Well, it finally has happened, I’ve have a hands on review of Nintendo’s Wii. First of all I have to thank my wife, for the wonderful birthday gift. So for starters it’s a lot of fun to play, even the free game that came with teh system “Wii Sports” is awsome.The console is pretty small and does look like some video game sitting in my living room which is cool. The sensor bar, that needs to be either on top of the TV or below the TV for the Wii remote to work, does stand out a little but overall not to bad.
The graphics are good but certainly not the best I’ve seen. I would say they are a slight upgrade over the PS2 or Xbox, but no where near the PS3 or the Xbox360. The menu is easy to navigate and your do have some neat extras like local weather and news headlines, if you have your Wii connected to a broad band connection. The Wii has built in wifi, but if you are still using wires you need to buy an adapter. The virtual console is pretty cool and for a small cost you can download classic games like “Super Mario Brothers” and “Mario 64”, the cost range from 500 Wii points ($5) to 1000 Wii points ($10). Of course the best part of the Wii is the cool controller, the controller(s) is comfortable and seems really natural when you use it. The only draw back so far has been trying to find and extra one in the stores. I wanted a second one so me and my wife could play “Wii sports” and had to go to eight stores before I found one. Another slight draw back is the cost of the controllers, I needed a second remote ($40), a second nunchuk controller ($20), and two classic controllers ($ 20 each) to play classic games via the virtual console. Ouch, another $100 just so my wife and I could play together without sharing one remote. The Wii did have a couple of points I thought would be useful for parents.
First the Wii “inbox” has a daily message that can not be deleted that keeps track of everything you do on the system, from what games were played and for how long to any online activities that were done through the Wii.
Secondly the Wii has built in parental controls that are password protected and does not allow certain game ratings to be played. So if you don’t want your kids to be playing mature games, they can’t, at least not at home, and if they figure out your password, you can see all of their activity in the Wii activity report.
The Wii came with “Wii Sports” for free, which is basically a collection of small sport games highlighting the Wii’s controller. Games include tennis, baseball, bowling, boxing, and golf. The games themselves are very addictive, especially the bowling, basically your swing the remote just like you’re bowling for real, it’s a lot of fun. Although I will warn you I was very sore the next day after a long night of Wii bowling.
So overall the Wii is worth the price if you are looking for a fun family game system.
The cost at $250 is a bit deceiving if everyone wants their own controllers because the additional cost will add up quick, but you could just share one remote if you really didn’t want to spend the extra money. So if you want a new game system that everyone one in the house can play and have fun together I recommend the Nintendo Wii.
Showing posts with label video games. Show all posts
Showing posts with label video games. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 29, 2007
Wednesday, May 09, 2007
Used games can save big bucks!
Chances are your kids are tired of their old video games and are asking for some new ones. Well I know, at $50+ a game they can keep playing the ones they already got. Well today I’m going to talk about how you can save some money and still get your kids some new games. Many of you might already know this, but a few of you probably don’t, many chain video stores buy old video games and resell them as a cheaper slightly used alternative.
First off if you think you are going to sell them back for what you paid, you’re wrong. On average you only get like $5 for a game when you sell it, sometimes more. Most of the time it’s less, and sometimes it’s been as low as $1, which doesn’t really seem worth it to me. However buying used games is where you can save big time. If you want the latest and greatest your chances are slim but if you do find it you can expect to save around $5 off the price of the same game new, not to bad. If you are looking for an older game, like one that came out a few months ago you can usually find it around the $20 mark. Now keep in mind the stores used the supply/demand model with their pricing. So if they don’t have a lot in stock chances are the price will be on the higher side.
Here’s a pretty reasonable scenario, your kids are done with say three of their games and they don’t think they would ever play them again so lets got trade them in. Okay we got $20 bucks to trade them in plus the store was running a special promotion today, when you trade in three games you get an extra $10. Great, now we are up to $30, so the kids pick out two used video games ones $15 and the other is $20, but there’s a promotion today. Buy three used games and save 15% off your purchase so the kids pick out a third game at $10. Okay so lets’ see what we got the games cost $45 minus the 15% so now they cost $38.25, minus are $30 for the games we sold and we just bought three new to us video games for a total of $8.25 plus tax. Not to bad since if we bought the new versions we would have probably spent around $65 plus tax for the same games.
So don’t think that because it’s a used game it not as good, you can save a lot of money doing this like this even if you decide not to sell games you would still be spending $38 apposed to $65. Some people might not want to buy a used game because they are afraid it won’t work, or that it’s a old game. Well the stores will usually replace the game if it doesn’t work, they usually take a pretty good look at it when then original owner sold it. As far as the game being old, if I never have played it its new to me. There are lots of games out there that looked really good when they first came out, but at the time maybe I didn’t have the money or just didn’t get around to buying them. Well now I can get those some games at a discount. Just the other day I bought two games that were a few years old. Now I could have bought them new for $20 each, but I decided to buy them used. I paid $11 including tax for both games, not to bad. They work fine and since I’ve never played them its just like have two brand new games.
I wouldn’t buy a used game for a gift because they usually do look used if you know what I mean, but as a treat I would always try to fine a game used. So go out there and bring your kid’s home a new (used) game today and don’t forget to have some fun playing it with them.
First off if you think you are going to sell them back for what you paid, you’re wrong. On average you only get like $5 for a game when you sell it, sometimes more. Most of the time it’s less, and sometimes it’s been as low as $1, which doesn’t really seem worth it to me. However buying used games is where you can save big time. If you want the latest and greatest your chances are slim but if you do find it you can expect to save around $5 off the price of the same game new, not to bad. If you are looking for an older game, like one that came out a few months ago you can usually find it around the $20 mark. Now keep in mind the stores used the supply/demand model with their pricing. So if they don’t have a lot in stock chances are the price will be on the higher side.
Here’s a pretty reasonable scenario, your kids are done with say three of their games and they don’t think they would ever play them again so lets got trade them in. Okay we got $20 bucks to trade them in plus the store was running a special promotion today, when you trade in three games you get an extra $10. Great, now we are up to $30, so the kids pick out two used video games ones $15 and the other is $20, but there’s a promotion today. Buy three used games and save 15% off your purchase so the kids pick out a third game at $10. Okay so lets’ see what we got the games cost $45 minus the 15% so now they cost $38.25, minus are $30 for the games we sold and we just bought three new to us video games for a total of $8.25 plus tax. Not to bad since if we bought the new versions we would have probably spent around $65 plus tax for the same games.
So don’t think that because it’s a used game it not as good, you can save a lot of money doing this like this even if you decide not to sell games you would still be spending $38 apposed to $65. Some people might not want to buy a used game because they are afraid it won’t work, or that it’s a old game. Well the stores will usually replace the game if it doesn’t work, they usually take a pretty good look at it when then original owner sold it. As far as the game being old, if I never have played it its new to me. There are lots of games out there that looked really good when they first came out, but at the time maybe I didn’t have the money or just didn’t get around to buying them. Well now I can get those some games at a discount. Just the other day I bought two games that were a few years old. Now I could have bought them new for $20 each, but I decided to buy them used. I paid $11 including tax for both games, not to bad. They work fine and since I’ve never played them its just like have two brand new games.
I wouldn’t buy a used game for a gift because they usually do look used if you know what I mean, but as a treat I would always try to fine a game used. So go out there and bring your kid’s home a new (used) game today and don’t forget to have some fun playing it with them.
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