Wii Launches, Sells Out Peacefully 565
porcupine8 writes "Like the Playstation 3, the Nintendo Wii sold out on launch day this weekend. Unlike the PS3, the launch was a peaceful affair with no reports yet of console-related violence in the US. This may be partially due to the fact that Nintendo promises to have a total of four million units in stores by Christmas, with the bulk of those going to North America.
Midnight launch parties on both the east and west coasts ushered the new console in with a bang." Please, if you've managed to snag a Wii yourself, share your opinions below! Update: 11/20 17:25 GMT by Z : A few quick impressions from 24 hours of owning a Wii, and some links on the subject if you Read More.
All I have to say so far is pretty positive. I snagged Rayman Raving Rabbids, Zelda, and (on a lark) Red Steel. I haven't had the heart to play Red Steel yet, but Rayman is a great, quirky mini-game game. I think this format is going to be pretty common for the Wii, and I'm actually looking forward to it. Zelda is ... Zelda. I really, really like it, but if you're getting tired of the same old thing you're going to be disappointed. My big complaint is the glacially slow internet connection. I have never owned a Genesis, and so wanted to snag Sonic for some cheap laughs. Purchasing Wii points took about half an hour, and I never actually managed to download the game (despite having paid for it). I'm hoping that today, with less hammering on the servers, I'll have more luck. Expect a more complete review next week. In the mean time, Chris Kohler at Game|Life has had a Wii since last week, and has some considered opinions on its launch issues, and a bit more specifically on virtual console problems.
Re:That just means... (Score:4, Insightful)
you know... whichever you prefer.
Why a Christmas Launch? (Score:5, Insightful)
Christmas buyers aren't your hard core fanboys who will wait in line to buy the thing, so why not launch it in the summer, get the fanboys set, then work hard to produce enough of your system to keep in in stock for christmas buyers (you know, like MS did). Sony made a major error here, in that lots moms and dads buying the system for their kids are going to wait a full year till next christmas to do so. Meanwhile, Nintendo has Wiis in stock, for 1/2 the price, ready to be snatched up by Santa.
Re:That just means... (Score:0, Insightful)
Two more weeks for Japan (Score:3, Insightful)
Wiilief (Score:5, Insightful)
Good work, Nintendo
Re:xkcd (Score:2, Insightful)
Mod points++! Funny because it's true! I talked with people who said PS3 line fans where pretty much saying that or worse. Though, I cannot say I hugged any of the people in line for the Wii... nor would I have wanted to unless some of them showered.
Of course "day 1" is a sellout... (Score:5, Insightful)
If they made 1M units available on day 1 and only 50% sold, the headline would be: "Plenty of Product X left after first day (expect discounts soon)"
However, when they make 100K units available on day 1 and all sell in a few hours, the headline is "Product X sells out first day (don't expect a discount soon)"
The whole point is to create a buyers frenzy and match it with artificial supply constraints to ensure everyone pays full price or more, all while getting free press from Slashdot and other media whores with lazy editors...
Re:Resell (Score:5, Insightful)
That is if you ignore the profit from game sales, and look only at console sales.
Nintendo has even hardcore gamers excited (Score:3, Insightful)
Big box stores such as Best Buy and Wal-Mart had campers early the night before and easily sold out hours before official store opening.
To say the least. The Future shop picture in that article is at a local mall here. They had nearly 100 units. That line-up had gone all night. But what's really amazing is that right behind that store (past the Winners you can see the sign for) is a Best Buy. With 90 units. Also lined up. Also sold out before store opening. At the other end of the mall is a WalMart. Also sold out before opening.
Half a mile away is another mall, with a Zellers, Toys'r'us, and EB. All sold out before store opening (Toys'r'us several HOURS before). All with dozens of units each. EVERY store, big and small, sold out within the first few minutes after opening. Small towns 50 miles out sold out within minutes.
Nintendo shipped anywhere from 2-5x as many units as Sony, and THEY'RE ALL GONE. Something like 25-50% of the PS3s were on ebay within hours, and the price is already dropped down nearly to retail value. Most Wii owners are actually playing theirs.
