I love the design. It's a great looking system, I think. I think I like the PS3 design too. I'm not a big fan of the Xbox 360, but I don't hate it and it certainly wins the prize for Greatest Aesthetic Improvement. The original Xbox is the absolute ugliest console ever made. As for stuff that matters....I've said it already, but....Nintendo deserves success. It is nothing short of astounding that a company as big as Nintendo has the guts to take a risk like this. I will preorder this system as soon as I can to get one on launch day. If enough people buy one of these, third parties WILL support it. Of course. And if everyone takes a wait-and-see approach, third parties won't support it, and then those wait-and-see people won't buy it. Some people simply have to have faith in the beginning or the system will fail. This controller is worthy of the name Revolution, and any self-respecting videogame lover should do their part to help it create a revolution -- to help move videogames beyond the rehashed game, over and over, with nothing but incremental upgrades in graphics.
I don't necessarily believe that the console will be a success, but I do have faith in the potential. Nintendo needs to do a lot of things right, but for the most part, at this point, it is up to consumers. What do consumers want, and are they willing to take a risk in order to get it? If they want an Xbox 1.5 (a.k.a. Xbox 360), and want to play games that differ in no way from Xbox games, aside from polygon counts, they'll buy the Xbox 360. If they want to play games that are truly unlike anything they've ever played before, seriously....the choice is incredibly obvious.
But still, it won't happen if Nintendo doesn't do a few things exactly right. They absolutely need the following:
Mario Revolution (This game must be absolutely ---auto-censored--- amazing)
Metroid
Star Wars (made by Factor 5, and incorporating light saber melee combat)
Smash Brothers
Madden '06
Final Fantasy
All of these games MUST MUST MUST be launch titles. And they MUST be spectacular. Not just really good, but utterly spectacular. They need, of course, more games than that....but those titles had better be there. And hopefully they're actually doing the smart thing and reworking the Zelda game currently in progress to release on the Revolution instead of the Gamecube. It will disappoint Gamecube owners, but the number of people these days who actually care about the Gamecube is small - down to hardcore gamers who sometimes have to be sacrificed for mainstream success, unfortunately. They've already said that the game won't be released until '06. Might as well use it to open up the Revolution with a bang. A brand new Mario, Metroid and Zelda would make for one helluva credible launch lineup.