I got a Wii

[AlanS17]

Well... sort of. It's a Christmas gift so I don't get to actually open it and play it til Christmas. Got it at midnight at GameStop through pre-order.

[AtomSmasher]

Well... sort of. It's a Christmas gift so I don't get to actually open it and play it til Christmas. Got it at midnight at GameStop through pre-order.

If you preordered it and can't play it until christmas anyways, why did you go at midnight?  Seems like you could of waited until a more convenient time.   

[AlanS17]

Well I didn't pick it up. My brother did. See, I wanted a Wii for Christmas so I made it easy for my brother to get me one by pre-ordering for him. Then all he had to do was go pick it up.

I cheated and called the store. They confirmed that he already grabbed it. 

[RTSDaddy2]

I also got one for Christmas but it was my treat to myself and my wife,  so mine's open - placed the little thing inside our arcade cabinet front door last night!

God, what a night...I had NEVER done a launch before, so let me try and give the reader's digest version here.

- last week, Dad has stroke and we place him in nursing home on permanent basis.  This is both crushing - and a relief as it takes a load off my Mom's back (Dad had not been well for several months and had gotten grumpy and mean toward her).  Still though, it's hard being a parent to your parents.

- Monday 11/13: catches my eye that PS3 and Wii are debuting this week. Never a Sony person, I keep my eyes practically plastered to all things Wii. For as CRAZY as this is, the launch of the new Nintendo unit is the only thing that keeps me sane during this personal tragedy.  I don't know why, go figure.  It just excited me, made me smile.

- Wednesday / Thursday: Wii reviews are coming out.  Game system more fun, apparently, than initially thought...Wii remote is a stroke of genius.  Now I can't wait to see one actually work

- Saturday Morning 11/19: Finally discover in the early hours that Wal-Mart's 24 hour stores are doing a 12:01 launch.  According to net numbers, each has 53.  Change initial plans a bit.

- Saturday, 11/19, 3 PM - Check BYOAC board again for aid.  Am told 3 hours ahead might be ok to leave, but I decide on 6 to be safe.

- Saturday, 11/19, 6 PM - After a normal drive from my house to first Wal-Mart closest to me that is 24 hour, I arrive to find no one in Electronics...but then am told I need the Garden department.  Head for Garden department, ask for line.  I get there around 6 - 6:05 to discover I'm not the first in line, but I ain't the last either....15th!  To top it all off, they've only set out 20 chairs.  Begin to wonder about all that PS3seeker stuff...yep, they only have 20 units to sell to public, and I'm in seat 15.

Saturday 7:30 - 7:45 PM - Cold as heck now. Call wife, she brings coat.

Saturday 8:45 PM - Wife puts our little one to bed, calls grandmother (who lives next door) to  come stay with our daughter.  Sonya brews a pot of coffee, fixes me a latte, brings a blanket.  Stays while I take a restroom break.  Yes, I do in fact have the queen of all women.    
 

Saturday, 10 PM - FINALLY! We are moved inside! Even so, I cannot complain too much as Wal-Mart put out only enough chairs for the units they had...and we didn't have to stand the entire time.

Somewhere around 11:45, tickets are handed out.  We are told if we aren't there when our number is called, we can forget it.  Glued to my spot.  About 12:15 - 12:20 AM this morning, they called number 15.  I am praying "please let my debit card work" to myself.   Around 12:27 I walk out with one of the first Wiis off the assembly line.  Now, however, in the wake of the PS3 shooting we are all paranoid...looking over our shoulders as we leave to make sure no one is following us...finally get to car, head home.  The launch night is over - and I'm too tired to do anything except say "Thank God." 

Wal-Mart did handle this very well at my location. It was understood that if you left before you got your ticket,  you lost your spot.   The people in line with me were VERY laid back, just Moms, Dads, students, and friends hanging out, waiting and hoping to be amongst the first to try a great new gaming unit.   

It was fun, but unless the next wave is REALLY impressive I won't be doing that again for a long, long time.   I still have to go out today and pick up my pre-ordered Zelda from EB.  Thinking if I can find it that I'll go with Madden O7 and Cars or Excite Truck as well.  My wife EARNED her first Wii racing game and then some.   

