Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 08:26 AM

So...
The NY Times leaked everything before Nintendo could give her pressconference. IGN confirmed everything NYT said.
De Wii will release in North and South America on the 19th of november for 250 dollar.

IGN added new things on their site: games will be 50 dollar, and Wii Sports (attention DJ!) will be bundled.

Wii Sports will also contain a new bowling game. Virtual Console games will be between 5 and 10 dollar.

Wii will also be a family object. For instance, digital photos can be watched and sent online via the Wii. You can also follow the news and weather on the Wii. Naturally Opera will be included as the browser.

Nintendo will come with 25 games this year.

In Japan it will release on the 2nd of december, which is strange because Japan normally always comes first. Price will be 25,000 Yen. Japan doesn't get Wii Sports bundled.
One Japanese Wii Box will contain
Wii console, Wiimote, Nunchuk, Wii AC adapter, Wii A/V kabel, Wii console stand, sensor bar, sensor bar stand, and 2 AA batteries.

For menu movies of the Japanese Wii, click Here

Posted By: Cancerkitty

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 10:28 AM

Man, PS3 has its work cut out for it, coming out last and most expensive, especially compared to the Wii.

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 01:18 PM

In Japan the PS3 comes one week ahead of the Wii.
In the USA I think the Wii will be a little ahead (not sure though).
In Europe the PS3 will not launch till march 2007 and even that date is uncertain.
When the Wii will launch in Europe will be revealed today or tomorrow.

Posted By: Double-J

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 03:40 PM

Darn, coming out a few days after my birthday!

Posted By: Don Sicilia

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 03:44 PM

Will EA be making all of its games on the Wii? Particularly, Tiger Woods and NBA Live?

Posted By: Double-J

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 03:52 PM

Absolutely. In fact, they're designing their games with a special team specifically to take advantage of the unique control style.

DS - since you're a football fan, check out my thread on Madden \'07 Wii to see how they will be utilizing these controllers for games.

---

To weigh in: The price was expected, as was the inclusion of Wii Sports.

What is bullshit is a.) it comes with only one nunchuck/Wiimote and b.) it costs $60 for another set. Totally nuts! They must be trying to make up for the losses with the prices of accessories, because holy shit, paying $60 for a second player controller is crazy.

Think about it - for a console stressing multiplayer capability with a bunch of people who just pickup and play as fun, not necessarily serious gamers...wtf, you'd have to spend $180 just to get three other people to be able to play at one time...

Posted By: Don Sicilia

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 06:42 PM

Thanks DJ. I actually did see your Madden thread - the game looks great and pretty innovative.

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/14/06 07:33 PM

Only one controller included was expected, if I'm not mistaken it has always been that way. At least with all the Nintendo systems, don't know about Sony - Microsoft - Sega.

60 fucking dollar for an extra controller? WTF? That means Wiimote and nunchuku, right?

Kinda hypocrite of Nintendo. In the Cube era they bash Microsoft and Sony for being online (= not social) while they stress the importance of actually playing together in the same room because you socialize that way.
And now they do everything to make you not play together.

Posted By: Double-J

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/16/06 12:34 AM

I feel the exact same way Enzo - though Nintendo has actually had consoles in the past come with two controllers and a game - the NES and the SNES (NES came with either Duck Hunt and the light gun too or World Cup Soccer/Super Spike Volleyball and the NES Satellite, which is the package I got, or the Super Mario Bros. action pack), SNES came with two controllers and Super Mario World.

So I totally agree - Nintendo has gotten arrogant, with all the hype they received from the gaming community. It's exactly like you've said - they have been pushing multiplayer pick-up games for a whole group to play, but who will pay $180 for another three controllers?

Egads. And the PS3 is coming two days before the Wii. I may have some serious trouble deciding which to get...though I doubt I'll get either at launch with such high controller prices. Maybe for the holidays.

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/16/06 12:18 PM

I agree DJ. Nintendo needs to stay modest now. Because they haven't actually reached something, the Wii has not sold a single unit yet.

