TEH AWESOME!

First off, sorry for the long delay between posts... I guess frequent blogging just ain't my forte!

Last night two friends of mine and I hopped into the bat-cruiser and hit the freeways to make our pilgrimage to San Diego, where we attended the latest stop on the Nintendo Fusion Tour! Needless to say, we were there for one reason, and one reason alone - THE SLEEPING! I kid, I kid! We were there for Wii, of course (yes, I avoided a terrible pun...must be losing my touch)!

We arrived later than I planned, about 5:30 pm, and I was concerned, as there was a block-long line outside the venue, a little rock club named SOMA. But apparently my concern was unfounded; about ten minutes after we got in line, everyone began filing forward and into the theater, where we were told to go straight ahead for the bands, or down a hall to the right for Wii games (no DS kiosks were set up at this stop - apparently not enough level floorspace). My buddies and I stopped first at a counter where we could enter a raffle for a signed DS Lite, grabbed some minor swag (guitar picks, mini-buttons and a keychain) and made a beeline for the Wii room.
The room was basically a gutted movie theater room with five Wii kiosks at the front end, and the lines had already begun to form at each station. The games on display were the same bunch almost every Fusion Tour report has mentioned; Wii Sports Tennis, Wario Ware Smooth Moves, Wii Play Shooting Demo, Excite Truck and Legend Of Zelda: Twilight Princess. I had already made up my mind that if the line looked reasonable in length, I would head straight for Zelda, and so I did.

I must say that I'm so glad I made that decision; even though I was privileged enough to play Twilight Princess on Gamecube two E3's ago, trying it out with the Wiimote and nunchuck is an incomparable experience. I'll write up my full impressions and a few noteworthy details in my next post.

I only had to wait about an hour to play Zelda, and the bands, which had been playing in an adjacent room (we could see and hear them through a glass-less window between the rooms), had progressed up to the second to last act, Relient K. I happen to like them a lot, so I sort of paid half-attention to them and half to the rest of the Wii games in the room.

The lines were still present, but those for the Wario Ware and Wii Play kiosks were shortest, so we got in the queue for those. I chose Wario Ware, shedding a tear for my lost opportunity to try Excite Truck (looks outstanding, by the way), and soon enough got a shot at the zany micro-game title. The game is great fun, as are all of the Wario Ware titles, and I really got into the creative ways they used the Wiimote. One of my buddies pointed out, however, that the game did seem to lack a bit of polish; some games used the rumble, while others did not, and it didn't make much sense to us that the feature was missing in some places. Hopefully Nintendo will iron this out before the game launches in the Spring.

By this time, Relient K was winding down their final song, and we knew that the Fusion Tour staff had instructions to shut down the Wii kiosks before the headlining band, Hawthorne Heights, came on, so we called it a night. Driving back home to the desert, all three of us wore smiles of contentment on our faces, knowing that we were among the few fortunate souls to have tried Wii out before its launch.