Wii launch date/price revealed

I took a peek into the IGN forums when I saw this. They had themselves all hyped up that it was going to be $169 and release in October. It makes me laugh how wound up they are.

I hear it's coming with Wii Sports, which I think is pretty cool. If it came with 2 remotes, that would be even cooler. But either way, it's nice to finally know when I'm going to have to drop my money.

$169. Hah, what a joke. It was always going to be higher than $199, either $229 or $249.

250 with a game is actually a damn good deal if you think actually think about it...

Apparantely there are reports of a December 2 launch in Japan.

250$ with a game of your choice would be nice. I don't find Wii sports interesting at all. Still I'm not surprised.

Oh sure, the day AFTER my birthday. Bastards...

Guess it's time to get a job so I can afford it

Dammit, who cares about when it's released in the States? I wanna know when I can get it in the UK!

...but $250? That'd translate as about �175, I think. That wouldn't be too bad...

goKi wrote:the NY times is pretty much as reputable as it gets.

You might not know this since you don't live in the states, but the NYT has been under repeated controversy for fudging facts and literally making up stories out of nowhere.

http://www.engadget.com/2006/09/14/live-at-nintendos-nyc-wii-press-conference/

The price I expected, though I'm a little disappointed the date is so late. At the very least I was expecting *early* November. Oh well.

BTW, the whole Wii Channels thing is kind of cool. Reminds me a little of Tivo. And it's neat that they are packaging an Opera browser with it.

Edit:
http://www.nintendo.co.jp/wii/topics/wii_preview/presentation/index.html

That is pretty neat. It's all in Japanese, but they have videos of pretty much all the Wii features on there (and you don't need those in English to understand what's going on).

No word on an European release yet.. maybe they are pulling a Sony?

Anyway, console comes with the stand, the sensor bar, one remote and nunchuck, and Wii sports, which includes 5 games (I know of baseball, bowling, golf and tennis, but what's the 5th)

I like that there will be 30 VC games at launch, and I think the prices aren't too bad... 5 for NES, 8 for SNES, 10 for N64. Can't argue with that.

And ah yeah. The classic controller is an extra $20. And the box art is very apple-ish. Which isn't a bad thing.

It seems Metroid might miss launch, too. I could be wrong though, but it is hardly mentioned.

European release date comes tomorrow. It will be a worldwide release, as they definately used the words 'worldwide' in both conferences, i understand.

goKi wrote:European release date comes tomorrow. It will be a worldwide release, as they definately used the words 'worldwide' in both conferences, i understand.

No it's not being released until Dec. 2nd in Japan

There's only two weeks difference there. I'd count that as worldwide.

Haven't had time to look at all the information since I'm at BOT, but is that whole retro-classic downloading feature of old first party/third party games still a feature of the Wii? The retro-game library? Or was that finally taken out?

It's definately still in there. They announced the prices of the virtual console games today, too.

$5 for NES (very overpriced, IMO)
$8 for SNES (a little overpriced)
$10 for N64 (pretty nice price)

EDIT - Wii.com is now open with a bunch of movies and such regarding the new features. Looks pretty damn awesome.

The one thing, the ONE THING that really gets me down is that only one Wiimote is included, and extras are $40. One controller? WHAT!? Look, it's just that this whole "Wii" thing has been promoted to death, and I'm really annoyed by the fact that the first day, I have to go drop $40 if I want to be able to play against my friends. What the hell kind of crap is this? Okay, 10/10 for good business strategy, 'cause they're gonna make a lot of money from people buying extra controllers, but -several million out of 10 for good thinking. They promote it as a social thing, but give you one controller. Where's the sense in that? Grr...

Also, I may have missed it, is there any word on how much the classic controller will be.

The controllers do seem to be a little expensive. But yes, upselling is a retailer's best friend.

The Nunchuck is also included. Otherwise, IIRC no system since the freaking SNES has released with more than one controller (I don't include no-names like CD-i or Jaguar which I have no idea about, or most of Sega's stuff except Dreamcast only because I also have no idea but also because Dreamcast was really their only "successful" console since Genesis :P). It's just too expensive.

And $40 is about standard for an extra controller these days (I'm talking 1st party of course) - not to mention it being wireless, having motion sensor technology, and a built-in speaker. Besides, the classic controller is only $20 which isn't bad (IIRC that's how much SNES controllers used to cost to put it in perspective)

P.S. - As far as game pricing, that's pretty much exactly what I expected. I'm actually even a little surprised it didn't go $5 -> $10 -> $15. Considering the fact that Nintendo can repackage NES/SNES games on the GBA and sell them for $25-35, and sell them WELL, $5/$8 is really kind of cheap for them :P

Also notice they went with a "Wii Points" system instead of just "NES games are $5". They are "500 Wii Points". That just screams giveaways, free games with purchases (i.e. maybe if you buy Metroid Prime 3 you'll get a free copy of Metroid 1 in VC), promotions, etc. I suspect there will be other "free" (free in quotes because it will probably involve something like buying other games) promotions to get them too.

