both consoles for the for see able future. The Wii still has it's fanbase, they'll probably continue to pile it high with shovel ware. I mean The PS2 continued to gain new titles for years after the PS3 was released, maybe it still does, I don't know.

 

[Kelethor]

Brawl was pretty cool.

But seriously, The Wii was a fun little thing. I loved Donkey Kong, and loved seeing Mega-man and the Old Zelda games come back to me...But as a serious gaming console? It didn't have any Dragon Age. It had no games that kept me up all night.

 

[Scow2]

Did you like Nintendo's direction?

Not really - They needed a LOT more "Hardcore" games, and a lot less shovelware

Can motion controls be the future of gaming?
Yes, despite what Yahtzee said. I found LoZ: Twilight Princess and the lightgun precision of Call of Duty: Modern Warfare Reflex to be far better than the corresponding control schemes in other FPS/Hack-and-Slash games. While they may be slower than button presses, all that means is that the spftware doesn't need to ignore quite so many "junk" inputs from frantic keypresses because the activation cycle of a motion control is longer. I've never had motion controls be slower than a corresponding button-press.

Did the lacking specs affect your opinion of it?

Yes... games like Monster Hunter Tri and others that attempted to be pretty and/or large would have been MUCH better off with a stronger system.

Despite its setbacks, where the exclusives up to standard?

The FPS, Fighting, and Core Licences were up to standard. The shovelware that nobody would dare release on 360 or PS3 wasn't. Nor was the new Mario Kart. Then again, the best Variety Racing game ever was Diddy Kong Racing for the 64.

Did you own one?

Yes

Overall, what are your opinions on it?

Good console, but shovelware drowned out the good titles.

The ability to play almost all games from previous cycles was also a very nice touch... though Y U NO HAVE STAR FOX?

 

[JokerboyJordan]

Well Wii... You kept me amused for a few months.

Because that's all it ever did for the majority at least.

I don't pay for games that are a generation behind, I buy games when they're this generation, and sadly the Wii isn't this generation, and the Wii U (stupid name) will end up the same.

No More Heroes was cool though.



Did you like Nintendo's direction?

Not really, it's the same old same old. Nintendo's exclusives have never struck me as 'deep'. I'm not saying they're easy, but they just churn out the same recycled shit with better textures (and because of the Wii's graphical capability, that isn't saying much).

Can motion controls be the future of gaming?
No, voice integration is far more likely, though I kinda dig the PS3's sixaxis when it's not required

Did the lacking specs affect your opinion of it?

Yes, along with the gimmicks.

Despite its setbacks, where the exclusives up to standard?

As I said, I've never been a fan of the core titles. Some exclusives should've found a wider market if they just developed for the better consoles, the innovative titles would've found far more success on a non casual audience.

Did you own one?

Yes

Overall, what are your opinions on it?

Not much, I'm sure it made money and all, but I honestly couldn't give two shits.
I'm not a fan for Nintendo titles, but I do wish that the Nintendo's JRPG monopoly will fade and that titles will gravitate to the other consoles and enter this generation.

 

[Mr. Omega]

There were a bunch of interesting games for it. Most were rough around the edges and/or lacked polish, not exactly up to the highest AAA standards, but were unique, and there were more than enough of them to justify the system's run. The vast amounts of shovelware doesn't stop the good games from existing.

The motion controls often were implemented badly. Forced gimmicks often end badly, like in this case, but with the 3DS and the option to turn it off, as well as the fact that the WiiU controller is just a standard controller (4 buttons, dual analog, 4 triggers) with a touchscreen, Nintendo seems to have learned their lesson.

The exclusives were very good. Not the best, but far from the worst.

As for the whole "Nintendo betrayed hardcore" thing, that stuff it total bullshit. Nintendo has ALWAYS marketed to the young. They just happened to also market to others this time around. Nintendo has done what they always do. They didn't "betray" anyone. YOU expected Nintendo's games to get dark and gritty as you got older, and threw a hissy fit when they didn't, crying "BETRAYAL!".

Overall, a mediocre console. Far from the worst. Still better than the 360, at least. To be frank, this entire generation, despite the steps forward, just seems to be taking leaps back.

Still, the handling of the 3DS and recent events has given me a lot of hope for the WiiU. Nintendo made mistakes with the Wii, but they really seem to be getting their shit together recently. Lord knows that so far, the WiiU seems like the best of the 3 new consoles by a mile...

