I just went out to Target and picked up a Wii Fit. I was going to wait until lunch, but a couple of threads from the east coast talking about sell outs everywhere made me move it up a bit. I can't believe the amount of hand wringing by the "hardcore" gamers over the Wii in general and now the Wii Fit. What is it about the Wii's success that is so threatening to traditional gaming people?
Wednesday, May 21, 2008
Wii Fit
I just went out to Target and picked up a Wii Fit. I was going to wait until lunch, but a couple of threads from the east coast talking about sell outs everywhere made me move it up a bit. I can't believe the amount of hand wringing by the "hardcore" gamers over the Wii in general and now the Wii Fit. What is it about the Wii's success that is so threatening to traditional gaming people?
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7 comments:
Got one today on my 5th stop, along with 4 of:
"Well did you reserve?" complete with rolled eyes.
Many of us have spent in the 5 digits on different consoles generation upgrades and games in search of the newest and best. Perhaps it's a bit disconcerting to know that it was partly a waste: we could have been receiving fun games with less tech and lower costs all along.
The only really good argument against the new, casual boom is that we'll get a glut of garbage like we did in the early '80s -- the kind of glut that strangles the industry to death.
Am I hallucinating that linear algebra scrawled across the front of the box? The sensation of spiders crawling on me I've gotten used to. The higher math is giving me the willies.
I would add to Gus's comment that there might be a fear of the soulless middle managers in the gaming industry killing projects with higher development costs and smaller audiences for more accessible products. Hopefully the industry can support both. Pulp novels never put the classics out of print.
"Press up to view me from the back."
The math on the box is a shadow from the marker on my cube window. It's the definition of the Nash equilibrium that I wrote there as a joke a few weeks ago.
I would say that the core gamers might have something to fear if all forms of gaming weren't currently expanding. Didn't Grand Theft Auto IV just make 1 hojillion dollars last week?
Ah, that wacky Nash equilibrium! Hoo. (**Wipes eyes**) That's some good stuff, there.
The fear is, as in the '80s, that the junk will flood the market, crowd the actually good product and create the kind of junk glut that results in millions of E.T. cartridges being dumped in a landfill. That's the nightmare, because if Nintendo hadn't have come along with the NES and revitalized the market we might not be having this conversation at all.
Funny that they're the ones now taking most of the guff.
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