5 Games I Would Like to Demo Before Buying Wii U
New video game consoles can be looked at as an investment. You are paying out at minimum $300 for the console, controllers and one game – and most likely a lot more – and therefore it is reasonable to expect the expensive investment to have a good ROI. Why else would gamers consistently pay out hundreds of dollars for consoles, controllers and accessories then hundreds more on software?
The Nintendo Wii, though significantly cheaper than its competition, did have its moments where it lacked. Having strong support from the first party titles, the console had times where it was reigning on top of Microsoft and Sony, but far too often I found my Wii sitting unplugged by the television simply due to a lack of real good titles. As a gamer, I consider myself a hardcore gamer. The typical Nintendo franchises will win me over, but I also enjoy being part of the community of other best selling games or to be corpse stomping necromorpths in a non-rail shooter methodology. As a consequence, I was left playing the first party installments (when they were not terrible like Donkey Kong Country Returns or Wii Music) and only the first party installments.
The Wii generation is all but over though, so it is time to move on. All of that is a sunk cost and it is time to consider a new investment, the Nintendo Wii U. With a pricey investment being considered, it is only fair that some information is acquired in advance of making the final investing decision, and that best comes from playing demos. These 5 games/concepts that play well could likely sway me to the purchasing side.
1. Metroid Wii U: Metroid was brought back into fashion on the Game Cube with the Prime series, which wrapped on the Wii. After the trilogy ended, it was for some reason thought wise that the successful formula be changed up drastically. While Other M was a passable title, it was far too easy, extremely directing and lacked any real value to play through it again. Metroid is supposed to be about challenging game play and exploration, not a button that allows the gamer to dodge every single projectile without any skill involved. The new Wii U controller offers many possibilities for the franchise in both its 3D and 2D form, and therefore would be a great demo to try out to see how a hardcore game would fare with Nintendo’s new technology.
2. Call of Duty Wii U: Call of Duty sucks. The campaign has some decent story lines going on and surprisingly good character development, and regardless of the multiplayer’s popularity, it totally sucks. Spawn killing is what the game is all about, and of course inconsistent physics and “realism” and a matchmaking capability that could take a few lessons of fairness from Halo. Despite these attributes, it continues to sell well and attract millions of online players. Nintendo was all but left behind last generation with their horrible excuse of internet play, but the Wii U is supposed to bring change. What better way to see if this is true than to see how a high definition, fast paced and heavy server usage game like Call of Duty does?
3. Smash Brothers Wii U: There has been a lot of talk of this already announced title, and that’s it. Seeing how this game fares in a demo would not only demonstrate how Nintendo and its software developers are at continuing to keep a franchise fresh (other than Mario) and if they have listened to the need for more customization, the ability to update games through downloadable content and turn a game with a lot of potential into what it should have been on the Wii – a real online competitive experience. Instead we got a lag fest that was barely tolerable at best.
4. Resident Evil Wii U/ Dead Space Wii U / Silent Hill Wii U: We know Nintendo can make bright graphic based games that are happy looking and fun. Even the lava based levels in Mario looks almost too happy… But can the Wii U bring terror, darkness, environmentally based cinema to gamers? The popularity of Resident Evil. Silent Hill and Dead Space has come from the environments, which in part comes from graphical ability to create eerie environments, to create moods and atmospheres and to accompany that with the proper sounds and emotion. The Wii received Resident Evil as a remake and received a terrible rail shooter for Dead Space, but it rarely offered a game that brought on any sensations that these titles can bring to gamers when they are presented properly. These titles would demonstrate the system’s true graphical and sound capabilities, while of course showing that third party support is actually going to come around this generation.
5. A sports game that does not feature Mii’s: Wii baseball is not fun. Wii bowling is not fun. Wii Sports is not fun. It was a great collection of mini games to be given out as a free game to show off the system’s capabilities for new time gamers who take more than 5 minutes to understand a control scheme, but beyond that, the games quickly lost value. NHL and MLB on the Wii looked terrible. The Gamecube saw better graphics than most of the Wii’s sports installments, and as a result of the Mii’s being forced into everything, the sports titles suffered on the Wii. Madden, MLB and NHL titles would have utilized the Wii’s capabilities in innovative and fun ways that actually justified an additional $60, instead of paying that much for a roster update. Instead we got terrible ports that looked just as bad. The Wii U once again offers justification for a new installment for a sports title to be purchased at a $50-$60 price point, but it will have to actually utilize the controller in a legitimate innovative way that does not impair the ability for the game to be played. The system’s graphics will also have to be powerful enough to support real time plays and not look like blurry pixelated people running across a pixelated field.
While these games have not all been made available or announced of even had commitments to ever appear on a Nintendo console, they would clearly demonstrate whether the Wii U is a good investment or not and whether it will have the capabilities to function as a multipurpose entertainment system rather than a device that plays a new Mario game every week and a new Zelda game every 5 years.