 

[Jodah]

Mildly entertaining. Really, I had more fun with non-motion controller games though. Being able to finally play the Fire Emblem games that were not on the handhelds was fun. I don't regret the purchase but I doubt I will buy the next gen one. Then again I dunno if I will be getting any next gen consoles. Might just stick to PC gaming.

 

[Username Redacted]

Did you like Nintendo's direction? Not especially. My first console was a Playstation 1 so I don't get all nostalgic over Mario, Zelda, etc. To that end I didn't find much that piqued my interest on the Wii and even more given that one of the two genres of games that I really put a lot of time into is fighting games it greatly annoys me when the Wii gets exclusive titles that would have worked better on other consoles.

Can motion controls be the future of gaming? I don't see why not. But it isn't going to be like the Wiimote or the Kinnect. People don't usually want anything resembling exercise during their gaming unless they're specifically playing fitness games.

Did the lacking specs affect your opinion of it? Not really.

Despite its setbacks, where the exclusives up to standard? Again, not really.

Did you own one? No, but that's what roommates are for =p

Overall, what are your opinions on it? The supreme lord of shovelware.

 

[Grygor]

Wah!

Hoho!

Yahoooo!

That's true, but I just thought what with the Wii having sold so many more units it would be less likely to follow in the footsteps of past Nintendo consoles. They've never had a console as universally popular before, so it wouldn't be fair to expect it to turn out just like its predecessors. I just don't see that many people buying a Wii U straight away and completely ditching their Wiis, so it would seem foolish to stop making games for such a large group of consumers. Total speculation, of course.

(Apparently, the Wii has sold [roughly] 1.5x as many as the NES, 2x the SNES, 3x the N64 and 4x the Gamecube. Pretty interesting.)

It's not so much a matter of the customers abandoning the hardware as the developers. Nintendo has a track record of drastically cutting back support for a platform once they publicly announce their new hardware - and third-party developers tend to shy away from platforms that don't have strong first-party support. Their handhelds show the same pattern.

 

[IrateDonnie]

The only thing I like about the wii is the virtual console for old school games. It showed me I don't like motion controls & will be sticking to a controller or mouse.

 

[CLJ304]

Turning mine into a george forman grill.....burgers!

 

[babinro]

A strong introduction to motion gaming. The Wii came across a lot like N64's introduction to 3D gaming.

There are styles of gaming that are vastly improved thanks to motion controls. Golf, Bowling, and elements of FPS are all superior on the Wii when compared to a controller or mouse/keyboard.

That said I'd consider the console a failure on a personal level. While I certainly got my money's worth for the machine. There were simply far to many flawed controls built into the games to give this console any true lasting appeal. I will remember the Wii for Wii Sports, Tiger Woods Golf, Metroid Prime 3 and very little else despite owning about 10 games on the system.

I don't want to see motion controls die out, but at the same time I have no intention on further supporting them until further advances are made.

 

[android88]

Twilight princess was good, but some of their other exclusives didn't live up to the hype. Motion controls are good for some games but I would not use them in prefurence to a pad.

One positive is the virtual console. I lost count of how much money I spent on it. More games on the virtual console please nintendo.

 

[Nalgas D. Lemur]

In brief (cause I'm on my phone and I hate virtual keyboards) the main thing the Wii did for me is prove that motion controls aren't anything more than a gimmick. I've not seen a single compelling core experience which required motion controls.

Well done Nintendo, the Wii printed money, brought people who were never gamers into your target audience, and had the other companies scrambling to copy you. But lets move on.

I see what you mean, but here are examples of core experiences that used motion controls (pointer included) well:
- Red Steel 2
- Zelda: Skyward Sword
- Metroid Prime 3
- Zack & Wiki
- Warioware: Smooth Moves
- Pikmin 2 (Wii controls worked much better than Gamecube)

Uses motion controls well is rather different from 'couldn't have happened without motion controls'. I just can't get over the imprecision and overall pointlessness of it.

That's true, in that sense I do see your point. However I think it's the same thing as all advances in video game controllers.

Super Mario 64 COULD have been done without an analog stick, however it was done BETTER with one. This was proven with the DS port.

Out of the games you listed, I've played MP3, Zack & Wiki, and WarioWare, and I didn't feel like any of them really worked properly with the motion controls. WarioWare was frustrating enough with its inability to recognize what people were doing that even my girlfriend seemed to sick of it pretty quickly and wanted to go back to the GC one, and she's much more tolerant of things like that than I am. Zack & Wiki was a great game, but it too was frustrating at times for being somewhat unreliable with its controls. If it had done what it was supposed to all the time like with a "normal" controller instead of only 90% of the time, it would've been a near perfect puzzle game, but it just wasn't quite there.

