I'm going to pick on Wii Music a little bit here in light of its less-than-stellar showing in the past month-odd. This may, perhaps, initially come as a surprise to you if you read my review, since it's rather clear I'm a fan of the game; but hear me out. I'm not here to pile on the title; in fact, my opinion remains pretty much the same as it did when I put those words down.
No, I believe the problem with Wii Music is larger than its core concept; largely separate from its execution as software. There are simply things that could have been done that were not.
It was doomed out of the gate after its atrocious E3 showing this year. (I'm told by some of the "connectivity" show that featured Pac-Man Vs. that was similarly disastrous—not just for that title but the whole concept. It's amusing to consider that I also love Pac-Man Vs., actually, in light of that comparison.)
I need not recount the whole sordid affair here, but there was one key problem with that demonstration: instead of showing Wii Music's unique ability to let you creatively enjoy the music you're playing as a very personal endeavor, like was done in the tragically late Google Zeitgeist demo by JC Rodrigo, Nintendo lined up a bunch of execs and hired out a pro drummer to play together on stage.
Here's the thing. Wii Music isn't ever really a good multiplayer experience, at least for people who don't enjoy cacophony (ideally drunk). E3-watchers the world over could not help but leave with a sour taste in their mouth, and who could blame them? Nintendo chose to try to prop up the package as something it was not, and the result was nearly three months of stewing bad impressions. Sprinkle those with the ongoing abandonment issues that so-called "core" gamers seem to have hanging over their heads at all times and mix in the rest of Nintendo's E3 showing that only served to amplify those feelings... well, it's no surprise that almost nobody wanted to even look at the game come October.
So what's next in the comedy of errors? Perhaps less obvious is what I think is a misuse of the Wii franchise. See, unlike Wii Sports, which is a throwback to arcade sports action, Wii Play's demo-scale minigames, and Wii Fit—which, though cool, was basically Brain Age for your muscles and your gut—Wii Music isn't the sort of thing that really has universal appeal. I'd go so far as to say that Wii Music is really pretty experimental in nature. It's trying to do things with its dynamic arrangement capabilities and very different inputs that have never really been done before.
The Wii franchise implies universality. Until Wii Music hit shelves, one could clearly see through any Wii-franchise title and likely understand it completely without having to have it laboriously explained to you. Wii Music does not fit that mold. Even big-name reviewers didn't really get it, which I think spoke more to the positioning of the product rather than its intrinsic quality. I think Nintendo might have been trying to communicate that "everyone can play" by attaching the Wii franchise to this title, but really, that's simply not true. Well, maybe everyone can play, but not everyone can sound good to their own ears.
I don't think it would have been wise to, for example, drop Miis from the game. There was no real problem here, honestly; Miis don't just go with the Wii franchise. If anything, they carry an air of personalization which is actually a great fit for Wii Music. But putting the word "Wii" at the beginning of a title carried a lot of expectations... expectations that were improper to ask Wii Music to follow through on. It just wasn't a good alignment.
But even in the face of a perfect storm like this one, given Nintendo's apparent thorough lack of understanding of its own game, I think there is one more thing that could have saved Wii Music, though it would have required modifying the software itself: enabling a tight-knit community.
Right now, there are a few scattered Wii Music players around the Internet, but they're not really interacting with each other. Including the ability to send videos even to people who didn't own Wii Music (perhaps through a downloadable player channel) or simply a more accessible way of getting videos up on a video sharing site would have let Nintendo mobilize Wii Music fans to spread the good word, while. I rigged up a capture setup to put a few videos up to share with others online, but not everyone has the capability—and even my own time-consuming efforts are pretty poor-quality.
Those same fans, in my own dreams, would have a full-up dedicated website to Wii Music videos, streaming to all comers with ratings, contests (play song x in theme y), and such to tightly knit the numerous tiny communities enabled by the current "share to friends" structure. Wii Music's design probably precludes user-created tracks, but Nintendo-provided DLC—even at a price—would have been a godsend.
