Thanksgiving with the Wii

I haven’t fully recovered from Thanksgiving, so I’m a bit behind with posting. Just ten working days until I get my big vacation, so I’m excited about some quality time with Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess.

We took our Wii with us for Thanksgiving at my in-laws. I was really interested in how it would be received, since there are many ages and skill levels in the family. My two brothers-in-law are avid gamers, particularly football games, so I expected Madden 07 to get a lot of play over the weekend if anything did. I figured it would be something that I might get some of the family to try, but I didn’t think it would be a smash hit. I was wrong.

I hooked the console up on Thanksgiving Day at about 11:00 AM. Setup was really fast the second time through. The only real challenge was the TV cabinet. The TV barely fits inside of it, so I initially put the sensor bar on top of the entertainment center. Bad move. The cursor was uncontrollable, so I squeezed it above the TV and everything was fine.

I threw Wii Sports in to let brother-in-law one, Jeff, get used to the controller. We started with baseball, since he played baseball in high school. It was ok, but baseball isn’t the strongest game in the collection. I suggested tennis, which turned out to be a great idea. He liked it so much that he got my other brother-in-law, Mike, to play. A couple of hours later, we broke for dinner, which Jeff cut as short as possible to get back to tennis. My wife joined in as the fourth for another couple of hours.

We switched over to bowling after that. I believe Wii Sports Bowling is the strongest of the five titles. Golf is a little twitchy in the short game. I haven’t even played boxing yet. Over the next couple of hours, plus three or four more on Saturday, we bowled like crazy. We created Miis for everyone – another great diversion and more fun than you expect- and got going. My eight year old nephew thought Bowling was the best thing ever. Even my mother-in-law, after she stopped being grumpy about playing a video game, got into it and bowled well.

All told, both brothers-in-law are at least considering getting a Wii based on their experience with it. I once read that Nintendo was doing community-based advertising with the Wii by letting families bring in friends and play with a unit. It is a device that is much better used than shown. In my limited experience, the people who use one walk away impressed. Packing Wii Sports with the console was a great move, even though it probably raised the price of the console. A lot of gamers probably would not have picked it up since the launch lineup was so strong, but it would have been a mistake. I’m not saying that it would have been worth $50, but it is the best demo Nintendo could have ever asked for.

It’s no wonder that over 600,000 Wiis have been sold in eight days.

Technorati Tags: Nintendo, wii

Wii Setup

I go the Wii unpacked and set up, so I’m not a bad owner anymore. Setup couldn’t have been easier, though I did have a few small issues.

My first impression was that the box was heavy for such a small console. The shipping weight is about 7 lbs, and it felt every bit of it. The funniest thing is that the manuals were one of the heaviest individual items in the box. Unpacking felt very iPod-like. The box was split into two trays: one with the console and power supply and another with the other accessories.

I got everything hooked up in just couple of minutes. There weren’t any major issues there. It just works. After power-on, the console goes straight to the Wii Menu. I decided to hit the shop first, so I was prompted for wireless networking settings. It took a couple of tries, but I got everything configured and it downloaded the first of two updates. It took somewhere around ten minutes for each of the updates to download and install.

One interesting thing was the virtual keyboard that was used for character input. It uses the rumble in the remote to provide feedback on the cursor location as it crosses keys. It was very intuitive and fast. Creating a Mii that looked like me was a blast. It didn’t take very long and is one of the most fun parts of setup.

One disappointment for me was that Golden Axe was not in the launch lineup. It will be out soon, but I want it now!

Wii Sports impressions next up.

Technorati Tags: Nintendo, wii

Casino Royale

I’ve gotten a little skeptical of the James Bond franchise over the last few movies. I felt like they got a little predictable and a bit campy. I don’t know if it is the new Bond, Daniel Craig, or the fact that the studio chose to revisit Casino Royale, but I was pretty interested in seeing it.

This movie is not your father’s James Bond. It felt more like The Borne Identify than the Bond movies that I remember watching. Yes, there was the ever-present Bond Girl and Aston-Martin, this time the fantastic DB9. There were a few gadgets, though most of them were cell phone-related. What there was though was a ton of action. Absolute, wall-to-wall, pulse-pounding action. The foot chase scene in the first ten minutes was enough to do most movies proud.

In some ways, the movie lacked that central villain that is so common the the Bond movies, but the the plot followed the trail of blood well and there are lots of twists to keep it interesting. The poker game was brilliant, as were the settings used in the film.

If you like action, spy thrillers, or James Bond, run to see this movie.

Technorati Tags: casino royale

Nintendo Wii

We got ours after about a four and a half hour wait on Saturday night at our local Wal-Mart. I was number 27 of 27 available consoles at the store. The store’s assistant manager, Sid, was absolutely awesome. He kept us informed with up-to-the-hour stock updates, timing information, and other info as the night progressed.

After al of the PS3 horror stories, I was pleasantly surprised. Everyone in our line was really nice and very excited to get their new console. There were a few really interesting stories. The two guys in front of me in line hadn’t heard about the Wii until Saturday. They were so impressed they went to find a line to stand in.

