Live at the NYC Wii event

We have just been seated and are awaiting the presentation to begin. I'll, of course, update as things happen. They tried to get a PAX thing going with a ball, and instead used this pathetic Mario doggy toy. I tried to nail Crecente of Kotaku with it, but alas, he saw me and caught it. Ninty's marketing girl is up now talking about the launches and other PR marketing fluff. She's touching on the NY Times article and says it was "just the tip of the iceberg." Presentation is less than an hour with a Q&A at the end. Reggie now takes the stage. He says they will reveal all the relevent info for the Wii. He says today marks the next step in driving the industry forward. Says usual thing about bringing gaming to everyone. Talking about landmark Nintendo products and innovation. First is the DS. Now talking about the DS. Next is Touch Generations. Says Touch Generations is different than escapism. Connects you to life rather than taking you away. He says, the DS supplements your life, rather than replacing. He's just continuing to ramble about the DS so far. Touting the success of the DS. Says new players are driving the growth of the DS. "Over the last few months, the new Mario title represents 35% of all DS games sold." Says DS and Touch Generations is driving growth in the industry. Up 142% compared to last year. Says industry only grew 2% without a DS. Nintendo WiFi Connection is the next big step. More than 2 million unique users registered on the system. Fourth step is Wii remote and fifth is today and the connection of people to the Wii and other things in it. Now for the hard news. Wii on sale Nov. 19. Worldwide debut is here in Americas. The same place they debuted DS. Available across 25,000 points of distribution. Price will be $249.99. One price, one configuration, one color -- white. 4 million Wii consoles shipped worldwide during 43 days between launch and Dec. 31. America gets the largest share. Flow will be continuous and even. Inside box, get everything you need. One Wii remote and one nunchuck. One central message for Wii: Once you play it, you will understand. There are two dozen games here for us to play, with some better than E3. Some we've never seen or heard of before. Showing us Wii Bowling now, which is part of Wii Sports. Showing Wii Bowling now. Holding Wii remote like a bowling ball. Same as bowling. Wii Sports included with console. Nov. 19, $249.99 with Wii Sports. Also going to offer consumers "largets range of launch titles." They are adding Wii Boxing to Wii Sports. Five game compilation. 1st party launch titles: Zelda, Excite Truck, Wii Sports "This Zelda plays like none other." "If you played Zelda today for 6 hours, you'd only be scratching the surface." "It is the must-have title." 3rd party games at launch window show confidence in Wii. 104 different titles shown at event in Japan. He is showing some 3rd party titles with a lot being movie tie-in games. Most we've already heard of before. Nothing really new there. Giving us quotes from 3rd party publishers on how the Wii will be good. 30 Wii games available at launch window. Half of those available on day one. Wii software will be $49.99. Wii Channels is landmark. Not just Virtual Console but "total effort to redefine who will use video games in the future." Will next go into details on Wii Channels. "Our challenge was to find a universal appeal for Wii that would act as a counterpart for Touch Generations and the DS." "Beyond our controller, our answer is the Wii Channels menu, unique to Wii." Wii believe Wii Channels can change the interface between TV and viewers and their games. When Wii is connected to TV in standby mode, user will see a unique menu of 12 Wii Channels that is expandable. First Channel is "Disc Channel" which allows players to play Wii game or GC discs. Next is Wii Shop Channel which is home of virtual Console. Users can browse and download software from over 20 years of gaming. 30 "legacy" titles availabe at launch for VC: Legend of Zelda, Super Mario World, Mario 64. (500 Wii points or $5 NES) (800 points for Super NES games) (1,000 Wii points for N64 games). Wii card can be purchased at stores for $20 -- 2,000 points. Once downloaded, becomes own channel on menu. Other channels: Mii Channel -- digital character of you or anyone in a big 3d virtual room. Can interact with others in this channel. Can customize avatar -- he's making a Samuel L Jackson character. Guy actually looks like Jackson, pretty funny. Tons of choices and such to create character. Gives Sam the Pulp Fiction stache. Can change outfit color and put in a nickname. Can do a little dance move. Now showing interaction. Can transfer Mii's to Wii remote and can customize Wii remote to carry Mii's. Can populate your own Wii console and also populate other consoles. Can also let Mii's populate your games like Wii Sports and Warioware and others in development. Now showing the Photo Channel. Looks very slick. Great interface for this channel. Take SD card and insert card in Wii to look at photos. Can look at all the photos at the same time -- crazy looking. Interface is fast and smooth. Very impressive. Other features: Can do a cool slideshow -- showing slideshow now of Ninty stuff at offices -- funny. Now going to show a movie on Wii Photo channel. Can have fun with movies buy making a puzzle or doodle -- can also do with photos. Makes a game out of it. Reggie now takes the stage again and is going to show us more channels. "When connected to Internet, users have more access." Can get forecasts and news headlines on Wii through WiiConnect 24 system. Feature called Wii message board where users can send message or photos to cell phone, PC users, or Wii users. Can also leave messages to family members on Wii bulletin board. "Our approach with Wii Channels reinforces our philosophy of bringing Wii to the masses." WiiConnect24 could include game news, content -- will share more with us later. Internet channel: Opera has to be downloaded with Wii Points. Not free. Navigate net with Wii remote. "TV replaces PC screen." No need to wait for boot process. Wii Chennal available easily. "We want consumers to rely on Wii Channel everyday." This is our mantra: "Satisfy current players in new ways. Re-engage old players. Grow market." "We are intent on changing the way players connect to their games." Wii proposition: Revolutionary way to play games. Time travel with legacy content. Biggest launch library in history. Unique channel system is like "pied piper" for gaming. Wii is mass market ready on day one. Noone has ever matched this. Now doing Q&A with press. $39.99 for Wii remote, $19.99 for nunchuck. Both sold seperately. System can have expansive memory. Zelda for GameCube will launch Dec. 11. Will launch for Wii on Nov. 19. No cost to accessing the Internet through the Wii. Wii is already WiFi enabled, as has been said. Wii points is most straightforward way to buy content. Plan to ship 4 million units by Dec. 31. All 1st party will support widescreen -- all content should be widescreen. Graphical power: we have different idea for what drives industry. "If you want power, go somewhere else. What we're doing is something very different." When you play the games, you are going to say "wow" because of how it looks and plays. People have asked us to focus on gameplay. The box has all the state of the art technologies. Like a Ferrari under the hood. The Wii is pleny powerful to achieve what happened. More important to bring gaming back to the masses. In the future we will hear about DS integration. Nothing to say now. Metroid Prime 3 will be a 2007 title. Nintendo has schedule for 1st party titles after launch. They say they don't want lag in content beind delivered. Want to continuously launch product in retail and online. "We want continuous, new news for mass audience." First online multiplayer game will be Pokemon -- Battle Revolution -- launching during their launch window. Can expect in U.S. shortly after. In-game advertising in 1st party games -- they are looking at it. But their strategy is different. We look at in-game branded content as a way to drive realism. No plans for branded channels at the time. "Who's to say what the future will bring?" That's it, presentation over. Now it's time to play. I will be updating my impressions of games as the day moves on.