This is most definitely NOT the soccer mom and grandpa crowd. These people lined up for hours in the sub-freezing cold to be the first to play the new Zelda. You don't get any more hardcore than that.
Interestingly enough, and I've never seen this with a console launch, GAMES are sold out too. Most stores didn't get near enough copies of Zelda, and only had 3-5 titles each. The only title on the shelves that seems to be in quantity as of this morning is Excite Truck. A local WalMart here has nothing but that - and over 3 dozen copies of it. Look for it to be the first discounted game, if the stores around me are any indication.
The Wii might just end up being the "Tickle Me Elmo" of this year's xmas season.
Craigslist (Score:4, Insightful)
Strange, no?
My favorite sales pitch on craigslist was the person who said they "needed" to unload their PS3, for $1500. Perhaps they shouldn't have bought it 2 days prior for $700, no? I also saw one ad who wanted to sell their PS3 for college books, tuition,etc. Of course, it was for a 4-figure amount. But if you are a broke college student, you shoulnd't be shelling out $700 for a get rich quick scheme.
Re:Of course "day 1" is a sellout... (Score:3, Insightful)
Our local Wal-Mart set up an XBox360 in their layaway department for the Wii campers to play until midnight. Unfortunately, the waiting room was full at noon on Saturday, so I didn't bother. Prior to the PS3 sales (for which the Wal-Marts had like 6), I was really expecting to be able to wander over to Wally World at around 8PM and stand around waiting for midnight.
Re:Of course "day 1" is a sellout... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:Of course "day 1" is a sellout... (Score:5, Insightful)
We figured the 36 they told us they'd have would be out of stock shortly, and they were. They told us they had 36 of them and 40 people were camped out front here in Wake Forest, NC.
They also told us that they will be getting bi-weekly shipments of 'at least a dozen' from now until after Christmas. I had my wife call and she said the guy laughed and said 'good luck though if you want a PS3, nothing like that is coming'. It seems to me that Nintendo did a huge build as much as they could, shipped them, and then is going to keep the pipe full from now until the end of the year.
Meanwhile PS3 blew their wad quickly, and is going to take months to recover.
Also speaking as someone who is in product marketing as my day job I can tell you that personally I've never twirled my mustache points thinking 'ooh, let's make one and that'll drive up demand' because people can/do find something 'good enough' to take its place and loosing to THAT kind of a sale sucks more because you've just collapsed your market onto a competitors product. This is my personal opinion at least, maybe there's a secret club of people that do that but not at my level.
Re:Wii/PS3 numbers (Score:3, Insightful)
Where is your link Mr Anonymous Coward Sony Fanboy Troll?
Nintendo had always wanted to "Sell 4 Million Units Worldwide By January 1st 2007" which would require an, estimated, 2 Million units sold in North America; there were no reports that Nintendo planned on shipping 2 Million units on the first day just that they needed to sell them in the first 6 weeks.
The PS3 has shipped 400k as of launch confirmed by Sony. And there are 600k additional units in the process of being sent by air from the Asian manufacturing plants between launch and the end of the year.
Link please?
I have seen tons of articles online talking to EB/Gamestop (and other retailers) who claimed that Sony reduced their shipment to them at the last minute and no confirmation of the sales numbers; there is also confirmation that Sony undershipped (by 12%) to Japan. There were tons of reports in October that Nintendo had millions of units ready for launch so why would they undersupply? On the other hand, there were tons of reports that Sony started to manufacture late and has been having tons of problems.
Middle of December the retail sales tracking numbers will be out and everyone will know for certain. But whatever the actual numbers are, Nintendo is not going to have any huge lead over the PS3 in US sales.
Please log in so you can be held accountable for lying.
Parasites (Score:5, Insightful)
It's like domain name parasites. Don't feed them, people, you're only making the problem worse.
"Camping" out (Score:3, Insightful)
Went to a Circuit City that had 15, only 4 people in line when I got there at 2am. They handed out vouchers at 7am. Was surprised at the influx of people around 6am. Almost felt bad for the parents who showed up at 10am when the store opened, but yet I didn't. I braved the cold, and had fun with some other fans all the same.
