Nintendo Wii front and center at E3

Mathew Everett 9 May, 2006 at 1:38pm ET Article published in Tech

This morning at 9:30 Nintendo took the stage at E3 announcing its new gaming console “Wii”. Nintendo didn’t push on next Generation console’s but “New” Consoles to be released in 2006.

Now without knowing the specs and what partners Nintendo is working with yet, I have to say the graphics are pretty impressive. Along with the beautiful layout of Zelda we found out it will be released the day of Wii release this year.

Source: Short Media

Comments

9 May 2006 ~ 5:07pm entropy I don't know... maybe it's just me, but everything I've been reading about E3 so far has been in Nintendo's favor. It's subtle, but it's there. Basically everyone is jumping on Sony for being nonexistant and uninnovative (from what I've seen).

Nintendo may not be last, after all.
9 May 2006 ~ 5:21pm RWB Mew Ants Naiantento Wiiii!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
9 May 2006 ~ 6:09pm Hard OCP linked to an article stating the following:

Sony Criticism Abound

Eventually, Sony will get bitten. They've had one single innovation since they entered this industry, and that's the EyeToy. Everything else has been a take off of a rival company, and it's getting to the point where even the mainstream will figure it out. This press conference proved how far they're willing to go to copy their competitors. Sony isn't innovative as Phil Harrison claims. They're thieves, and cocky ones at that.

SCEA’s COO, when asked about the price being $600 for the PS3:

It means that people are going to perceive enough value that they're not going to consider the price to be a barrier to entry; that they're going to be willing to do it just as they have on the last three platforms.

That's pretty cocky, ya think?
9 May 2006 ~ 6:39pm Garg Innovation is overrated when it comes to game consoles. Were the Konga Drums for Gamecube innovative, or boring gizmos?

The VirtualBoy was innovative, but it sucked. The Power Glove? The NES MAX controller (marketed for Marble Madness)? These inventions were memorable, and may have even shaped future development. But the gizmos themselves weren't that useful in their own time. So what if Sony lets others innovate for them? They're saved the bad PR of a flop, and they get to absorb whatever ideas were good. They get to concentrate their money on making and marketing good games.

The take-home message - I'll take fun games over new and confusing ways of interacting with them any day! I don't think I'm alone, either. Many of us still play classic video games from the 1980s.
9 May 2006 ~ 7:07pm profdlp

Gargoyle wrote:

...The take-home message - I'll take fun games over new and confusing ways of interacting with them any day! I don't think I'm alone, either. Many of us still play classic video games from the 1980s.

Definitely. I'm not much of a gamer these days, but I'll still drop a quarter in a Ms. PacMan machine if I happen to pass one.
10 May 2006 ~ 10:06am Armo i still play my original GB games, not cause they were 3d, or shook the handheld when you blew somthing up, but they were just plain fun, and if comes the day that i find some bad ass old skool snes games, you damn right ill buy them.
12 May 2006 ~ 9:12am Echo{(:)} Well the Nintendo Wii will be as amazing as the hype...In this E3 it seems that the main part of the show was Nintendo, in the last few years however, nintendo has been in the slumps. I think sony is going to make a downfall this time around. Remember the sega dreamcast? It was way before its time, it had good graphics (about the same as the ps2) and even had online support! Sony is going in a direction where they are creating processors and things that are not needed in this day in time. It will have the same fate as the dreamcast, and sony will pay(hahaha) I truely think nintendo is comming back with a vengance!
12 May 2006 ~ 5:22pm Thrax People don't buy with their brains; they buy by brand-loyalty. Having worked retail for close to a year, I see how ridiculously this is true. I have so many customers come in and say "Well it's a (Insert a brand that produces shoddy products for the current generation of that product type, but has been good in the past) what could have possibly happened?"

The only answer is that you didn't do your market research.

And that will continue to be the case. I don't want to paint console gamers with such a large brush, but Sony people will be Sony people, Nintendo people will continue to be Nintendo people, and the only reason the XBoX succeeded was because it came out at precisely the right time: Between Sony's and Nintendo's console generations.. Something the Dreamcast failed to do.
12 May 2006 ~ 6:48pm RWB OMG They are selling Pilotwings!
http://www.ebgames.com/product.asp?product%5Fid=T000529

Dunno if $59 is worth it though ehh?
12 May 2006 ~ 7:29pm Thrax Wouldn't that be Pilotwiings?

I slay me...
13 May 2006 ~ 9:30am Cyclonite

RWB wrote:

OMG They are selling Pilotwings!
http://www.ebgames.com/product.asp?product%5Fid=T000529

Dunno if $59 is worth it though ehh?

OMG! I loved that friggen game!!
17 May 2006 ~ 12:19pm Go Nintendo The Nintendo Wii has something that the other systems dont have, like a totally new way to interact with games! I'm deffinitely getting the Wii!
17 May 2006 ~ 6:10pm Medlock

Thrax wrote:

And that will continue to be the case. I don't want to paint console gamers with such a large brush, but Sony people will be Sony people, Nintendo people will continue to be Nintendo people, and the only reason the XBoX succeeded was because it came out at precisely the right time: Between Sony's and Nintendo's console generations.. Something the Dreamcast failed to do.

I've owned every Nintendo console except the VirtualBoy and the DS. When Nintendo flops, I will flop with them.

Bet you can't guess what my next console will be?
18 May 2006 ~ 1:28pm Renno It's still too early to really know the game or console prices for the Wii, so many stores like EBgames have just been using "place holder" amounts. I would not expect the Pilotwings game to be $59.99. In fact, Iwata said in an interview that he could not imagine any first party Nintendo game being more than $50. Obviously that doesn't cover 3rd party titles, but you'd think many would follow suit.