E3 Impressions - Nintendo

Despite promises of core game announcements at E3, the Nintendo press conference focused squarely on a bunch of shit that I don't care about. The big announcement was Animal Crossing for the Wii. SNORE. I've already played it on two systems and they were identical. At least we know the Wii version will have waggle.

I watched the press conference live, but I only caught the last third or so. In that time, they were showing off Wii music. I think I can honestly say that it's the worst "game" that Nintendo has come up with yet.

Now, I'm generally a huge supporter of Nintendo and what they're doing with the Wii. It's opening up games to an entirely new group of people; I never thought I'd see my mom not only playing a video game, but enjoying it enough that she now has her own console. I find that incredible. That having been said, Wii Music is a joke. It requires no skill to play, there is no winning or losing, and there is no score. The "gameplay" doesn't even require button matching. To play the horn, you quite literally put the remote up to your mouth and push buttons randomly.

The most painful part of this presentation was their demonstration of gameplay. They brought out 4 Nintendo execs, all in their mid to late thirties, and had them play the Mario song on stage. This amounted to four fully grown adults jumping around the stage like retarded toddlers hopped up on sugar. It was so cringe-filled that I actually had to turn it off. The best comparison I can come up with is think of how you feel during the super awkward scenes in The Office. Now apply that to a group of real people. Harrowing.

I heard there was more horrible parts to the conference, but I just couldn't be bothered to take time away from doing absolutely nothing to listen.