Blog - My Parents Bought a Wii.... for the Exercise.
Friday, June 6, 2008I leave for Atlanta to start my job with Emagination (EGD) again tomorrow. Huzzah!
But since my time here is brief I'll only write about an odd phenomenon which I meant to write about earlier but it slipped my mind:
My parents bought a Wii. Specifically, they bought it for the new Wii Fit. They both have to do a lot of exercise now because of health issues in their old age, and they figured it looked a little more appetizing with Wii Fit.
In effect, my aging parents have purchased a contemporary, next-gen video game console as a piece of exercise equipment.
I find this very strange.
I won't say I haven't been able to get them to play the occasional video game over the years, but they haven't ever really enjoyed it.
Modern video games were just too complicated for them with too many buttons.
Perhaps I shouldn't be so surprised. They were once no strangers to video games. They seem to have been some of the ones who got lost in the shuffle of the great game crash and never found their way back as they remember playing games like Pong and Pacman with great fondness. This wouldn't even be their first console -- I inherited the Texas Instruments TI-99/4a my mother apparently played with while I was still in the womb (as such it was my first console too!)
And yet, I don't think this is just a case of the Wii's trademark image as a non-intimidating game console that even grandma can play (i.e. like the games they were used to.) They knew of the Wii and we had talked of them, but they had no real interest in playing with one until now.
They had no serious interest in the Wii until Wii Fit.
They will likely enjoy a few other games now that they already own it (I plan on bringing home my copy of WarioWare: Smooth Moves as I think my mom would like it) but they initially purchased the console not as a gaming platform but as a piece of exercise equipment.
Well done Nintendo, for embracing so many rather out-there trends for our industry: the exergaming branch of serious games, and a casual-gaming sense of simplicity that anyone can understand and enjoy.
It grabbed you two new customers that I thought was lost forever from video game purchases. Which is saying something, given that their son wants to make video games for a living. posted by Brian Shurtleff @ 6:06 PM
1 Comments:
Dr. Ernie "Exertainment Evangelist" Medina, Jr. said...
Yes, it is a strange phenom. going on, and we have the big N to thank for that. They are definitely bringing in the casual and non-gamer into the fold when the other game consoles couldn't. Yeah!!!