Relatively little commotion, some people were upset... the employees had a meeting before the store opened and a lot left with empty display boxes, but did it obviously to incite some sort of "envy". A guy in line was friends with all the employees and he told me that they had empty boxes. Seems ridiculous that the manager would allow this.
At any rate, love the Wii... worth the wait.
Re:Wii Launch Not Going Very Well (Score:5, Insightful)
These days, the only place you'll hear about problems, if they exist, are in web forums. Eventually, you'll get news reports whose source is actually the web forums. Then you'll get anecdotal stories from people who are actually well-known (game reporters, bloggers, Penny Arcade, etc.), which is just as bad as web forums. And if you're lucky, eventually eventually eventually the company will admit there is a problem. But only after tons of people have posted to tons of forums and the news sites pick it up. Even then it's not likely. That's how it has been with problems with just about every console since about the PS1.
So, while I have no reason to think there are widespread problems yet, I wouldn't write it off because it came from a forum. I just don't know where else you'd be expected to get the reports. It's not like CNN has a test lab of Wiis or something.
Re:Resell (Score:1, Insightful)
But to add this note in relation to a wii, that's just hilarious. I mean I've longed for ages for a good motion sensitive aiming device, it would greatly improve the speed, reactivity and efficiency in an fps.
Wii remote > mouse > gamepad.
Of course, that is my personal experience, as I said I have friends who swear by the gamepads. I'll have to let them try the wii sometime soon.
Re:xkcd == pure genius (Score:4, Insightful)
I have been saying exactly this (minus the pics) for months now. It's good to hear it from someone else.
This concept of "console sell-out = good thing", just doesn't ring true with me. My little bro had a pre-ordered 360 for last x-mas, but didn't get it until February. B/c we knew he wouldn't have it, nobody bought him the standard set of accessory gifts (controller, Live subscription, games), so for two months MS lost this potential income as it was spent elsewhere.
I don't know where the pro MS marketers got their ideas, but most people I know, but things in small bursts. Once the console is paid off, they'll buy a controller one month then a game here and a game there. I know very few, if any, people who will hold money in some sort of "personal x-box account" waiting for their next big spend. If there's no x-box accessory, the money just gets spent elsewhere (nice dinner, night at the movies, computer accessory,...)
I'm probably a rare case, but I didn't buy an XBox 360 b/c I couldn't buy one. It was late January, I'd been interested in owning one for 3+ months, but nobody had any in stock. My local outlets were still filling pre-orders taken in November. So I took the money and spent it elsewhere (bunch of Magic cards). I still don't own a 360, but I'm not unhappy playing my Dance Dance and Karaoke Revolutions (given that penchant, I'll probably end up with a Wii).
Point is, MS lots tons of "opportunity buys". The console is the biggest barrier to entry, yet the games/accessories are the largest source of profit. If people can't buy a console (even with money in hand), then you've erected an infinite barrier to entry. Inability to buy a console bottlenecks the whole chain from the very beginning. Nintendo obviously has the right strategy here, they sound like the stock to own.
Wii picked up a Wii at Midnight Saturday (Score:3, Insightful)
Our well-oiled and hot cocoa filled band of three got there around 11:30, only 18 in line ahead of us, but some were like us, a group of people there as support staff. After delegating tasks, we managed to pick up our pre-ordered Wii and got out sixth (6) from the store, with official Nintendo staff taking pics of us. Even though we had forgotten to preorder a memory card, an extra Wii-mote, an extra nunchuk, or any games, we left with the only copy of Rayman's Raving Rabbids as well as someone's preordered Legend of Zelda game. All the controllers - both Wii-mote and nunchuks - were sold out ahead of time, as well as most cool games.
Drove over immeadiately to the Fred Meyer just a few blocks from our house, which apparently let customers into the store (but couldn't purchase) at 11 pm. They were sold out of Wii consoles (they had 70) and controllers as well, by the time we got there at 12:30, and had closed the doors.
We set it up and made Mii versions of ourselves, storing one on the Wii-mote, and played a quick game of bowling, and boxing. Then we went to sleep until 7 am. OK, only four hours sleep. Total cost still way less than a PS3 or an xBox360, with Sims 2: Pets and guide books for both Zelda and Sims 2: Pets thrown in. No, not a Wii version of Sims 2: Pets.
