Is the Wii overrated?

In what some will see as coming from a fan-boy of the competition I would have to say, YES. Of course I love what Nintendo wants to do with the Wii, but anybody calling it innovative is just delusional. Spreading gaming beyond the already established consumer based is what the goal of every video game related company should be, but not when you pass off old technology with just another way of doing the same thing as “New Generation”.

Nothing says new like taking the same old and mixing it with something new, right. Thing is tough, motion sensitive control has been done before. Admittedly no one remembers or ever heard of it at the time, because it was either relegated to the hardcore PC space or an expensive 3rd party controller that saw a limited release and next to no in-game support. Being one of the companies to try this out before was Microsoft. Being the only current 1st party to not have some sort of motion sensing technology in it’s controller, almost everyone see’s this as some sort of disadvantage.

Being the seasoned gamer that I am, I see this as being the main advantage for Microsoft this go around. Yes, motion sensitivity sounds and looks cool, but what happens if it turns out to be just a novelty that will ware off overtime. Better yet , what happens if motion control turns out to just plain flat-out not work this go around to? If this happens, get ready for the shit to hit the fan real hard. The PlayStation 3 may still be for the most part still using a dual shock 2 controller, but this won’t save it in the end being that in this case it will still be missing the rumble feature.

Forgetting all of that, considering the blistering  pace that the Wii has started off on, it makes for a good argument when discussing why the Wii is seeing success thus far. Look no further that the Wii-mote itself for the answer. The reason the Wii is seeing such success thus far is because of the separation of the nunchuk attachment from the main unit of control. Usually a non-gamer immediately gets intimidated when eyeing what is considered the default layout of a controller.

Luckily for Nintendo they have seemingly rid themselves of this intimidation factor simply by lessening the amount of visible buttons on what many case’s is the only form of input you need, the Wii-mote. Having this separation of the controller, makes it seemingly approachable for the person who never even tries to play games simply because of the fear to fail.

Never-mind the motion control portion of the interface. After playing this way, non-gamers before are now essentially playing the same games all gamers have been playing this entire time without even knowing it, simply because they don’t see that log jam of buttons that are unfamiliar to them staring back at them laughing. Of course there’s more to it, but this is it for now. More is to come on this topic for sure, but for now I commend Nintendo for what there doing as long as they can keep it up.