Dec 10
As an operator of an Apple blog I have seen how important customer service is. A bad experience can sour a customer’s image of a company. People have been turned off from Apple completely due to broken screens on the first generation iPod nano. Nintendo has been replacing Wiis left and right, with little explanation or coercion needed. Stories can be found in various forums about Wiis that stopped working while trying to install firmware and software updates, and in every story I have found so far Nintendo was quick to offer a replacement. Nintendo knows that they must treat their customers well, since they were the underdog coming into the next generation console fight. This is the way to win over customers and it seems to be working.
The most recent news comes in the form of Nintendo’s fix for the Wii remote strap problems. Wiimotes have been slipping off due to broken straps and sweaty hands. The straps can break if enough force is exerted by the slipping remote, or the strap can slip off the arm if not secured. According to Gizmodo, Nintendo is releasing a WiiMote with a more durable strap. These straps will first be available in Australia. Until then: wipe your hands off, and you can use this fishing-line fix (via Gizmodo).
As someone who played the Wii for a few hours the other day, my only concern is with the little slider that holds the remote strap in place on your arm. It’s a bit tricky to use with one hand and if people forget to slide it in place the remote will surely fly away. If you keep your hands clean and use the slider then you should be fine. Also make sure that the slider doesn’t come loose.
Dec 09
I was once going to post about my continuing Wii search. You may have read this post about my experience waiting out in the cold at a local BestBuy. Recently I kept my search to online retailers, and this past Wednesday I got lucky when I found the Wii available on CircuitCity.com.
How did I do it you ask? If you need help locating an available Wii you can try this site at RefreshThing. The “Auto-Refresh This Page” link will then put that page in a frame that refreshes. Make sure it is refreshing, since I found it wasn’t working correctly on Wednesday morning. I never would have found a Wii to order I didn’t wake up late for class and manually refresh the page.
I only had to buy an extra remote and nunchuk with the console, and it came with free shipping. So in 2 weeks time I will have my own Wii to play and review for this fine website. Many bundles require you to by a ridiculous amount of games, most of which you wouldn’t buy otherwise. I was tempted to follow someone’s advice and buy one to return the games to a Wal-Mart. Apparently they give you store credit with few questions, but don’t quote me on that. I haven’t actually tried it.
Nov 26
This morning I joined the throngs of people who have waited out in the cold for a Nintendo Wii. Unfortunately I was not so lucky. I got to the Best Buy here at about 8:30 am, and the line was already fairly long. I had my cute iPod Nano to pass the time and I was hopeful. That hope would be gone by the time the store opened at 10 am.
News quickly spread through the line that a Best Buy employee had been camped out since the night before and had a list of 69 people who were first to the line. According to this unnamed induhvidual the store would be going by his list and everyone else would be out of luck. At this time there were about 130 people in line. No one knew whether to believe him, and it was quickly pushed out of our minds. A little later there was some commotion and we would all later find out that they had apparently handed out tickets for the Wii. There were 60 Wiis and over 130 people in line, so I missed out. Many people had more than one ticket, and at least one person went around asking if anyone wanted to buy his ticket for $300. You would then have to pay $250 on top of that and it was just plain ridiculous. The woman ahead of me told him he was disgusting and to get back in line. That was the best display I had seen lately.
As I was leaving I saw a guy and his son with 3 Wiis and felt sick to my stomach. Many of the people on line were planning to sell their Wiis, and they won’t even wind up getting much for them online. In the end my experience was spoiled by the Nintendo haters who were just out to make a quick buck, the kind of people you hope will stay inside their nice warm house filled with the whirring of a PlayStation 3. There were no nice Nintendo fans at my Best Buy. At least not among the majority of the people who were able to buy a Wii. It looks like I will be waiting longer for my salvation.
Sep 14
Today Nintendo announced that the Wii will be available on November 19th in the US and retail for $250.00. It will come with all the cables, the sensor bar, 1 Wii remote and 1 nunchuck controller. It will also ship with Wii Sports which contains a bunch of games including tennis, baseball, golf, boxing, and bowling. They plan to sell 4 million units by the end of the year.
Wowzers. That’s a lot of Wii. I can’t wait to order one for myself. It seems like a really fun machine, and that’s what I want from my games. If I’m going to lose I might as well have fun. Unfortunately, IGN is reporting that the Wii will not play DVDs. That could make or break the system, as I currently use my Xbox to play DVDs.
For more coverage of the announcement, including pictures, visit IGN’s coverage. And visit this page for the brief notice about the lack of DVD playback.
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