“Nintendo Co. Ltd.’s new Wii video game console, considered the underdog in the console wars because it lacks the high-definition graphics and multimedia features of its rivals, is stealing the show at this week’s Electronic Entertainment Expo trade show. The wait to try out the Wii at E3 pushed past four hours on Thursday afternoon, while the wait for hands-on time with Sony Corp.’s (6758.T: Quote, Profile, Research) PlayStation 3 was barely 30 minutes. Both consoles will hit the market later this year, though the Wii is expected to cost much less than rival consoles,” Kemp Powers reports for Reuters. “The Wii (pronounced ‘we’) uses a motion-sensor enabled controller that looks like a TV remote and allows users to direct action on the screen by wielding it like a sword or swinging it like a baseball bat, tennis racket or golf club. ‘It’s basically a whole different thing from anything I’ve seen before,’ said Josef Faulkner, who had been waiting in line for three hours to get his hands on Wii. He still had an hour to go. ‘This is definitely the biggest thing here.'”
“‘You have to play (Wii) in order to understand what it is,’ said Don James, Nintendo’s executive vice president of operations. James said the company knew that lots of people would be drawn to Wii, but he was surprised by the sheer numbers,” Powers reports. “The enduring image of the show might end up being the enormous line, which snakes completely around Nintendo’s floor space.”
Full article here.
Nintendo gave TIME the first look at Wii here.
MacDailyNews Take: Is this Apple-related? Strictly, no. But, we tend to root for the underdog here, especially when they produce what looks like a winner. Watch out Sony and Microsoft, some people just want their games to be fun with controls that don’t require an ambidextrous murder-bent sadistic octopus with a Ph.D. to operate.
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“some people just want their games to be fun with controls that don’t require an ambidextrous murder-bent sadistic octopus with a Ph.D. to operate.”
That quote made reading this article worth it right there.
Nintendo…making a comeback?
I can see some parallels to Apple for sure.
yay for nintendo. they’re very apple-like in their business model, and they definitely deserve the wii to be a hit
nintendo, inovating like apple, and including the ‘i-tunes style’ retro game download service
” width=”19″ height=”19″ alt=”smile” style=”border:0;” />, i might actually buy the 1st console since dreamcast.
Sony seems to have forgotten that we usually see large shifts in the dominance of the console world upon each new hardware generation. Sony has bucked this trend only one time; that does not make them invincible. Obviously they must feel invincible, as that’s the only way to explain the tremendous hubris of the PS3.
I will preorder a Wii as soon as I can… it looks to be very innovative and fun… I just want my consoles to play games, thank you very much. Sony and Microsoft have made gaming confusing (2 different versions of the PS3 and XBox 360).
An Apple-related comment about Nintendo from the Times article http://www.time.com/time/magazine/printout/0,8816,1191861,00.html …
— start quote —
But the name Wii not wii-thstanding, Nintendo has grasped two important notions that have eluded its competitors. The first is, Don’t listen to your customers. The hard-core gaming community is extremely vocal–they blog a lot–but if Nintendo kept listening to them, hard-core gamers would be the only audience it ever had. “[Wii] was unimaginable for them,” Iwata says. “And because it was unimaginable, they could not say that they wanted it. If you are simply listening to requests from the customer, you can satisfy their needs, but you can never surprise them. Sony and Microsoft make daily-necessity kinds of things. They have to listen to the needs of the customers and try to comply with their requests. That kind of approach has been deeply ingrained in their minds.”
And here’s the second notion: Cutting-edge design has become more important than cutting-edge technology. There is a persistent belief among engineers that consumers want more power and more features. That is incorrect. Look at Apple’s iPod, a device that didn’t and doesn’t do much more than the competition. It won because it’s easier, and sexier, to use. In many ways, Nintendo is the Apple of the gaming world, and it’s betting its future on the same wisdom. The race is not to him who hulas fastest, it’s to him who looks hottest doing it.
— end quote —
I love the wii–hate the name though. The game development process for the wii is not going to be closed like other systems are… it is like open source–anybody will be able to make a game for the wii, so there will be tons of games, and redos of classics, and small budget games that you would never see on a playstation or XBox. Anyway, I love nintendo and can’t wait to get a Wii.
OMG Shigeru Miyamoto is the Steve Jobs of the video game industry!!!!
I WANT A WII!!!!!
A very pleasant surprise, as people have said that “the Wii would have less than 15% market share”. I bet that’s a lie.
Nintendo making a comeback would be fantastic. Nintendo is the only gaming company that has stayed true to gaming only (I guess Sega and Atari both count as well, although they aren’t hardware makers anymore), and they aren’t trying to make their gaming system have a billion features, they embrace the simplicity of gaming.
I don’t really consider Nintendo the underdog. They have been doing this the longest and while Sony and Microsoft have put up bigger numbers Nintendo is actually more profitable than their systems. I still don’t know if xbox has made a profit but corporations like MS and Sony can just keep throwing money at it while nintendo just keeps making great games and profit.
Real Artists Ship!
The most important similitude, I think, between Nintendo and Apple is that they actually have a bussiness model.
Both Microsoft in it’s computer department and Sony in the videogame one share one hell of a weakness: They think that market dominance is permanent, so they don’t have a bussiness model, they go with the flow, they don’t have a goal.
Nintendo has a goal, having as much people play games, even if they never have.
Apple has a goal, to offer a consumer oriented experience that has enough underlying power to appeal to pros.
To Microsoft and Sony: LOOK WHAT YOU’RE DOING, GET AN ADVISOR OR SOMETHING!
Wii will rock you.
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I dunno I kinda think of Nintendo as the Apple of the console biz. Wouldnt mind seeing them team up.
Jay,
The designation of underdog usually isn’t based on much more than public image and perception. Nintendo didn’t do GREAT with the GameCube by comparison. They’re fighting the perception that Nintendo is for kids. In the market, they’re very much the underdog because many people think so.
If Apple and Nintendo teamed up.. ZOMG!
The WiiPod is coming!
Apple should acquire Nintendo while it has the cash. Then put the Wii vs. the xBox and integrate some gameboy features in a gamer iPod… (vs. the PSP)
Wii are not amused.
wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii
Hammer said, “I dunno I kinda think of Nintendo as the Apple of the console biz.”
Thanks for reading all the other posts first before unleashing your brilliant observation on us.
apple buy nintendo?
what makes you think it’s for sale?
HELLO! it’s a JAPANESE company. They’ll NEVER allow apple to buy them.
I for one would love to see an Apple-Nintendo partnership, I think that would be a great thing for both companies.
This whole “Mac users dig Nintendo” thing originated from the Nintendo Game Cube using a PowerPC CPU.
Kind of ironic.
Can’t believe they named it ‘Wee’ instead of ‘Revolution’. Does ‘Wee’ not mean ‘to urinate’ in the US like it does in the UK. It’s like calling it the Nintendo Piss.
Not as bad as the Toyota MR-2 in France, admittidly, but it’s still a stupid name.