I never actually made it past the tutorial/intro section of MP3 before my Wii died on me, specifically because of the controls. A lot of people praised them for being better than in the GC games, but even though I typically play first person games on the PC and hate moving/aiming with a controller, I always liked the GC controls. The Wii controls, on the other hand, were nearly unplayable for me, because after a fairly short period of time it would make my wrist hurt when I had to keep pointing at the screen and waving my hand around constantly. I've actually considered trying to see if I can rip the disc and run it in an emulator on my computer just so I can play it with a controller or a keyboard and mouse, both to see if it's possible and to see what the game's like.

I don't think motion controls are doomed to failure or anything like that, but I do think they're a bit primitive right now in most of their uses, and I also like having the option to not use them. I've gotten some entertainment out of my Wii over the years, but I think the biggest thing I've learned from it is that playing games on my PC is actually a lot more cost-effective with all the sales. Heh.

 

[blizzaradragon]

=Did you like Nintendo's direction?
Can motion controls be the future of gaming?
Did the lacking specs affect your opinion of it?
Despite its setbacks, where the exclusives up to standard?
Did you own one?
Overall, what are your opinions on it?

1) I enjoyed Nintendo's direction, but also felt there should have been more games that utilized the classic controller as well. Give people options instead of making them use one or the other.

2) They can, but not many would like it is the big thing. Personally I feel if they are going to be the future, they need something in your hand like the Wiimote or the PlayStation Move over something like the Kinect.

3) The lacking specs made me appreciate it more actually. It meant that the games put on there had to focus more on either telling a good story or having engaging gameplay rather than the competition on the other consoles of who can make the prettiest game.

4) The exclusives were not only up to standard, but they blew away the exclusives on the other consoles. Only other exclusives I can think of that came close to my enjoyment of the first party Nintendo games were the inFamous series and some of the JRPGs on the PS3 like Cross Edge or Ar Tonelico Qoga.

5) Owned two, actually. One was given to my little sister before I moved because I thought I could get along with my laptop and my PS3. Took me all of 2 months before I got a new Wii and started rebuilding my game collection.

6) Great fun, great for the industry, and shows that Nintendo doesn't need cutting edge graphics or the best hardware to make amazing games. Virtual Console sweetened the deal by letting me get games from earlier systems I don't have anymore or games I missed due to either being too young or just didn't hear about in time. People write it off as a "kid's console" but that's part of the charm, that EVERYONE can play it and enjoy it. Mario, Zelda, Kirby, Donkey Kong, etc are more fun and will continue to be more fun than the "mature" gray and brown shootathon games that make up a sizable chunk of the library of the 360 and PS3.

 

[TephlonPrice]

To answer said questions:

-Not really. There are games that I can say a traditional controller would've made much better instead of shoehorning in motion controls at every turn. Not to mention Nintendo make the mistake they did during the NES era of letting way too much shovelware get on; that gave us the modern Superman 64 - Ninjabread Man.

-For certain games, yes, but not enough to make it a really viable option. I could it see for swordfighting games or even some boxing type games & Time Crisis styled games, but not much else. But overall, sticking with controllers.

-To some degree, but it mostly the controls. I really can't think of too many games that work well with motion controls without putting my arms to sleep or making me reach for the creatine.

-Of course. Nintendo wouldn't screw those if their lives depended it. And the motion controls worked decently here. And bringing the Wii fit series was a good move to get exercise & gaming together.

-Not really, but played them.

-Overall, it was a good (and very successful) experiment but I think motion controls aren't the future at all. Sure, they brought new people in, but at the same time, it kinda sucks that it took a long time for the motion controls to start actually registering properly. It had potential, but some bad third-party issues, a little too much shovelware & forced motion controls in their games didn't work out to well.

It also had the bad idea of forced motion control/Wiimote bullshit in other systems. Too bad the PS Move was a failure pretty much.

 

[DeltaWolfson]

Great Idea at the time, but just badly practiced. Most games that they had allot of gamers did not just want. I can only think of 5 games that did not suck on the Wii, but they where just piratically remakes of the GameCube and N46 games.

 

[Austin Howe]

I will wait until the long-awaited American release of The Last Story to pass judgement.

 

[Pat8u]

the wii was good for the two games i played on it regualry those two games are monster hunter and super smash bros brawl