And it is awesome. Here is my story. If you don't want to see the story and go right to my impressions skip this part.
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The Best Buy that I was planning on getting it at had 45 units. I was shooting to get Legend of Zelda and Trauma Center. When I went to go check out the line around 5:15 p.m. there were already twelve peopel waiting in line. I talked to them for a bit and asked one guy who waited for the Playstation 3 what he think the line would be like. He said the PS3 line filled up fast (they only had 26, 20 of them were the $600 versons and the other six were $500 versions). My girlfriend was coming over just to hang out so I decided that I would wait in line all night if the line looked to be building up around midnight or 1 a.m. after my girlfriend left.
When she got to my apartment, she told me that she was spending the night. She knew of my Wii plans, and told me that she would be willing to go in line whenever I wanted to. So I formulated a plan that after we grabbed a bit to eat (along with other personal busniness that I had to take care of), we would go to sleep ASAP and wait in line at 3 a.m.
That part of the plan kind of worked. I did manage to get to around 9:30pm (so did she). However, I woke up at 2:15 and I knew I wouldn't be able to go back to sleep. She kind of woke up with me, so we deicded to go then.
When I got to the Best Buy, There were several people there, but I was the 20th person out of the 45 Wiis in stock! My girlfriend choose to sleep in my car. The same guy who got his PS3 at the very sane store remembered me from before and gave me a ticket. He was running his own thing where everyone who showed up recieved a ticket. This was part of some sort of "honor system". That way we could roam about freely, go to the bathroom, and go grab a bite to eat if we choose to do so. The only rule was that we couldn't leave forever, because that wouldn't be fair for obvious reasons.
To pass time, a small group of us exchanged funny stories, talked about local arcades that were no more, and just talked about gaming in general. Everyone was very cool. One guy gave me a brand new pair of thermal socks that he bought at K-Mart right before coming to stand in line because I simple stated that the only part of my body that was cold was my feet.
Anyway, most of the other people didn't show up untill 6 a.m-8a.m Right when we got 45 people, a Best Buy emplyee handed out vouchers so we would get our system for sure. We all kept the honor system going and no one tried to cut in line. The only thing that kind of went wrong is that once inside, the numbers weren't called in order. It was whoever happened to be first would have their first choise of games, accessories, and whatever. We weren't THAT out of order, but I just hope that numbers 40-45 were in the back of line because the people who dragged their asses out of bed deserved to get Zelda over those people who got a full nights rest.
Anyway, I got the games that I was shooting for, a SD memory unit, 2000 Wii points, and of course...The Wii.
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Impressions:
Right when I turned it on any doubt of the Wiimote being inacurrate was cast aside. Like many of you may have read, the Wiimote doesn't require you to wave your arm around all crazy like. The accuracy is perfect. When you boot up your system for the first time, it asks you where you placed your sensor bar. I placed mine lazily at the bottom of my TV. It's not even perfectly centerd or straight and there have been no problems at all. The only thing was annoying is that I had ot do two system updates (I could connect to the internet right out of the box since I have the Wi-Fi adaptor I bought for the DS) that took a bit long.
I decided to buy Sonic the Hedgehog (yes Joel, I know you're proud of me) from the Virtual Console list. That cost 800 pts (same price for SNES games). All of the Nintendo games cost 500 points and Super Mario 64 cost 1000pts, which is the only 64 game out on the list right now. I decided to save the rest of my 1200pts to wait and see what else is released.
As predeicted, you was turn the Wiimote sideways to play since it is kind of like a NES controller. It felt [i[slightly[/i] weird to hold it that way, but my hand didn't interfere witht he signal at all like some people worried. You can use a GameCube controller to play if you wish. Plus, you'll be able to use the Classic Controller when it comes out (I think in about a week or so).
There is also a News and Weather channel (I haven't checked that out yet), and some photo channel you can play with. I know you can take SD cars from cell phones or your cameras to put them on your Wii (I think). Another option seems to be something where you can download pictures off the Wii message board. I don't know if that means that you can post pics there and then download them or if Nintendo will put out pics you can download or what.
Also, there will be some sort of internet browser coming soon, according to a memo I read in the Wii shopping center.
I have played Zelda, but not Wii Sports (it came with the system) or Trauma Center (which I imagine will play like the DS version expect using the Wiimote instead of the stylus). I am going to make a thread for Zelda Wii impressions now.
Overall: I am very happy with my purchase. I can't wait to see how people developers will take advantege of Wii hardware.