The American launch titels confirmed

Blazing Angels: Squadrons of WWII
Call of Duty 3
Elebits
Excite Truck
Far Cry: Vengeance
GT Pro Series
Madden NFL 07
Marvel: Ultimate Alliance
Monster 4x4: World Circuit
Need for Speed: Carbon
Open Season
Rapala Tournament Fishing
Rayman Raving Rabbids
Red Steel
Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz
The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess
Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Double Agent
Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam
Trauma Center: Second Opinion
World Series of Poker
Wii Sports (bundled)

Excite truck, Call of Duty 3, Red Steel and Twilight Princess are the ones I would buy.

European launch details:

Release is on 8 december, for 250 euro (which is somewhere around 320 dollar). Included are one nunchuck, one wiimote and Wii Sports. Software will cost between 50 and 55 euro.
At launch there will be 15 to 20 third party games.
There will also be something called Wii play pack at launch. This pack consists out of a nunchuck, a wiimote and a disc with minigames.

Posted By: Double-J

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/16/06 02:08 PM

The problem is that I'm trying to decide which I'll have fun with the most right away...

The PS3 will have NHL 2K6, SOCOM, F1, and other franchises.

The Wii will have Zelda and Mario.

Tough choices...

Posted By: XDCX

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/16/06 05:03 PM

From 1up.com

Nintendo Wii: Secretly More Expensive than Xbox 360? -- blog by Jeremy Parish

Quote:

"$250!?"

Text on the Internet is a silent medium, but you could still feel indignation of a million nerds today, and all through the sheer force of their interrobangs. Apparently the cost of the Wii is just too high, especially if you suffer from an unusually high sense of entitlement and believe that the games industry is a charity. Which you probably do, through no fault of your own. It's just part of being a nerd on the Internet.

Me, I'm not bothered by the base cost of the Wii -- at $250, it is more expensive than any other Nintendo console in history, true. But it offers a lot more out-of-the-box functionality than any console they've ever offered before, what with its channels and wi-fi and Virtual Console and such. No, the problem I have with Wii comes from all the other costs. SD memory, Opera, optional peripherals... and, of course, the insane price of extra controllers.

When you add it all up, a fully-kitted Wii may well be muscling in on Xbox 360 territory. Let's see... a Wii with three extra controllers with nunchuk attachments is $430. Let's assume $20 for Opera, an extra $20 for the optional Retro controller to make use of those Virtual Console games, and presumably another $30 for component cables so you can enjoy progressive scan output (it's the next best thing to HD! And Nintendo never includes the best-possible connection type for free). That brings us to $500 even. But that 1GB of SD memory isn't going far once you start downloading VC titles, using Opera and letting your friends muck around in your Animal Crossing town via 24Connect while you're asleep, so you'll want at least a 4GB SD card. That's another hundred bucks, bringing us to $600. Suddenly Wii is much less of a bargain.

Compare that to the 360, which has 20GB of memory built right in and comes with component cables. That's $400. And three wireless controllers is another $150. There's no browser to pay for, although Xbox Live Gold will set you back $50/year. Of course, if you want a wi-fi connection that's another $100 for the adapter. So we're up to $700 now. And toss in a sports game to equal WiiSports for grins, which brings us to $760.

So I guess Wii is ultimately cheaper after all. The lesson here? The hidden costs of gaming are downright rapacious. Switch to a cheaper hobby, like collecting rare coins. They keep their resale value much more effectively.

Oddly enough, this isn't really an issue for Japan -- Nintendo is taking the slightly distasteful approach of of pretending 100 yen = 1 American dollar, meaning the $250 Wii is ¥25000 -- actually about $220. And The Virtual Console games are priced at ¥500, ¥800 and ¥1000, which isn't $5, $8 and $10 but something more akin to $4.25, $6.80 and $8.50. Of course, WiiSports isn't included in the box in Japan, which could account somewhat for the difference... but that doesn't explain why the Wiimote and Nunchuk are priced even lower in yen than in dollars (¥3800 and ¥1800 respectively, or $32.30 and $15.30, versus $40 and $20). And when you take into account the fact that Japanese consumers are used to paying much higher prices than Americans -- for instance, PS2 games there typically cost $50-70 -- the relative cost of Wii in Japan vs. America is even less.

