Nintendo's new question mark. The Wii U

 

Yeah I know this is my second blog in a row about video games, but this one I swear this will be much different from my previous blog. This one will be about a new home console and not so much a game. To be exact it will be about Nintendo's new system the Wii U.

Now when you first hear the new systems name (The Wii U) what do you think? When I first heard the name it made me think of Nintendo's last creation and which I believe to be their biggest disappoint The Wii. A system that was high in demand upon its launch back in November of 2006. It had a much cheaper sticker price then its rivals($199.99 for the Wii, $450.00 for Microsoft's Xbox 360 and $599.99 for Sony's PlatStation3).The console was a success selling over 97 million units to this day. It had a innovative new controller that relied on motion control which made gamers have to stand up and move around in order to play a game. Microsoft and Sony both copied it later on with the Kinect and Sony Move. The Wii was also backward compatible with Nintendo's previous system(Gamecube), and in the Wii store customers could pay and download nintendo's classics retro games.

 Sure the Wii sold well. I have many friends and family who bought it. But for everything Nintendo did right, and I believed they did wrong. First off unlike Sony's PS3 and Microsoft's Xbox360 the Wii's did not have High Definition gaming. The Wii also had a lack of 3rd party game developers making games for the system. And sure the controller was innovative but after a wile of playing games some people got tired of the motion control gaming. To this day anytime every time  I walk into a second hand electronic store I see piles of used Wii consoles. They normally sell for about 50 dollars.

So after hearing a similar name to its previous system and being disappointed by the Wii I was not  excited to purchase the Wii U. Until about a week ago. I was just stopping in Best Buy to pick up a copy of the Dark Knight Rises when I stumbled upon The Wii U display. There was no line to play and nobody watching. So I figured why not, see if its any good.

The first thing you'll notice much like the previous system is the new controller. It resembles a tablet kinda like a iPad but with a smaller screen. It has a direction pad, analog sticks, stylist, and many buttons that feels surprising comfortable in your hands. With the way the controllers set up for some games you'll use both your TV and controller's scene to play a game. I found this be very challenging, unique, and unlike anything I ever played before. Also very fun. If someone in your house would like to use the TV to watch shows there is a button on the controller that allows you to continue to play the game on the controller allowing them to watch what they want on the television. Another thing new with Nintendo, High Definition gaming and boy it look's great. Better then Xbox360 or PS3? No, but on par with them? Yes.

Now the part I hate to say about this new console but feel I should say about it. The bad. As for gameplay there was no bad. The price tag is a little iffy($299.99 for a 8GB and $349.99 for the 32GB).  With the other counsels out there I believe 32 GB is still a little small for hard drive memory. Also there is no other controller pad available for purchase. If I'm playing this system with a friend I wanna use this awesome unique controller. But what worries me the most about the Wii U is that seems too late to be released. In my opinion if Nintendo released this system instead of the original Wii it would be on par or even better the the 360 or PS3. But scheduled for next year is Sony and Microsofts new gaming consoles. From the rumors of 4K support to and even more enhanced graphics that surpass the Wii U capabilities I find it very hard for Nintendo to get customers to buy there new system over there competitors.

In the future I look forward to purchasing this system. Nintendo has their great classic releases which are always really fun like Mario and Zelda, but with other consoles coming out in 2013 I wanna see what they have to offer. Plus with how fast prices drop with technologies these days I'll wait for a better price, bigger hard drive and some more games to get released. Below this paragraph is a video under 7 minutes explaining how the new Wii U controller works. If enjoyed this blog I encourage you to watch it.

Looks like mom was wrong

Do you play video games? If you do how many hours a week do you play your games. Although I'm not kid any more (I'm 28) I still love playing them. My mom used to say to me when I was younger that if I continued to play video games for so long I would rot my brain. But maybe she is wrong and that is just a myth.

Now here me out. I just got done playing the new Call of Duty Black Ops 2 for a few hours and decided that I needed a break and do something constructive. So I pulled out my laptop and did a little online reading when I stumbled upon video on http://www.ted.com/talks . And what caught my eye was the very first video "Daphne Bavelier: Your brain on video games".

Daphne is a brain scientist and her research is to find new ways to make human brains Smarter, Better, Faster, Stronger. She goes on to say despite what people think of video games that nearly 70 percent of head of the households play video games. And what people don't know is that action packed games like C.O.D. is really good for the brain. In the video she gives little tasks to her audience to she how they do with these somewhat easy but complicated tests. And according to her research people who play action packed games usually test higher then people who don't. Also she goes on to debunk other rumors that video games will mess up your eye sight if you play them for along time. In her research it shows that gamers have better eye sight and seem to pick up little details in eye tests better.

Daphne uses different graphs and pictures through out the video to show her research. With her pictures  she shows what areas of the brain are affected by video games. My favorite graph was at the end when she shows her training graph were the volunteers would play action games for a few hours a day for two weeks and come back and do her tests. The results are very positive showing that everyone tested well above the original test. Even after five months after the training the results are still there. 

Ms. Bavelier does a pretty good job with her presentation. She uses some small humor to lighter up the crowd as she tries to get the audience to participate with her small tests. I was very engaged with this video despite the fact that she doesn't take questions from the audience. If I were to ask her one question it would be"Is there other types of video games that help the brain besides action games?" because she only covers action based games. But now its time to take a little stress break from all this blogging and hit the power button on my Playstation 3 and do my brain some good.

-Ryan Gormanhttp://www.ted.com/talks/daphne_bavelier_your_brain_on_video_games.html

The local social media

If there's one thing I've noticed about the local Milwaukee media, is that they are trying to keep up with the social media times. And I think they are doing a good job at it. Two companies that come off the top of my mind are The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and 1250WSSP AM SportsTalk Radio. They use Twitter, Facebook, and blogs to reach out to there consumers, and by doing this they are making it a more enjoyable experience for there fans.

What 1250 does with there social media that I really enjoy is when their sports personalities might have a really interesting topic that they are discussing on the air, and lets say you don't wanna call in and give your opinion. You contact them via Facebook or Twitter. And they make it really easy for you by posting the topic on both sites. They usually read off a good about of the posts too, making you feeling like your apart of the show. As for the Journal I really like some of the sports writers(mostly Tom Haudricourt). They write some really good blogs and deliver breaking news. And if you follow your favorite writers on Twitter or Facebook, you get breaking news sent instantly to you mobile device.

I remember back in February when there was a big announcement that I found very important because I am a big Milwaukee Brewers fan. Ryan Braun would not be suspended for failing a drug test. He got off because there was a miss handing of the drug test. I found out via Twitter because of one of the people I follow broke the news(Tom Hardricourt). A few years ago this wouldn't be possible. I would have waited to when I got home from work and get to my computer to read the story, but because the local media has a changed for what I believed to be the better, I was the first of my friends to break this big news. By using social media, local media has made following sports so much more enjoyable.