[alomar721]

  got mine at target this morning got in line at 6:00am two hours before store opened. they had 39 to sell i was 35 . they did run out of zelda which upset me but  will get it, also the extra controller which i can get later.. i got call of duty. will play when i get home from work. best buy across the street was packed and they were only giving out 60.

[MustardTent]

Got mine this morning too at Toys R Us.  Also ran out of Zelda before I got to it, but no biggie.  I got there at 7:30, doors opened at 9, and I was about the 20th person in line.

The line experience was actually pretty fun.  Got to talk to some nice people.

[somunny]

Picked mine up last night at GameStop w/ Zelda, an extra controller and some other BS.  Went out this morning to check things out and maybe pick up a second for a friend.  If you weren't in line early this morning, you weren,t getting one.  For the most part, it doesn't look like there will be any walking into a store this afternoon and grabbing a Wii off the pile.  This sucker is sold out.

[Spaz Monkey]

Got in line at local target at 6:30ish am.  was 53/60.

[grueinthebox]

Wife and I were out this morning running errands and made the rounds just to check things out.  When we went by Target at about 8:30 there were about 8-9 people in line to get one, kid working there wasn't sure if the had any systems left beyond those for folks who were in the line, but thought they did.  I didn't bother asking anyone else to find out since we weren't picking one up anyway...  People were walking up occasionally and getting into the line, so I hope they had systems.  The Toys R Us down the way had about 20 people in line ~15 minutes before opening, so they should have had an abundance of systems left by my understanding (60-80 per TRU).  Wife's sister and her boyfriend waited in line at Best Buy for one.  They seem to have been the only place sold out at that point. 

Looks like if we'd been in the market for a system we could have had at least one, probably two, with no more than a 20 minute wait...  As it stands we're waiting until after Christmas - told family we wanted Best Buy gift cards, then we'll pick one up when they're available again.

[sphetr2]

You guys are going to hate me...I got to circuit city at about 8:30, got the console at about 10:00. I got the LAST ONE!

Also got a wiimote, red steel, and LoZ:TP. Was going to get a nunchuck, but they ran out.

[AlanS17]

Don't you need a nunchuck to play those games?

[shmokes]

The system comes with one nunchuck

[Samstag]

My wife started camping at 8am Saturday morning braving the cold and the unruly crowds of adolescents and DIDN'T get a WII!


Maybe if she did this at Target or Toys'R'Us instead of at girl scout camp she'd have been more successful.
   It's good practice for the PS4 launch, anyway.

[AlanS17]

Maybe if she did this at Target or Toys'R'Us instead of at girl scout camp she'd have been more successful.

 

[AtomSmasher]

So, for those who got on and are allowed to play it...how do you like it?  I'm really curious how people are liking the new controls.

[alomar721]

well got home from work tonight. i just got done playing the wii sport very great. i like  the bowling and  the boxing is a work out  . the controls seem fine to me. i hope to get on and play call of duty. if not will play tomorrow.

[somunny]

Amazing!  My wife and I tried out Wii Sports tonight and were both extremely impressed with how easy it was to pick up the mechanics of the different games.  Baseball, while simple, is especially fun.  And boxing wore my butt out!

I haven't gotten into Zelda yet.  Tomorrow...

[somunny]

I should add that on the negative side, the virtual consol game selection flat-out sucks.  Not quite what Nintendo was crowing about several months ago.  The internet, news and weather channels are also all non-op currently.

Still, Wii Sports is a fun way to waste time for awhile.  Amazing how it actually *feels* similar to hitting a baseball...  My mind is playing tricks on me. 

[albybum]

[MustardTent]

So, for those who got on and are allowed to play it...how do you like it?  I'm really curious how people are liking the new controls.

Well, I've only had it for a day now, but I still like the controls a lot.  Very cool way to play Call Of Duty. 

I haven't had a video game system make me smile and laugh this much since NES.  Personally, I think this is a much better purchase than the Xbox360 or PS3. 

[MustardTent]

By the way, the Wii does support WPA2 (I'm using WPA-PSK w/TKIP).  I searched before my purchase, but couldn't find this little tidbit of info.

It also uses an 802.11b radio, which I was a little disappointed in.  Would've been nice to have 802.11g.

