Consider the FPS.

You use the directional pad to walk, strafe and backpedal. You can point up and down to aim, move the wiimote down to crouch gradually, move it in a curve to turn, leave it in a sideways position (Pointing at a screen edge) to turn 180 or turn continuously.

All this combines to make a system that is completely intuitive and reacts to your movements with a lot more fidelity than a mouse can.

I feel strangely dirty fighting for the same cause as Verithrax...

I felt the same way when he started wielding that V for Vendetta avatar

But yes.. the Wii is going to open up a whole new kind of gaming to the casual gamer. My girlfriend and I, for instance, plan to get one partly because of the playful factor. And this is definitely something I can see parents getting for kids, because it brings a level of activity into video games that is otherwise lacking (and in some cases is the reason why parents don't like their kids playing video games)

Nintendo is doing the smart thing here, and really blowing the doors wide open. Kids and adults, and everyone in between can find something that has never been available before. A dad wants to spend time with his kids, but doesn't know how to connect with them? Suddenly he can actually golf or play baseball with them on their terms, without having to learn a bunch of un-intuitive controls; instead, he can just pick up the wii controller and take a swing.

Wii is going to dominate this generation in the Console Wars, hands down. Its going to be released before the PS3, and going to be half the cost. And, for the first time in a long time, we're actually going to see something new.

Sure, it might not work perfectly, but I'd rather the Wii do incredible sales so that it becomes evident to console developers that we want them to further the technology, and that we want more than button mashing in our entertainment. I know I do. Sure, it may look silly swinging a controller around... but when did it become a bad thing to be a bit silly when playing a game with your friends?

Also, it's so very refreshing to see a console that's not boasting about super awesome graphics. Past a point, I really don't care. Yeah, they're pretty, but they won't sell me a game. I'd love if they did Link's Awakening with the same graphics, but the date storage of a Gamecube disc, and made it HUGE, instead of making things prettier.

And fix the eighth level where you can completly screw the game over and have to start a new game. The colour version had the same problem.

Ape Escape used what was somewhat like a novelty controller for its time, and that game was highly badass.

Fallen has taken to coping me in using Nintendo avatars. *tease*

Eventually, we reach what I call the 'graphics singularity'.

This is where the quality of poligons and rendering and effects in games becomes on par with digital effects seen on film. In reality, game graphics are about five years before ILM; I can render Jurassic Park dinosaurs in real-time right now, and human beings in modern games look a lot more real than Neo did in the flashy, quick sequences of digital fighting in The Matrix.

The singularity is where the limit to graphical quality stops being hardware or software, and starts being art. Once we reach this point, and tools to develop art faster and more easily start to crop up (Not to mention procedurally generated art, like in Spore) we'll have something to replace the graphics race.

And I think that the singularity is going to be very close in this next console generation, and I think that graphics are going to be phased out.

Physics is the new graphics. One of Half-Life 2's selling points is its physics model, which is actually pretty limited and unrealistic, but it implements several things earlier games often did not - Density, for example, and with that buyoancy. The next installment of the series will simulate the real-time deformation of malleable materials (IE, steel girders will bend under weight, for example) and already we're seeing lighting effects that simulate the way the human retina works. The Wii, here, has an advantage, not in its processing power, but rather in how it gives us a much more intuitive, responsive, fine way of interacting with a tridimensional simulated environment. Think of simple things like object manipulation, for example, which can become engrossing and fine parts of a game. Simply being able to, in an FPS for example, hurl a grenade by actually controlling the movement, would be a huge increase in the quality of gameplay.

The next generation of graphics is going to use oculization (sp?) which treats light as physics so you get softer shadows and shading is done by the engine instead of the artists.

At least thats what GameDeveloper said this month.

I remember seeing scenes rendered wih oculization at sigraph last year, its really impressive.

I'll just buy the PS3 even though its going be like 700 dollars, but that does not matter I'll get it anyway.

can't wait to play Dead Rising, FF12, the other FF game with vincent, and still have not played the new Morrowind, it needs to be on PS3 too

oh and almost forgot about Fable 2 that is going to have online play which is freaking awesome!!!

heh

There's a rumor that the Wii is supposed to cost $230 and be released Sept 2nd There's a link to the ign article here.

But once again, it's a rumor...

I personally think the Wii is going to do the best (and hope it will), but I probably won't be able to get it for a little while...



And by the way, what's wrong with the eight level of Link's Awakening? I never had any problems with it...

The 2nd? DAY BEFORE MY BIRTHDAY. O_O

Oh, that. In the eight dungeon theres a part where you can only have one key but two doors to open. If you open the wrong one by accident you cant go any further cause whats needed to progress though further in that way is a bit behind the other door. It can be avoided, but Ive walked into it a few times.

No wonder I thought that was so hard my second time through. God damn bugs.

Its in both the Gameboy one and the Gameboy Colour one. Sucks much.

State saving at every door ftw.

The other rumor is that it will be released on October 2nd and and cost $250.

Nintendo released a press memo thingy and it said that the Wii's launch date might be hidden inside somewhere. People scoured over the thing and pulled from it that it will probably be October 2nd. Because it gave a list of game release dates, and there were 3 voids. October 2nd, then another which was the PS3 release date. And another that was after the PS3 release, and since Nintendo has said it would be out before the PS3, they figured it would be October 2nd.

But who knows? All I do know is that Super Monkey Ball looks like it'll be kickass. I love Labyrinth, and using the controller to manipulate the maze will be so much more like the real game.

I've beaten Link's Awakening like five times, never ran into that problem. :S

Ah, I know what you're talking about now.
And just to let you, it is possible to find another key, it just required some really creative thought... (pegasus boots are your friend)

What really was hard figuring out in that game was the swamp temple place where you had to kill the three things in a specific order to get the nightmare key...