Aching Man Flails Wildy Whilst Beaten By A Toddler (Nintendo Wii)

Member Name: Muffin_the_Mule

Product:	Nintendo Wii
Date:	23/05/08 (272 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: She hasn't learnt how to gloat

Disadvantages: Her parents have.

Lately, I've been flailing around in my living room like a lunatic in full view of all of my neighbours.
I've been waking most mornings unable to straighten my arms which is surprisingly limiting - it makes no difference to my ability to wash my hair - but doing pretty much everything else has involved a groan or a grunt, reaffirming my rattle towards my next birthday, my 30th birthday.
My most recent humiliation came at the hands of a 4 year old who appears to have been born a sporting genius. She (Yes she. A 4-year old GIRL) conspired to beat me at tennis. It was from 200 miles away, too. The shame.

Last Wednesday was my 29th birthday, and written in a card I'd received from my brother was, along side the usual birthday greeting, the line
"Make sure you keep the wrist straps on!"
Puzzled, I left for work and concluded my brother was offering some friendly advice on a snowboarding trip that I didn't have planned, or he'd overdone the vitamins.

Home again, and it was time to open my presents. Sorry. Present. There was only one box to open. How birthdays lose their sparkle over time eh?
The gift looked about the size of a shoebox. Brilliant. A sensible and comfortable everyday reminder of dull dullness. Practical though. And I do need new shoes.
But wait, I thought, this box contains no shoes. It's all shiny and white. And Nintendo don't make shoes. Do they? They probably do actually, but this isn't the time.

It was a Nintendo Wii.

Oh dear lord. My inner monologue bounced loudly like a child but I managed to restrain my actual self to a meagre 2 laps of the flat and a short dance in the kitchen before it was time to get down to the business of wires and untangling lots of very tangled stuff.
I, like every man since Adam ignored the "Apple Trees - A user's guide" book, paid a cursory glance at the instructions and dived right into battle.

In an anticlimactic minute or three, everything that required connecting betwixt the television and my glossy white box had been, and the sleek sensor receptor had been sticky tabbed to the top of my television. And mighty easy it all seemed to be.
I hit the AV button on the remote and as if mysterious forces beyond my comprehension were at work, there it was. I was set up.

With my Wii came the game Wii Sports and one controller and one nunchuck - an extension to the otherwise one-handed controller. It was less than 24 hours before I'd bought a second controller and nunchuck. Each controller is safely attached to your wrists by a strap. Forgive me brother, for I thought you had lost your marbles.

First up, after several health and safety warnings that later prove both accurate and necessary, you create a "Mii" - a character to play on your behalf in the games. But don't be fooled. The little man on the TV looks a lot less obscure than I did about 10 minutes later, trying out as I was the Boxing game. I hadn't even looked at the Bowling, the Tennis, the Golf, or American Rounders.

With Boxing, you hold the controller in one hand and the nunchuck in your other, and attempt to pummel the other player, be it a fellow flailer or a computer character. I was 3 goes in before I realised that not only is the controller motion sensitive but the nunchuck is too. I'd been one-handed boxing with all the panache of an injured Joe Calzaghe. At least that's how it was in my head. In reality I was being pounded and I'd already gone all hot and sweaty through physical exertion

The whole premise of the Wii Sports games is that you behave like you're actually playing the games as if you were in the park, or in a gym.

For Golf, you swing the club and the power-bar at the side of the screen will tell you how hard and straight your swing is. Or how rubbish you are.

American Rounders, or "Baseball" as they call it, will duly wrench your arm out of your socket as you attempt to slog the ball out of your lounge, and then double the agony as you then Pitch at your opposition. None of my shirtsleeves are long enough anymore.

Bowling is bowling. You bowl the ball at the pins. You can still get scenes like those usually reserved for You've Been Framed if you don't let go of the ball at the correct time. A little man even comes on screen and shows you how to do it. It can all get quietly embarrassing.

For the Tennis game, I used possibly the Wii's greatest feature. The Wii is Wirelessly connected to the good old internet and you can play total strangers online and get beaten. Or, you can get "together" online with other family members who have caught "The Wii" and play them.
I played Molly, my four year old niece, at Tennis. It was a best of 3 matches, and I'm confident I would have won the third game if Molly hadn't already won the first two.

Overall, this little box of solder and plastic is wickedly clever, and highly addictive.
Soreness and exhaustion dictated a break from game playing to find other features like a news channel and a weather channel. I've also created enough "Mii" look-alikes to cater for most of the people I know, giving them no excuse when they come round not to join in.
Unless they're Children.





Nintendo Wii's cost around £170 including Wii Sports and one controller and nunchuck.
A Second Controller will cost £30 or £35 with a "Wii Play" game included.
Nunchuck's are around £14.


Aches and pains come free.

Summary: A lot of Gloating.