Unfair? Sure, but here's the Rosetta Stone to understanding Nintendo's very different regional strategies:

They don't really care that much about the U.S.

And even less about Europe! (Sorry, dudes, but you know it's true.) Wii has to be a success in Japan, and only in Japan, in order for Nintendo to consider it a job well done; success in other territories is just gravy. And to capture the Japanese market, they need to appeal to casual gamers, just like with DS -- and a great price is an easy way to do that.

In the U.S., they'll worry about the casual market later. The early adopters here -- which is to say, the bulk of the people who will actually be able to find a Wii this holiday amidst the inevitable shortages -- are more hardcore types. And hardcore gamers have no common sense when it comes to money. Search your feelings; you know it to be true. (Which is to say, you probably ran out to buy the Star Wars original-Original trilogy DVDs this week, even though you already bought the original trilogy on DVD last year.) And you'll gripe about Wii being overpriced, but you'll still line up to preorder one anyway. Once Nintendo has made its mint off of you, there's plenty of room for price drops next year to appeal to a broader market.

You're being played for suckers, American gamers. And if you still need some sort of written confirmation that your priorities (i.e. buying fun things while still being able to afford your rent and meals) are different from that of the people who create and sell games (i.e. making obscene gobs of money regardless of what it means for you, the consumer), look no further than:

* Reggie Fils-Aime reaching around to pat himself on the back (possibly as a new application for the Wiimote) for the fact that the Wii's higher-than-expected price means fat, fat loot for Nintendo from the word go.
* Third-party publishers getting cranky at the prospect of WiiSports cutting into sales of their own products. And here you thought it was good that Nintendo was reviving the art of the pack-in. Silly you. Turns out Nintendo is actually staffed by terrorists who want to destroy the economy.

Ah, the cold, hard glare of reality.

Me? I bought a nice TV and a 360 last month and I still pretty much just play portable games. So I'm in no rush to buy yet another console just to see it sit disused. Join the portable revolution! We'll sit back, play some Contact or Castlevania, laugh at all the people standing in line for hours and getting stuck with unwanted software bundles for their trouble. It'll be fun!

Aw, who am I kidding. There's no region lock on Wii, so the minute Super Paper Mario hits Japan there'll be a Wii gleaming on my television stand. Frailty, thy name is Geek.

(Yes, I totally put the wisdom of Jon Stewart to work with that misleading title.)

Suddenly the PS3 doesn't sound so bad...

...ok...the price of PS3 still blows...but the thought of spending $600+ just on the Wii and accesories...

Nintendo had the ball...they got cocky...and they may have just dropped it.

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 09/17/06 01:41 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by xXx_DoN_CoRLeOnE_xXx:
but the thought of spending $600+ just on the Wii and accesories...

Yeah, but are you gonna buy from the start on 3 extra wiimotes and nunchucks, a new cable, a retro controller, and Opera?

And even then, compare that to the basic price of the PS3, and then you still have to buy all the extra accessories for the PS3.

Europe is indeed even more screwed than the USA.
One gamecube game is 50 dollar. It is also 60 euro which is
76 dollar. A 26 dollar difference...

Posted By: Enzo Scifo

Re: Wii EU + Jap + USA launch date & price - 10/08/06 10:41 AM

American retail prices. Maybe already known but I'd post them anyway.

Quote:

WII CONSOLE - 249.99 / 237.50
WII REMOTE CONTROLL - 39.99 / 32.00
WII POINTS CARD - 24.99 / 17.00
WII CLASSIC CONTROLLER - 19.99 / 14.50
WII NUNCHUK CONTROLLER - 19.99 / 14.50
WII GPAK ORGANIZER&TRAVEL - 29.99 / 18.95
WII RAYMAN RAVING RABIDS - 49.99 / 41.2
WII THE LEGEND OF ZELDA:TW - 49.99 / 40.00
WII RED STEEL REVOLUTION - 49.99 / 41.22