But really, even without touches like this, the game is fine and fully enjoyable. I am just rather saddened when even to this day I continue to see the fruits of poor decisions keeping people away from experiencing the joy of Wii Music.
No, I believe the problem with Wii Music is larger than its core concept; largely separate from its execution as software. There are simply things that could have been done that were not.
It was doomed out of the gate after its atrocious E3 showing this year. (I'm told by some of the "connectivity" show that featured Pac-Man Vs. that was similarly disastrous—not just for that title but the whole concept. It's amusing to consider that I also love Pac-Man Vs., actually, in light of that comparison.)
I need not recount the whole sordid affair here, but there was one key problem with that demonstration: instead of showing Wii Music's unique ability to let you creatively enjoy the music you're playing as a very personal endeavor, like was done in the tragically late Google Zeitgeist demo by JC Rodrigo, Nintendo lined up a bunch of execs and hired out a pro drummer to play together on stage.
Here's the thing. Wii Music isn't ever really a good multiplayer experience, at least for people who don't enjoy cacophony (ideally drunk). E3-watchers the world over could not help but leave with a sour taste in their mouth, and who could blame them? Nintendo chose to try to prop up the package as something it was not, and the result was nearly three months of stewing bad impressions. Sprinkle those with the ongoing abandonment issues that so-called "core" gamers seem to have hanging over their heads at all times and mix in the rest of Nintendo's E3 showing that only served to amplify those feelings... well, it's no surprise that almost nobody wanted to even look at the game come October.
So what's next in the comedy of errors? Perhaps less obvious is what I think is a misuse of the Wii franchise. See, unlike Wii Sports, which is a throwback to arcade sports action, Wii Play's demo-scale minigames, and Wii Fit—which, though cool, was basically Brain Age for your muscles and your gut—Wii Music isn't the sort of thing that really has universal appeal. I'd go so far as to say that Wii Music is really pretty experimental in nature. It's trying to do things with its dynamic arrangement capabilities and very different inputs that have never really been done before.
The Wii franchise implies universality. Until Wii Music hit shelves, one could clearly see through any Wii-franchise title and likely understand it completely without having to have it laboriously explained to you. Wii Music does not fit that mold. Even big-name reviewers didn't really get it, which I think spoke more to the positioning of the product rather than its intrinsic quality. I think Nintendo might have been trying to communicate that "everyone can play" by attaching the Wii franchise to this title, but really, that's simply not true. Well, maybe everyone can play, but not everyone can sound good to their own ears.
I don't think it would have been wise to, for example, drop Miis from the game. There was no real problem here, honestly; Miis don't just go with the Wii franchise. If anything, they carry an air of personalization which is actually a great fit for Wii Music. But putting the word "Wii" at the beginning of a title carried a lot of expectations... expectations that were improper to ask Wii Music to follow through on. It just wasn't a good alignment.
But even in the face of a perfect storm like this one, given Nintendo's apparent thorough lack of understanding of its own game, I think there is one more thing that could have saved Wii Music, though it would have required modifying the software itself: enabling a tight-knit community.
Right now, there are a few scattered Wii Music players around the Internet, but they're not really interacting with each other. Including the ability to send videos even to people who didn't own Wii Music (perhaps through a downloadable player channel) or simply a more accessible way of getting videos up on a video sharing site would have let Nintendo mobilize Wii Music fans to spread the good word, while. I rigged up a capture setup to put a few videos up to share with others online, but not everyone has the capability—and even my own time-consuming efforts are pretty poor-quality.
Those same fans, in my own dreams, would have a full-up dedicated website to Wii Music videos, streaming to all comers with ratings, contests (play song x in theme y), and such to tightly knit the numerous tiny communities enabled by the current "share to friends" structure. Wii Music's design probably precludes user-created tracks, but Nintendo-provided DLC—even at a price—would have been a godsend.
But really, even without touches like this, the game is fine and fully enjoyable. I am just rather saddened when even to this day I continue to see the fruits of poor decisions keeping people away from experiencing the joy of Wii Music.