The funniest was not so happy for the customer though. A lady and her daughter walked up behind behind me and got in line. I struck up a conversation about how things were going and what the expectations were for the evening. We talked for a little bit and I found out that they were really just holding a place in line for the lady’s son-in-law who was driving from about thirty miles away. He arrived and the lady and her daughter left. He stood there for about half an hour talking about the Playstation 3 launch. Eventually, the topic of the Wii came up and he hadn’t heard of it. That’s right. Over an hour of time invested between the three of them for… wait for it… a Playstation 3 shipment that wasn’t coming.

I’m a bad console owner. I haven’t unpacked it yet. I had Thanksgiving with my folks today, so we haven’t been home. Since I’m on vacation tomorrow, you’d better believe that it will be finding a home in my entertainment center.

Technorati Tags: Nintendo, playstation, sony, wii

Wil Wheaton on why the Star Wars prequel trilogy sucked

Yes, that Wil Wheaton, but don’t judge. Wil is a great writer and has seriously overcome his Wesley Crusher stereotype.

One if his weekly columns is Geek in Review, in which he tackles pressing issues of geekdom. This week, the topic is why the new Star Wars trilogy sucked wind. I agree with almost all of his points here. I was stoked when the prequel trilogy was announced. It was shortly after the original trilogy was rereleased in theaters, so I was really excited. I enjoyed the re-release of the original trilogy because I had not gotten to see the original trilogy in theaters. The changes weren’t great, but I was thrilled to see it on a big screen.

When The Phantom Menace came out, I was thrilled, but it quickly faded. I thought it was a bore and, with the exception of random coolness like podracing, I was underwhelmed. I might have watched it one time since and don’t really plan to watch it again.

Attack of the Clones was mediocre, but better than Phantom Menace. All in all, it sucked until we got to the battles at the end. I did enjoy the Yoda battle, but I agree with Wil when he says that it seemed out of character. Still, it was good.

Revenge of the Sith makes me the most conflicted. I liked it a lot, but it had some serious flaws. I thought a lot of it was a little contrived, but what can you do? It was still my favorite of the three. I remember leaving the theater excited about a Star Wars movie for the first time in, well, a long time.

Just remember, Jar-Jar was the real Sith Master. He’s lurking out there… somewhere.

Technorati Tags: wil wheaton, star wars

New Spiderman 3 trailer

I can’t wait until May 4th. Watch here.

Technorati Tags: movies, spiderman

Studio 60 Gets Full Season Pick-Up

Woo hoo! John Goodman rocked the last couple of episodes.

Studio 60 Gets Full Season Pick-Up – ComingSoon.net:
NBC has renewed its critically acclaimed, first-year drama “Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip” (Mondays, 10-11 p.m. ET) for the remainder of the 2006-07 season, it was announced today by Kevin Reilly, President, NBC Entertainment.

CNN rips the Zune. Sort of.

This video is circulating on the web. It is a CNN/New York Times review of the new Zune from Microsoft and it isn’t pretty. The main knocks are the chunk factor and limited WiFi.

Two questions asked by the host that made me laugh:

1) While holding her iPod Shuffle, the female host asks “Why would I buy that, even though I get video…?”
2) The male host, while signing off says “Why don’t they get some decent design people to make things look better?”

Her question is priceless and I don’t have a good answer to. I love my iPod and I see no reason to change.

Oh, and some users are reporting problems using the Zune with Windows Vista. Not good at all.

Technorati Tags: iPod, Microsoft, zune

FreeMacWare.com : Free Software For Macs

FreeMacWare.com is a pretty sweet blog showcasing free mac software. Since I’m cheap, its a great resource.

One of the most interesting things about the Mac community is the amount of single purpose applications that are out there. I’ve always felt that the Windows community tries to have too many “swiss army knife” applications. Simple apps that do single functions well are good things.

Technorati Tags: mac, freemacware

UK fans in Japan

I was reading Kotaku’s coverage of the PS3 launch in Japan and saw this picture. Kentucky has fans everywhere. These just happen to have travelled to Japan to get a PlayStation 3, sorry PLAYSTATION 3, according to the name of the picture. That’s extreme.

Black Friday deals

In case you haven’t noticed, we’re getting close to Thanksgiving. That means we’re even closer to waking ourselves up really early to fight an angry mob looking for a cheap laptop.

If you want to know what will be on sale, go here.

Colbert quits

Funny reaction to the election.

here

Elections

Elections are very important. So are short speeches. Who wants to listen to a really long concession speech? Aren’t months of campaigning enough?

Even worse, why do reporters ask stupid questions.

Q: You lost tonight. How do you feel right now?
A: I feel energized and ready to come back for another exciting campaign in four years.
Real Answer: I feel like I got hit by a truck. I spent millions of dollars and got hammered by a person that I don’t feel is right for the job. How would you feel?

It is even more fun when they really are honest when they lose.