New Arrival

It's hard to believe the year is now more than three-quarters over. It only seems like a few weeks ago that I returned from holiday and began larking around on my new Xbox, as well as burbling on about it here of course. Now, however, I've got over 50 games for Microsoft's behemoth and had no plans to acquire any other systems for the foreseeable future. Then, however, for reasons I'm still unable to understand, I pretty much spontaneously decided I would buy a Nintendo Wii as well.

Not a bad haul for a grand total of £52 I guess!

Actually, I think it must have been partly because, as a result of my Xbox game-buying exploits, I had discovered how cheap Nintendo's console now is as well, but that alone can't be responsible - I've never really had any interest in it before, after all. In fact, I'd even go as far to say it was the target of some mocking on my part. Just take a look at the Wii shelf in any gaming store (I guess you'd have to go back a couple of years now though) and you'll see what I mean, surely? Quite a sizeable percentage of the titles that no doubt stand before you can scarcely even be classed as 'video games' never mind good ones! Anyway, that's a subject for another time I suppose. Decide I did, and soon afterwards I had duly selected a random example from the extensive list at the mighty fine CEX online store, and for a mere £24 I might add.

As soon as I placed my order I felt a little regret, however. I knew my wife wouldn't be happy for one thing, and her expected argument would be a valid one - it was cheap indeed, but did I really need yet another console? No, I definitely didn't. I still have dozens of games I've never even played (including lots of recent GOG and Steam 'bargains'), I certainly don't need more stuff clogging up my 'to do' list. Oh well, it was too late by this point so I just waited for the console and the handful of games I also bought to arrive, and they didn't take long.

Look, there's me on the left (apparently)!

Possibly in keeping with these new pangs of regret, or perhaps due to the apathy I felt towards 'modern' gaming generally, once my recent purchases had arrived I felt oddly unenthusiastic about doing anything with them. It wasn't that I didn't actually want to, just that I wasn't really in a hurry. So I put it in a drawer. And there it dwelt for a good couple of weeks. It was actually my better half who forced me to finally make use of it. It had a few bits and pieces missing (no console stand, no sensor bar stand, no controller wrist strap) and was a little grubby, but it was boxed (which is always nice) and, more importantly, it worked! I wasn't sure about that at first as it apparently wasn't able to detect the Wiimote, but it turned out I just had reset it. So, with surprisingly little setting up or messing around of other kinds, I was up and running!

All that remained was to find some decent games to play on it among the deluge of nonsense, and besides Nintendo's own titles featuring their usual characters (which, as usual, hold their value annoyingly well), there weren't actually too many I knew of. I did buy a few along with the console itself of course, a couple of which were just for 'comedic' purposes, and I'll take a look at these in an upcoming 'Exploring' posts here, but longer term? Who knows, but I can't help feeling that unenthusiastic feeling lurking again. Come on Wii, surprise me with your splendour...