Nintendo’s Wii came out a year ago this week. The little console that many pundits laughed at has turned out to be a completely disruptive influence on the market. Even Microsoft “gets it” now and just released the Xbox Arcade, an obvious attempt to cash in on a similar concept to the Wii’s family-friendly and party-friendly gaming experience.

Nintendo can’t make enough of these to suit demand anymore, and that’s even at a monthly production rate of 1.8 million units. A steady trickle of units has sold out within minutes, making it a Christmas bonanza for retailers after every shipment.

And the games keep pouring in, getting better and better. The games at launch were a bit suspicious. Everyone loved the ZELDA game, but others were a mixed bag. Remember RED STEEL? It was supposed to cash in on the new control scheme by giving you a first person shooter with both gun- and swordplay. Sadly, it didn’t quite live up to what people were hoping for, but it still sold pretty well. ELEBITS and RAYMAN RAVING RABBIDS took advantage of the new control scheme in more interesting ways, getting better reviews. And those RABBIDS returned for a sequel just last week.

I wrongly chose that MONKEYBALL game that I gave up on after an hour or so, though the disc golf mini-game was pretty cool. That’s what you get for choosing a game based on the $10 off coupon Best Buy offered up, rather than the MARVEL ULTIMATE ALLIANCE game.

The Virtual Console has churned out a series of classic Nintendo games, starting with Super Mario Bros. for Christmas last year. By now, the rest of that series is available, including LOST LEVELS. And though we might laugh at the offerings some weeks, there’s a wide back catalog of games from Sega, Turbo Graphix, Super Nintendo, and Nintendo 64 available for download for anywhere from $5 to $10.

While there is some understandable grumbling about the Wii being short on memory space, it’s a good problem to have. Once you buy the game, you can re-download it anytime you like. But the fact that you can download so many cool games that your Wii runs out of space is the kind of problem we only dreamed of having in the GameCube days. (I’m not a serious enough gamer to have hated the GameCube days. I had one for a couple of years. I had a few games I enjoyed on it for those spare times when I played, Super Mario Kart chief amongst them. It worked for me, but in a very similar way to the Wii, come to think of it.)

Heck, I’ve even started to have a blast with designing Miis. Some friends and I create characters and pass them back and forth at will, often causing a chuckle when a new character based on a mutual acquaintance drops into view.

2008 has seen, as predicted, a stream of great Wii games: Mario Strikers Charged, Metroid Prime, Guitar Hero III, and Super Mario Galaxy are the most recent. I said it last year when I initially reviewed the system: You buy it now for its future potential. There weren’t all that many games available at the start. And while most of them are still the kind of licensed assembly-line style games that consoles are infamous for, there are enough diamonds in that rough to make the Wii attractive.

And a year later, I’m still playing the pack-in game, Wii Sports, more than anything else. Nintendo’s only missing the boat by not producing a Wii Sports 2. They’re probably making up for that by selling Wii Play with a Wiimote. That game is selling like hotcakes, too. I wonder which drives that purchase more — another Wiimote, or the game? I don’t need a new Wiimote (I rarely use my second), so I haven’t justified buying another one yet for some mini-games.

The future is still coming, as the Wii Fit board promises a new method of game play, while the just-released Wii Zapper helps modify a popular control scheme with a cheap piece of plastic to give it a more “real” feel. It’s not just another Dance Dance Revolution pad here.The DS continues to outsell everything in the video game world, and the integration between it and the Wii is starting just now to ramp up, with the promise of DS demos flowing through the Wii coming in the spring.

Right now, I’m still happy playing Wii Sports.  A nice relaxing game of golf is always a pleasure, even with only nine holes.  I hit my first hole in one over the weekend.

And, hey, remember when Nintendo was going to die a horrible death for changing the name from “Revolution?”

They aren’t laughing anymore. . .

Happy First, Nintendo.

Related Various and Sundry posts:

• Well, it was worth a shot (19 Nov 2006) - In which I miss launch day
• Good Wii News (20 Nov 2006) - In which I redeem myself
  
• How I Got My Wii (21 Nov 2006) — still good advice for this Christmas season
• Initial Wii Impressions (22 Nov 2006)

This entry was posted on Wednesday, November 21st, 2007 at 8:04 am and is filed under Games. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.