Wii didn’t expect anything less than massive popularity on its Japanese launch day, and neither did we.

Well, Internet pundits originally thought otherwise, questioning the Wii’s ability to truly appeal to a new gaming audience: those that simply were not interesting in console games before.

But despite those doubts, the Wii has had am amazingly successful start after all, with over 1 million sales in just a few days – 600,000 in the US and 400,000 on day one in Japan. That’s definitely nothing to sneeze at.  

Nothing to Wheeze at either, despite the heart pumping movement and action to Wii so easily encourages in its users. Sony hasn’t even got 600,000 units it would seem, and with every day before Christmas quickly ticking by, so they have to get more units in if they don’t want to be in third place on the gaming ladder. But that said, the Sony PS2 at it’s much more affordable entry level price, and might, in the final analysis, outsell all the next-gen consoles this Christmas.

Nintendo are on the verge of launching in Europe and Australia, where we can expect not only sellout crowds, but sellout sales to match Japanese and American enthusiasm.

If you haven’t yet seen a Wii on display in major department and retail stores, do yourself a favor and check one out. The damn things are irresistible – or is that wiiresistible? Perhaps wiisistance is futile after all!

Nintendo expect to sell 4 million Wii’s worldwide by the end of 2006, so there are 3 million more on the way to all worldwide territories.

It’s the closest thing to a successful worldwide near simultaneous global launch any games console manufacturer has ever achieved, and it’s good to see that it’s Nintendo that have managed to do it – a company with presumably far fewer resources than Sony or Microsoft, despite Nintendo’s long standing success in the games console business.

What Nintendo needs to do now is to keep the good games coming. People need a reason to Wii as often as possible.

Fat kids beware: your parents are going to buy you a Wii. How far off can the Wii fitness program be? They already exist for the PS2 and original Xbox, looking much like a TV show with an animated instructor on screen guiding you through the exercise moves that will have you fit and trim in no time.

But those computerized fitness programs needed you to actually get up off the couch and load up the DVD with the fitness program in it, and then actually run through the exercise routines. The Wii requires no such thing. Just playing it is a workout.

Who’d have thought a Japanese games console could be the potential answer to the world’s obesity problems? We didn’t think so, but it looks like Wii did!

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Entry was posted on Monday, December 4th, 2006 at 7:51 am under Technology.

Read more entries by Alex Zaharov-Reutt.
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