0  | 

I found this helpful Thank You! Your vote will be tallied soon!

My oldest swings the remote like a golf club to hit the ball

So I have been hearing the hype over the Nintendo Wii forever.  Considering that I love games, gadgets and electronics, I'm surprised I hadn't checked it out sooner.  But with two kids and no time, the whole thing had escaped me.

Then a few weekends ago, we got a taste of the Wii life.  Some friends came over and brought their Wii and a game called Guitar Hero 3.  (You follow the notes on screen and try and play on a guitar to keep up with the song.  Guitar prop and all.)  We were hooked.   The next morning (they had spent the night), we showed my oldest the Wii and we played a few rounds of bowling and he loved it too.

After that, I was obsessed - I had to have one.  Of course I didn't realize how hard it was to get one.  My first attempt was to walk into Toys R Us, only to get literally laughed out of the store.  I smartened up quickly and began regularly calling local retailers.  ("Sorry, only one shipment this week - we got 3 and they are gone," was a usual response)  I was frequenting eBay too but people have been asking top prices and it's pretty much highway robbery on there unless you're totally desperate.  (I was close!)

In the end, I lucked out.  I met a friend for coffee at the mall last week and I walked into a Gamestop.  He had gotten in 12 boxes that day and "highly doubted" there were any Wiis in there but told us to come back in 10-15 minutes.  We did, and the last box held 3 Wiis - one of which is now our own household Wii, which my oldest has named "Nutty".

Now that we've had it in our house a few days, I think the whole game system/gaming thing definitely has a bad reputation.  Playing on our Wii, we do anything BUT sit still and veg out.  The games keep us moving - to the point where I have to take a break and sit down at times. Okay so it's not as educational as sitting down and reading a book with my kids, but it certainly has a lot more going for it than the Atari system I played on growing up.

My oldest just loves it.  His favorite part is creating and editing the "Miis," which are your own little personal people that you play with on various games on the system.  He has his own Mii, and he's also created a fictitious Mii whom he's named "Treehouse."  He also loves the Wii Sports and Wii Play games that we got along with the system and extra remote.   And some of the games are great for the entire family - we can all play a round of "tennis" (where you really swing the remote as you would a racket), or box or golf. 

I think this is a great family piece - as I type this, it's snowing hard here in Philadelphia today so we're stuck inside. And no, I won't let my kids sit in front of it all day but it's nice for a change and for something we can all do as a family together during these cold winter months when we're stuck inside.