That’s right, the Wii arrived back, safe and sound. Turns out my “main circuit board” needed replacing. I’m unsure as to what was specifically wrong, but the solution was really the best I could have hoped for. All my Miis and saved games were preserved, which is excellent.
The only downside is that UPS had my console in Horsham as of last Saturday but “kindly” refused to deliver it until yesterday. Ahh well. See you jive turkeys on Mario Kart!
Wii-less
Curse and blast! Above is the screen that I am now resigned to staring at each day until my Wii returns from the Nintendo service depot.
It started exhibiting “visual tearing” (little black shimmery spots) artifacts a few months ago, particularly in Zack & Wiki and Super Mario Galaxy, so much so that Z&W almost looked like a swarm of microscopic gnats was inside the TV and taking issue with Zack’s slow progress. So, just when I started getting friends (and friends) playing Mario Kart over teh Intarnet, I decided to send the stinkin’ thing in for service, as my warranty was creeping up towards expiration and I just wanted to have the whole thing over with. Of course, the day I send the Wii on its merry way, I arrive home to have my son say “Please, Daddy, can we play some Wii tennis or baseball?” in his best Dickensian waif imitation. Just about tore my heart out.
So Nintendo, hurry up! Daddy’s got some family bowling to attend to and some friends to race!
Defend Your Castle
Okay, this just looks ridiculously fun.
Nintendo released their “WiiWare” channel today, allowing original, direct-download gaming on the Wii in exchange for Wii points. Nintendo Wii Fanboy has posted their review of Defend Your Castle, one of the launch titles for the channel. The game is hard to describe, so I’ll let their video review do the picture-painting (literally) for me:
All of that for 500 Wii Points ($5 USD). I may have to throw down for it and some sweet River City Ransom before too long here.
Good Idea/Bad Idea
Good idea: Defending your intellectual property via every means necessary.
Bad idea: Defending your intellectual property via every means necessary by threatening to sue a competitor whose president is a former lawyer and who has the law on their side.
Good idea: Reading Dave Barry’s Tax Day column.
Bad idea: Reading Dave Barry’s Tax Day column at work and laughing so hard your coworkers question your sanity.
Good idea: Seek alternatives to fossil fuels.
Bad idea: Seek alternatives to fossil fuels by stupidly passing legislation that in effect turns edible foodstuffs into highly inefficient alternatives to dinosaur juice.
Continue reading “Good Idea/Bad Idea”
SBCG4AP — Good Jeorb, Guys!
So, uhhh, Strong Bad’s Cool Game For Attractive People is coming out in episodic form for the Wii via Nintendo’s WiiWare downloadable content service. It is official: there is now no good reason for you not to own a Wii and, like, 40 gazillion good reasons to do so (30-35 gazillion of which are the aforementioned “SBCG4AP”, as Strong Bad himself has labeled it.
Peep the trailers that hit the ‘Net today below:
Soooo grood. I mean, good. And great. Great + good.
…Saint Crispin On A Cracker! That’s Some Good Sith!
GamePro got their grubby mitts on an advance copy of Star Wars: The Force Unleashed for the Wii and, well, call me jealous. Their impressions of this early build are enough to make this Star Wars fan’s drool glands activate:
Having had extensive hands-on time with The Force Unleashed for Wii, we can indeed confirm that the combat makes great use of motion-based lightsaber attacks. It’s not 1:1 motion sensing, but it manages to mimic ‘saber swings in most directions (left to right, right to left, up to down, down to up, and straight thrusting). It’s not a completely new concept–Dragon Blade and No More Heroes used the same method to a degree–but a few additional Force-infused actions really sell the Star Wars Wii ethos. There’s blocking, which requires you hold the Wii Remote sideways so your on-screen counterpart can do the same. There’s also Force Push, which allows you to shove anything not bolted to the ground simply by thrusting the Nunchuk forward. A few basic actions are still mapped to standard button presses, but otherwise, this is about as immersive a motion-sensing Star Wars adventure can get.
They’ve even got a diagram laying out the full control schema.
Whoa momma. Yes, have some.
It’s A Brawl, Y’all
Super Smash Brothers Brawl for teh Weeee!the Wii. Now that looks like some good fun. Vinny and I will have to be hooking up the online VS. play, I tell you whut.
Them Old Folks Take Their Wii Bowling Seriously
The geriatric set has really taken to the Wii, apparently, and this mini-documentary goes to show the lengths to which they’re going in order to squeeze every last cent of value out of their (highly-desirable, easily eBay-able) Wiis:
Heh.
Source: Gizmodo.
Viele Verbindungen
Guten Abend, meine Damen und Herren. Welcome to “Doug’s Brauhaus von Linkenarbeitsgemeinschaftigenluftenwarnungsteinen”. Tonight we are featuring a sumptuous feast of the finest in hand-picked links, personally selected by the owner. Please won’t you consider the menu?
First off, we have two exquisite examples of technological cluelessness, the first of which, “Shut Up I Hack You“, features self-inflicted “haxx0ring” spiced nicely with some inappropriate l33t language and mild cursing. Next, we have the finely-aged Attack of the Repo Men, resplendent with paranoia, legal threats and a near-obsession with Russian hackers. I would suggest a nice hearty red wine to go with either link.
For those of you whose tastes instead run towards a more refined videogames-centric list, we have a wonderful preview of the Wii-specific controller developed for Guitar Hero III, freshly-picked news of a forthcoming “Beirut”/”Beer Pong” game headed for the Wii, a piquant “Jane Goodall among the Geeks of Penny Arcade”-esque article from WIRED and, of course, the trailer for Penny Arcade’s upcoming computer adventure game, “On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness”:Also of interest on today’s menu is a photo gallery of Goth Day At Disneyland 2007, a freshly-caught copyright infringer infringing on infringers who infringed upon him and word of the tarring and feathering of a known drug dealer in Northern Ireland.
Should you find the need to use our extensive, ahem, facilities, I might ask you to brush up on Male Restroom Etiquette:
For dessert, we have a lovely selection of Geeky Wedding Cakes. (I particularly like the Homestar Runner one, personally. Seriously.)
If I may be of any further assistance to you this evening, please don’t hesitate to call me back over to your table. Enjoy!
Bloody Brilliant!
Wii Fit: “No, honey, it’s not about Zelda, it’s a workout program! I swear I’ll lose my beer gut!”
Now you just have to find one of the stupid units (and it’s not like Nintendo is going to be helping you out any. Jerks.).
ADDENDUM:
“No, honey, I have absolutely no interest in Super Mario Galaxy, either!”