[sphetr2]

So, for those who got on and are allowed to play it...how do you like it?  I'm really curious how people are liking the new controls.

Well, at first the controls were ---steaming pile of meadow muffin---. The cursor was all jumpy. So I re-synced the wiimotes. And still it was jumpy! So then I closed all of the blinds in the room, and it worked flawlessly.

Strange, I didn't think sunlight would have that big of an effect...guess it's cause I was facing right into it.

I played red steel and absolutely love it. Controls are very nice.

I haven't gotten too far in LoZ:TP yet (too busy with red steel), but so far all I've received is the wooden sword. The controls for that, unfortunately, are kind of sucky. As long as you wave the wiimote, it slashes. It doesn't actually trace your movements. At least that's what I noticed.

Wii Sports plays well too.

[RecycledPast]

No Wii for me.  I was lazy and didn't get to Target until 7:15am, all the tickets had been handed out.  This comic is pretty accurate;
http://xkcd.com/c186.html

[AlanS17]

It also uses an 802.11b radio, which I was a little disappointed in.  Would've been nice to have 802.11g.

This is sort of a non-issue since it's still faster than your broadband connection (and that's where any bottlenecks will occur). Might make a difference in networked games, but I doubt it. There won't be any massive file transfers so you don't really need the 802.11g capabilities.

[ChadTower]

If it ever gets an XBMC style capability you will.

[AlanS17]

I haven't gotten too far in LoZ:TP yet (too busy with red steel), but so far all I've received is the wooden sword. The controls for that, unfortunately, are kind of sucky. As long as you wave the wiimote, it slashes. It doesn't actually trace your movements. At least that's what I noticed.

That's one thing that was mentioned in reviews before. There is no mapping for the sword. The slash you perform, and the slash that Link performs will probably not be the same. That was brought up weeks ago, but I forgot the source - probably GameSpot.

... and Wii has no hard drive. There's nowhere to store large downloads. You'd have to have one heck of a memory card for that. Besides, at that poinjt, the bottle neck is still the broadband connection.

[ChadTower]

Broadband is only a bottleneck to the outside WAN.  It's not a bottleneck on the LAN and I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo tries to use the LAN at least as much as the WAN.

[AlanS17]

Broadband is only a bottleneck to the outside WAN.  It's not a bottleneck on the LAN and I wouldn't be surprised if Nintendo tries to use the LAN at least as much as the WAN.

Well 802.11g is good enough for streaming audio over a LAN. Streaming video is probably not practical even with 802.11g.

Nintedo is not builinding an all-in-one device like the 360 and PS3, though. They're building a video game console. I don't know how many of those other extra features it'll have. They have some broadband content such as news and weather, but we'll see how far they take it.

The only real LAN use I can find for this thing will be multi-player gaming. I think 802.11b ought to be fine for that. That's the core of the Wii's model. They wouldn't render it useless. I can only assume they know what they're doing.

[MustardTent]

It also uses an 802.11b radio, which I was a little disappointed in.  Would've been nice to have 802.11g.

This is sort of a non-issue since it's still faster than your broadband connection (and that's where any bottlenecks will occur). Might make a difference in networked games, but I doubt it. There won't be any massive file transfers so you don't really need the 802.11g capabilities.

I'm familiar with 802.11b/g.  I have actually developed the MAC for a couple 802.11 devices.  My problem is that my wireless router was previously only allowing 802.11g clients, and I had to change that setting because of the Wii.

Not really a big deal, but it was an inconvenience nonetheless.

[Samstag]

Well 802.11g is good enough for streaming audio over a LAN. Streaming video is probably not practical even with 802.11g.

Huh?  Until very recently I was doing video streaming over 802.11b on a regular basis.  I got better quality from that than I get from DirecTV.  I only upgraded to g because I'm doing file transfers.

[shmokes]

I've always heard that b was no good for video, but that g worked just fine.  I've never done it, though.  My XBMC uses cable.

[AlanS17]

I've always heard that b was no good for video, but that g worked just fine.  I've never done it, though.  My XBMC uses cable.

That depends on the quality of the video. If you're going to stream something of TV quality, I don't think 802.11g will cut it. That being said, I've never actually tried it. I've streamed video that's compressed/decompressed in real time from my Tivo over 802.11b and that worked fine. But the compression made the image quality suffer.

