Yesterday I went to buy some books from Fnac (my favorite bookstore). I was quite amazed to find out the entrance of the shop literary covered with Nintendo Wii boxes. In the Forum area of the shop you could find people experimenting with the Wiimote controller and playing Zelda, Wii Sports etc. Let me tell you something, this was love at first sight.
The machine is unresistably beautiful, the Wiimote is small and very responsive. I was even more amazed to find out that you could actually buy the machine (2 days before 08 December, the official launch day). I immediately grabbed a box and rushed to my apartment to try this out!
Opening the Wii package was a ritual compared with opening Apple products. The box is beautiful as well. After a while I plugged the console to my TV and pressed the ‘on’ button. Setting up my Wii was a real pleasure thanks to the ultra cool Wiimote. This is like having a 3d mouse.
I was afraid that the Wii interface will be too childish. In reality, it is quite ok. I tried Wii Sports as well. Tennis and bowling are great fun, even though you do not totally control your avatar’s hand. I will try some of my old GameCube games later today and of course go and buy Zelda later this week.
The most strike aspect of the console (excluding the controller that is) is the design. It looks like an IBM designed machine, and I love the looks of IBM machines. Perhaps the collaboration of IBM and Nintendo was much stronger. I bet the manufacturer referred in this text is Nintendo.
Nintendo Wii is Blue Ocean Strategy in practice. I expect Nintendo to make lots of money from this console. Eventually, though I expect Sony and Microsoft to copy the controller. Moreover, Wii’s last generation hardware will be a problem in the near future. But perhaps Nintendo is aiming for a shorter product life. Ie, instead of paying 500 euro for 6 years you pay 250+250 euro for 3+3 years. This means we will get a Wii2 shorter than we expect.
One thing is for sure. Wii will make gaming and (dare I say) Internet browsing accessible to a real broad demographic. At the moment it seems like the ultimate (and totally cool looking) set top box. And I can’t wait to try WiiLi on this thing!
Way to go Nintendo.