Buying A Games Console As A Gift
If you decide to buy your child or grandchild a gaming console, there are certain things you should take into account in order to get the best possible choice for them. Here are a few of the things to consider when deciding what console to purchase.
First of all, there is the prices. It's rather self-explanatory, really. Not only should you decide just how far you are willing to go in terms of the console itself, but keep in mind the cost of the games and accessories. Games on the Xbox 360 and PS3 generally cost $60 at release, while Nintendo has promised that their games on the Wii will not cost more than $50, as an example. Do you plan on buying a game to go with the console? And then there's controllers. While the Wii itself is extremely cheap for a console, a complete controller can cost up to $60, almost twice as much as for other consoles.
Then there is the nature of the games on the platform. The Wii is currently considered a family-oriented console, with many party and multiplayer games available. The Wii is a very kid-friendly console at the moment, whereas the Xbox mostly excells in terms of shooting games, and the PS3 has many types of games, but most of them are geared toward older kids.
Is the person you are buying for a fan of a particular developer of company? If he has experience with games on older Nintendo systems, the games on Wii like Zelda: Twilight Princess, Super Mario Galaxy, and Metroid Prime 3 may be familiar and fun. However, if he's allowed to play more violent games and enjoys shooters and whatnot, the Xbox 360 has a better offering in that area. Not that he won't find good shooters on the Wii, but they are not as readily available as on the 360, or the PS3 for that matter.
Another thing worth mentioning is that online play on the Xbox 360 requires a monthly or yearly membership subscription, whereas on the Wii and and PS3 it's completely free.
Lastly, how are you going to buy it? At a store, or online? If you are planning to buy extra controllers or games, etc, you can save money with an online bundle. On the other hand, you have a better selection if you buy all the things you think you need seperately at a store.
When it comes down to it, the process probably isn't nearly as complicated as it looks. I'm sure you will make the right decisions to get the perfect console.
Graphics The Wii And The Amiga
The arguments about the graphic power of Wiiconsole compared to other current systems will continue and people will have their favorite systems and want to defend their choice but there is no doubt that the most important feature of any system is what games are available and how good the gameplay is.
To demonstrate the point here is a video which briefly shows 100 games that were available for the Amiga home computer and many of them date back to the 1980's. The graphics were good in their day but now look a little basic but these games had oodles of gameplay and gamesplayers were enthralled.
You don't need incredible graphics to have superb gameplay which is why the wii console is so good with it's motion sensing controllers which give you the feeling that you are a part of the game instead of simply watching.
Win A Wii
If you are struggling to get hold of a wii games console, or even if you aren't, you might be interested in taking a look at this website I discovered that is offering a wii console as a prize.
You can enter once per day up until the contest ends on the 31st Dec 2008. If you are interested ... click here
Wii Hacks – Cool Things You Can Do With Your WiiMote
You may just think of the Wii Remote, or WiiMote, is just a revolutionary new way to play video games but it also opens up all sorts of new possibilities outside of video gaming. For an example we have the "WiigoBot, a Lego Robot specially designed to hold the WiiMote in the upright position and flick it at the right moment in Wii Bowling. With this you can bowl a perfect game without physically playing! One may wonder why someone would want to do this and the answer, almost certainly, is because they can.
Another, perhaps more useful and practical example is by reconfiguring your WiiMote to work as a computer mouse. You can find plenty of video tutorials showing how to do this online.
I think the most ingenious uses of the Wii that we have seen so far have been devised by Johnny Lee, formerly of Carnegie Mellon University and now employed by Microsoft. His contributions have include an interactive whiteboard and "head-tracking technology" to see a video presentation of this click.. wii whiteboard.
This incredible interactive whiteboard requires only a WiiMote, a Bluetooth connection for your computer, and an LED pen. The reason that these few items can achieve this magic is down to the WiiMote which contains a fairly high quality infrared camera. The result of these experiments was a whiteboard that is truly interactive. One can "draw" on it, or even move or shrink portions of it as in the film Minority Report and Lee makes the software that you need to drive it freely available on his website.
Now, Lee's head-tracking technology is another example of someone using their knowledge of what is required together with an understanding of the clever technology the wii console uses. I doubt very much that the original developers ever conceived an idea like this or I feel sure they would have developed it as part of the wii bundle you buy. Lee has discovered a method for making a television display interactive with the movement of an individual person.
Making the discovery of this effect he described it as similar to the sensation of looking out a window. When you move to the left or to the right while peering out of a window, your field of vision changes. The closer you get to the window, the wider the area you see. Lee's adaptation of the WiiMote technology provides interesting possibilities for Nintendo Wii game developers and perhaps other applications as well. It opens up a whole new area of gaming for Nintendo and no doubt they will make good use of it.
The head-tracking technology works for reasons similar to the factors that make the interactive whiteboard possible. Since the WiiMote contains an infrared camera, all you have to do is place the WiiMote in front of the television and pointed toward the room, and the gamer must wear a device that mimics the sensor bar. Lee found the simplest way of doing this is by retrofitting safety glasses with LED sensors on each side which enables the interactive experience that could take future video gaming to a new level.
The WiiMote contains the possibilities for so many new applications in business, scientific research, and of course gaming. We can expect to see a whole new generation of interactive games and applications in the future. Who knows what new uses developers and researchers will come up with, next. These WiiMote hacks show how relatively inexpensive technology can replace applications costing hundreds or even thousands of dollars and manage to do 90% of what the more expensive technology is capable of achieving.
Wii Console Tops Ebay Sales In 2008
The online auction site eBay has released a list of the most popular items sold in 2008. In what they term the pop culture obsessions, the wii console bundles and related items is in first place followed by the Xbox. Here are the top three listings and sales numbers.
- Nintendo Wii - 2,056,866 related items sold
- Xbox 360 - 1,297,903 related items sold
- Apple's iPod Touch - 281,361 related items sold
