Ironically, video games - the iconic pastime of slackers and couch potatoes - have now incorporated the exact thing from which they first strived to escape: physical activity. Video games make me nervous. I usually get so agitated playing them that I contort my body and jerk back and forth, as if by banking right my player will bank right. With the Nintendo Wii (pronounced, "whee!"), my nervous habits have become institutionalized.
The purpose of the Wii is to provide total body immersion in the game. The console comes with one Wiimote (which has to be worn with a wrist strap to avoid accidentally flinging it at someone) and one "nunchuck," for games that involve both hands. Movement of the Wiimote is picked up by a sensor placed on top of the TV, and corresponds directly with the movement on the screen.
The console comes equipped with complimentary Wii Sport software, that offers golf, bowling, tennis, boxing and baseball. The games are fairly entertaining, but it is embarrassing to do most of them in front of another person. Switching between backhand and forehand in tennis is reminiscent of slapping an invisible ass, (or, as a commercial for another ridiculous piece of technology, Amp'd Mobile, recently coined it: "riding the pony").
This is the toy whose December advertisements featured the two Japanese businessmen knocking on doors in rural and suburban America, holding out a remote and saying, "Wii would like to play." If anyone needs to play, however, it is Americans, the fat of the land. In playing two rounds of Wii boxing, my arms felt like spaghetti. I recently read that one Philadelphia man has lost nine pounds in the last six weeks just by Wii-ing for 30 minutes a day. Nintendo now has its own Jared Fogle!
While shelling out $250 for a Wii might seem more appealing than a set of barbells, it will be difficult to find it at list price... at least for a while. During the holiday season everyone seemed breathless and desperate to get their hands on one of these things. One woman from California died of water intoxication after holding her pee in a radio contest called "Hold your Wee for Wii." Nintendo now has its own Tycho Brahe!
A fake commercial created by the video gamer's network G4 compares the Wii to the Sony Playstation 3 in imitation of the Mac versus PC commercials. This time however, instead of young boy versus old man, we get a skinny, ditzy blond in a bikini and hot pants who says things like "I'm cheap and fun! All you have to do is just touch and you'll have the time of your life!" versus a bespectacled overweight woman in a sweater vest.
Although gadgets are getting thinner, lighter, and whiter (see poor iPod Nano, the Olsen twin of MP3 players) there is no proof that this correlates with the sex appeal of the user. The Wii may not help its owners to snag a hot chick like the one advertised. But for true gamers, playing the Wii may be more fun than playing with her any day.