Like Warlock said, the Wii controller is fairly complicated and the price is totally understandable. You are still getting a good deal on the Wii. It certainly is tempting but I'm not buying it right when it comes out. Ofcourse you never know, I could be bored by then and buy it. Ofcourse Gears of War comes out around then too... Hmm...

MacWeirdo42 wrote:The one thing, the ONE THING that really gets me down is that only one Wiimote is included, and extras are $40.

Hey, the wireless controllers for the 360 are $50. So $40 isn't that bad.

I'm kinda bummed that MP3 is going to miss launch. The guy at e3 said that the game was basically done when they were demoing it (and what they showed us sure as hell felt complete), so I'm a bit surprised.

BTW, here's a list of the Japanese Wii titles for launch, post launch, and further down the line:
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6157582.html
This isn't exactly how it will be over here I'm sure, but it should be relatively close. I think the games I'll preorder are Zelda, Red Steel, and Warioware. Warioware is a great game for getting used to the controller as it asks you to use it in a whole variety of ways.

And Orion, the 5th Wii Sports game is boxing.

One more thing: It's been confirmed that Zelda isn't going to come out on the GCN until a couple weeks after it is available on the Wii.

Cloral wrote:Hey, the wireless controllers for the 360 are $50. So $40 isn't that bad.

I'm kinda bummed that MP3 is going to miss launch. The guy at e3 said that the game was basically done when they were demoing it (and what they showed us sure as hell felt complete), so I'm a bit surprised.

BTW, here's a list of the Japanese Wii titles for launch, post launch, and further down the line:
http://www.gamespot.com/news/6157582.html
This isn't exactly how it will be over here I'm sure, but it should be relatively close. I think the games I'll preorder are Zelda, Red Steel, and Warioware. Warioware is a great game for getting used to the controller as it asks you to use it in a whole variety of ways.

And Orion, the 5th Wii Sports game is boxing.

One more thing: It's been confirmed that Zelda isn't going to come out on the GCN until a couple weeks after it is available on the Wii.

In regards to MP3, I suspect they decided last minute to change something. I know IGN mentioned the control was a little ackward because the camera did not move with your gun (like EVERY other FPS out there) - Red Steel was the same. Maybe they are changing that? Or maybe it's something else.

Oh, and for the Japanese list, it's hard to say because it's not coming out till December 2nd in Japan. So some of those may be December titles and not launch titles for us. I wish they would post a US launch list 😞 But at the very least it should be close (within a month or two unless it comes out later here than in Japan).

I think MP3 may be delayed so they can work on WiFi features. I can't think of any other reason.

goKi wrote:I think MP3 may be delayed so they can work on WiFi features. I can't think of any other reason.

Yeah that would be a good reason. BTW, I looked at that list and it's definately incomplete. At the very least it's missing Metal Slug Anthology which is a confirmed launch title. Unless Japan is not getting that game (which would be wierd).

Warlock wrote:In regards to MP3, I suspect they decided last minute to change something. I know IGN mentioned the control was a little ackward because the camera did not move with your gun (like EVERY other FPS out there) - Red Steel was the same. Maybe they are changing that? Or maybe it's something else.

Actually that would be a good change. It was kinda nice to be able to aim within your vision without actually having to turn your view (like you could in real life), but at the same time it did make it harder to aim.

Metroid Prime 3 could also simply be delayed a short while if Nintendo is trying not to flood the gate, and save something for later on which is good game porfolio mangement I'd think. The FPS Aiming/Control system is of great concern to me. It sounds very interesting but it could just as easily turn out annoying/bad. I play Perfect Dark Zero like everyday, so I'll notice if a FPS plays shitty where as someone who doesn't play FPS games as often might not.

Oh and the other reaspn MP3 may seem like it's delayed is if you guys are looking at the japanese release list. The japanese versions of all the recent Metroid games has generally been delayed way beyond the english releases.

http://wii.ign.com/articles/732/732737p1.html

Just wanted to point out I was 100% right. MP3 now has a PC-style FPS control scheme (but it's an added thing, so it controls both ways now) Boo-yah!

goKi wrote:
$5 for NES (very overpriced, IMO)
$8 for SNES (a little overpriced)
$10 for N64 (pretty nice price)

As Warlock mentioned, when the NES classic titles are going for $20 minimum at launch, remakes going for 30 or 40 (for GBA or DS respectively), those prices are actually very reasonable. Especially since buying the original versions for your real NES will cost you far, far more. Something tells me that ebay resellers are going to see a dip in profits because of this.

Releasing the week before thanksgiving is probably a good idea. Big N wants to move a lot of consoles on black friday, and I'm certain they will. Maybe, if we're lucky, we'll even see some package deals that will make the system even more worth buying.

Virtual Console will have only a positive effect for collectors of real cartridges, but yes probably a negitive effect on sellers. Some of us like myself though, don't like the idea of paying for ROMs, I want something physical.

MottZilla wrote:Virtual Console will have only a positive effect for collectors of real cartridges, but yes probably a negitive effect on sellers. Some of us like myself though, don't like the idea of paying for ROMs, I want something physical.

But the good thing about ROMs is that it's very easy to change them, thus say, adding new levels to NES games or cool stuff like that.