Thank you.

It sounds like half the people want Reggie to drive to their front door, give them a hug, and give them a free Wii, along with any number of games they want at no extra cost.

Whine whine whine. There's more into setting a launch date other than 'OMGS WE MUST PLEASE THE INTERNET WHINERS!'

Here are a CRAPLOAD of Wii interface videos from Nintendo's Japanese website, all with translated descriptions: Link

You can see everything from the Virtual Console, photo browser / slideshow, weather channel forecast, web browser, messaging system / bulletin board, and some sort of character creation tool for the Wii sports games all in action.

The interface looks very Mac-esqe to me. Also, it appears they will be selling the same type of currency as Marketplace points for the virtual console games, among other things.

That's a fair point, but it could still be used for Standard Def.

I realize the two companies are in wildly different markets, just thought the Wii would fit the bill nicely for many people to do what apple is trying to do.

Dear Nintendo,

Please count me as a definite purchase on launch day.

Tell me I'm not crazy in that the Wii Sports videos on page 11 look awesome! I think it has confirmed to me that Duck Hunt is on that pack. And the Boxing looks great as well.

Here we go with the whining about the whiners. Why is no one allowed to complain? We've followed this launch with great enthusiasm for over a year. Are we not allowed to voice our disappointment when all that enthusiasm is shot to hell? Just because we will probably be buying it anyway doesn't mean we can't vent our disgust over the final package/price/launch date.


Exactly. That makes sense and justifies the price for a "turbocharged" Gamecube. What gets me is this whole campaign to get new gamers. How is a $250 barebones system do that? It doesn't. You have to have that package that is ready out of the box, and word of mouth gets around that you have to get it because everything is good to go out of the box, not a barebones setup where you have to buy everything seperate day 1. New consumers won't do that.

Don't want to thow in an extra $50 controller & $30+ game? Throw in the $15 VC controller and a few VC downloads. That would be gravy for them. I'm just saying give us something more for our $250 than Gamecube 1.5 and a new controller. You know who this really hurts? Third parties. With the rumored low price I was planning picking up about 3 games, possibly a couple from third parties. With a $250 price, looks like a first party launch only for me.

Of course this is all speculation until the official announcement still. Reggie may have something special in mind for the US, but my hopes have definitely been dampened. Some PR control would have been nice to put the kabash on the rampant rumors that spun out of control the past 6 weeks.

Long winded response aside, I've never missed a Nintendo launch, but if a barebones Wii is on the table for $250, I'd need to do some serious thinking about it. Might have to go with a 360 F.E.A.R. and Gears of War fall, and maybe the woefully mispriced Lumines. I'm sure this is not what Nintendo wants to happen.

Well, the same could've been said at the releases of the Gamecube, N64, SNES, and NES. The difference is you would've gotten to choose what game you got with those systems and with the NES and SNES, $250 would've actually gotten you pretty close to a system, 2 controllers and 2 games.

I'm not sure why anyone should feel lucky that prices haven't gone up exponentially over the years, as that would be the complete opposite of how things work with other recent technologies. See cell phones, computers, hard drives, digital cameras, televisions, etc., etc., etc. for examples. Over time, things get better and they get cheaper.

I'm pretty sure this thread is open to people's opinion's and not just a place for posting hard facts. For the record, the Nintendo announcement isn't bad enough to stop me from getting one, but I do feel like they're making some mistakes and that it has the potential to hurt them. If Microsoft were to add a small hard drive to their Core system, I could see a lot of one-console gamers going for a 360 instead of a Wii.

Michael, again, the system will come with Wii Sports in the US, so argueably they are providing a complete system ready to go, no additional investment needed.

I missed that. Wii sports and one controller still doesn't make sense though.

Ouch on the (possible) release date. Still, I'm getting one release date either way.. that way will just make the Thanksgiving holiday sweeter. I'm not sure about the price whining.. Nintendo should meet people's speculation?! That doesn't make sense to me.. the price (if $250) is what was expected to anyone with common sense, between $200 and $250. Methinks someone was reading too many of those $150 and $170 rumors.

Anyway, things should be starting in NYC right about now so let's just wait and see.

Now this stuff is really interesting me. I don't know how often I would use most of it, but its pretty cool.

I'm still probably getting one, but I just would like the option to get it without Wii Sports. Don't know how long that would hold my interest, but I'm betting not long. Having Duck Hunt though makes it a bit sweeter.

FUCKING FUCK!

I just caught something.. if it's 11/19 then that's three days before my biggest holiday release (Tales of Destiny PS2 Remake).

Generally speaking, a company shouldn't make decisions to meet speculation, but if they're any good at PR, they should definitely keep that speculation from getting so out of control that it sets up expectations they know they can't meet.

And they DID. They've said all along, "$250 or less."

Confirmed now.

With Nintendo's American conference set to start any minute, USA Today is confirming the U.S. Wii launch date of Nov. 19 and price of $250 in the U.S. (the news was originally broken early this morning by the New York Times). The USA Today story also includes confirms $5 -$10 pricing for most virtual console games and has a picture of what seems to be the U.S. box for the system (above) complete with a big note that Wii Sports is indeed included.

"or less" leaves it open for debate. That means they were just bullshitting the whole time. If it was $250 say $250. Don't get people hopes up putting "or less" in there.

Oh well, time do get to work.

Well, while I was getting all ready for a Wii sooner rather than later, at least now I'll have time to play Saint's Row, Dead Rising, and Okami.

According to the GoNintendo liveblog, Reggie has confirmed the $249.99 price and 11/19 launch date.

Edit: Oh, and only white consoles at launch - no black or other color options.

Edit 2: Console comes with Wii Sports. Seems like the newspaper article from last night was spot-on.

Guess Wii Sports IS a pack-in!

Nope, they just updated again, Wii Sports is included with the console.

C'mon. Don't you remember the old Atari 2600 commercials? "Under 50 bucks! (50 bucks?)" when it was $49.99? Whenever a company says $x or less, it's usally $x or $(x-1).99.

I've expected $250 all along. Anything else was just wishful thinking, and that's pretty obvious.

Wii Sports IS a pack in.. Joystiq has the box art up.

Ok, I'll just think of it as $199.99 for the system and $50 for Wii Sports.

Yeah, not bad now there's a reason for the extra cost over Japan's $215ish. Still makes more sense to include 2 full controllers. No biggie.

The fact that Wii Sports now includes Bowling and Boxing sweetens the deal a bit. The Boxing game definitely seems promising, especially if they use the nunchuk for controlling the boxer's left hand and the Wiimote for controlling the right hand (which is pure speculation on my part).