[shmokes]

Just to test this out I started Kill Bill Vol. 1 streaming on my XBMC and have been watching the network utilization on my PC for the last 30 minutes or so.  It's a Divx file encoded at 2200 kbps.  In the time it's been going network utilization on the 100 Mbps line connecting the PC to the Xbox has generally hovered around 2% with occasional spikes up to 5%.  That means that, at least for compressed video, 802.11b would probably be fine because 802.11b is certainly capable of handling everything I'm throwing at it including the 5 Mbps spikes.  And 2200 kbps is a pretty high bitrate.  That made about a 2 GB Divx file.  I'd say most people watching a Divx file of that quality would never know they weren't watching a DVD unless you told them.

[ChadTower]

I've always heard that b was no good for video, but that g worked just fine.  I've never done it, though.  My XBMC uses cable.

Depends on how you're streaming it.  If you're trying to stream raw video, analog style, it's no good.  If you're streaming it via TCP it depends entirely on the format... more than likely it's a compressed format in that case, DivX or such, and that would work just fine.

[MustardTent]

Getting back on topic, I find that I really enjoy the controller's built-in speaker.  Satisfying to hear the bat crack from your hand rather than whatever speakers you have.

Since I don't have Zelda, I've been wondering:  Hows does Twilight Princess use the speaker if at all?  Call of Duty 3 doesn't use it, and I'm wondering if the 1st party games are going to be the only ones for a while using all the bells & whistles of the controllers.

[somunny]

Getting back on topic, I find that I really enjoy the controller's built-in speaker.  Satisfying to hear the bat crack from your hand rather than whatever speakers you have.

Since I don't have Zelda, I've been wondering:  Hows does Twilight Princess use the speaker if at all?  Call of Duty 3 doesn't use it, and I'm wondering if the 1st party games are going to be the only ones for a while using all the bells & whistles of the controllers.

Some weapon effects and such, IIRC.  I'm sure the uses will improve over time.  One thing about Zelda that frustrated me was the fishing.  I fiddled with it for an hour before I figured out the little move you needed to perform to snag a fish.  Great game for sure, though I wish Nintendo had gone the high-def route.

I'm really only interested in games specifically made for the Wii.  First party titles.  I don't see myself purchasing cross-platform games that have Wii-mote fuctions tacked on.  COD3, Marvel Alliance and the like I'll pick up for the 360.

[AlanS17]

Since I don't have Zelda, I've been wondering:  Hows does Twilight Princess use the speaker if at all?

Though I haven't used it yet, it's my understanding that Zelda does use the speaker. When fishing, you'll be able to hear the casting. When drawing a bow, you'll hear the bow string tighten. I don't know which other situations apply.

I'm so totally ready to be playing that game. I don't think my brother hid the Wii anywhere in this house, though. I think he sent it with his girlfriend to her house.  I wanted to pull it out of the box and play it for a little while before it gets wrapped and stuck under the tree. I already know I'm getting one for Christmas so why make me wait, right? 

[More Cowbell]

Any ideas as to when the stores will be restocking or is it individual to each store? I'd like to pick one up for my kids (and by kids I mean my kids and me). 

[shmokes]

I played ExciteTruck at Game Crazy.  I hope the Wii remote was just low on batteries or that the sensor setup was just bad (the TV was mounted up high on the wall and the sensor bar was just sitting on the counter in front of me, abou 2-3 feet beneath the TV.  As far as I know ExciteTruck doesn't use the sensor bar anyway, but whatever the reason, control was AWFUL.  Rotating the controller often had little to no effect on the vehicle.

Turns would come up and my vehicle would barely turn or would even turn a little in the wrong direction.  It registered the gas and turbo buttons just fine, though, so I'm not sure what was going on.  At any rate, it was almost unplayable.  It barely felt like I was even controlling it.  I'm leaning toward something being wrong because while the game isn't getting great reviews, I would have rated it a 1.5 at best based on my experience.

So while I've technically played Wii now, I still feel like I have never played it, and I really really want to.

[AlanS17]

They've got demos at every GameStop, Target, and Best Buy under the sun.

I don't know when they'll be re-stocking, but I bet places like GameStop have some sort of next-shipment pre-orders going on.