Pushed to the Edge #11: Birth, Death, and Resurrection

This week we've got three things to commemorate: the birth (sort of) of a console; the death of a studio; and the re-birth of two of gaming's best characters. First up is the console. I trekked over to the Nintendo Fusion Tour last Friday at the Tabernacle in Atlanta, where a large room was set up with loads of Wii demo stations. I've been eagerly awaiting the arrival of Wii consoles in stores, because I want to see if the public responds as Nintendo and analysts expect, and the tour was a way to get an early gauge of public reaction.

Some of the people I encountered hardly qualify as the market Nintendo needs to hit -- I talked to more than one person who claimed they'd come to the show specifically to play Wii, which at $50-$70 per ticket is some real gaming dedication.

Excite Truck Excite Truck

Beyond that crowd, some of whom made up a rather long line to play the Zelda demo, a lot of the people bustled into the large room under the Tabernacle seemed motivated by mere curiosity, and stuck around to wait in more than one line. As you'd expect, the Wii Sports and Excite Truck demos were popular and filled with people who aren't necessarily gamers, all of whom seemed to have no problems picking up and learning the control system.

Everyone I talked to was enthusiastic about the system, and I didn't even have a big video camera on my shoulder to entice punters into enthusiasm. I didn't do any sort of scientific polling (come on, it was Friday night!) but there was more enthusiasm for the Wii than for the PS3 or 360 when I asked about what systems people thought about buying this winter. Price had a lot to do with it, but the controller was a selling point, too, and I'll be even more curious to see what happens when people get their hands on it in stores soon.