Next morning, tried out the boxing game (fun! exhausting!), tennis, bowling, and golf. Played Legend of Zelda until one of us had to leave (his mom came over, so it was down to my son and I). Also played a fantasy RPG (dungeon) for the GameCube, using GameCube controllers, on the Wii - graphics were sharper, load times were superfast, plays like a dream.
After talking with some friends, we figured out the Sears store might have some controllers and Wii consoles left over - our friends had picked up two consoles out of three people.
So, back in the car, went to Sears (next to Starbucks international HQ), picked up one of their two last nunchuk controllers (sold out of Wii-motes), and got Excite Truck (they still had one copy). Next door, picked up a 1GB SD memory card for the Wii at OfficeMax for $19.99 - sweet!
Then drove over to Costco. They said they won't get delivery until Tuesday, but if you get their sweet package (dirt cheap), you get both Zelda and Excite Truck with it! Best of the bundles we heard of! Think they may also sell it online [costco.com] if you're a Costco member. Well, no Wii stuff, but we bought four two-packs of beef jerky and some nuts, so worth going there.
Back home - played various games. A wonderful day!
Re:That just means... (Score:4, Insightful)
$250 - console
$49.99 (4) - games
$39.99 (3) - Wii Remotes
$19.99 (1) - nunchuck (still trying to find 2 more)
$19.99 (2) - classic controller (still haven't arrived at our GameStop oddly enough)
$39.99 - 2gb SD card (Haven't ordered quite yet)
$20.00 - Wii Points (to purchase Zelda, and have a few floating around for an impulse purchase)
===
$660 - $740 (if you count the 2 Nunchucks and SD I still need/want to buy)
Of course, I also had this...
~$210 - trade-in for games
Still a lot of money. Though, I'm sure the PS3 will end up even worse when you break it down like above, since their games list price are higher along with the console.
Cheers,
Fozzy
Re:People (Score:1, Insightful)
Re: Nintendo Games out sell the competition... (Score:4, Insightful)
I do. [vgcharts.org] Super Mario Sunshine sold less copies than Halo, however... Nintendogs outsold Halo 2 and almost every entry of Pokemon outsold GTA.
Re:Resell (Score:3, Insightful)
No, it doesn't (Score:3, Insightful)
Even though Gears of War is tempting as hell, and would look really sweet on my TV, I eventually decided to go with the Wii. Why? Because I still have some Gamecube games I haven't beaten. Because I really want to play with the Wiimote. Most of all, because it's $250. The "premium" 360 is still $400, with no games and limited backward compatibility.
HDTV adoption won't really hurt the Wii. It would be nice if it were prettier, sure. I'd like to play Zelda at 720p, at least. But when you combine the novelty of the controller, complete backward compatibility, and a price that's 30% lower than the nearest competition, it's really not a big deal that your TV doesn't get to show off.
My Launch Experience II (Score:3, Insightful)
So far, I've hit a table with the Wiimote, my son hit the light in the basement (on the ceiling) and my wife put a dent in the roof. I've never had so much fun breaking shit. AND - not a scratch on the Wiimote. The Mii's are a whole hell of a lot of fun to create. They spectate when you play the WiiSports, too! (look behind you when you're bowling, for example.) I've only played Tennis, Bowling and Boxing. Boxing is 'meh', but I only boxed one round (you use both controllers to box...and you get TIRED! It's fantastic.)
The Wii connected to my 3com AP with absolutely no problems - All common encryption schemes supported. Channel selection is slim right now, but that will change. On to Zelda...
GET IT. I got yelled at because I was 'cutting grass' too much. This game is much darker than those in the past, and the controller scheme is flawless. (You can run and swing the sword now...)
I'm holding out on games as the reviews arent' in yet (Red Steel I hear is not so good).
Big N has a real winner here. Opera. Online. Swinging virtual swords. George Lucas, I hope you're paying attention. I want to hear my Wiimote make that tell-tale lightsabre sound...
Went to bed at 3:00am.
Re:Resell (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Technical Specs? (Score:2, Insightful)