A Nitrous Crouton

I’m slowly feeling the programming discipline come back. It has actually taken me a while to get back into the groove, it feels like the mental equivalent of starting to run again after a long layoff. It does feel good, but I suspect I do prefer to do technical planning and management versus actually writing code. That’s right, I’m one of them.

And I bought a Wii. My restraint was being generally eroded and my desire to play with my siblings when they visit for the holidays was too great. I woke up early with a splitting headache on Sunday morning and the knowledge that I wasn’t going to be able to get any productive work done for several hours, and that Best Buy would be selling Wiis at store opening. No, the Wii did not cure my headache, but it did make me giggle like a madman when I started playing with it.

I’m sure the novelty will fade a bit, but it was a strangely pleasing experience to configure the Wii when I first turned it on. Using the controller to point at the on-screen keyboard/number-pad to name the box, set up the network settings, etc. was a definite ‘new toy’ endorphin buzz. The user interface just feels right.

I bought Zelda and Rayman. I have not yet tried Zelda, I want to be able to give it a decent block of time which I don’t have at the moment. Wii Sports is a beautiful pack-in. Even though it’s simple, I’ve probably played Wii Golf the most, doing the three-hole course only takes a couple minutes and it’s proved to be a nice little brain break. After messing with Wii Golf, I’d definitely be interested in a more sophisticated golf title for the Wii, and I’m not a golf aficionado by any stretch of the imagination. Bowling is well done, but didn’t grab me, but then I recently spent time working on a bowling title. Tennis is just fun to do, it’s so simple but the fun is as much making the physical motions as playing the game. I can’t wait to play it multiplayer. Boxing and Baseball remain unplayed.

Rayman deserves a more detailed write-up at some later point. In short, I’ve only played it for a couple hours, clearing a couple of the stages, but I love it. The style, graphic and audio design, the mini-game concepts, the controller use, it’s brilliant.

For me, it has already been worth buying the Wii just for the fact that I couldn’t help but have a big goofy grin on my face while playing with it. I’m giggling to myself and feeling like a kid, versus a grizzled jaded old geek who has spent more than a decade working in the game industry salt mines. Bravo, Nintendo.