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Talking to non-gamers about Wii - their reactions

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I though it would be great to read about discussions gamers have had with non-gamers about Wii, and how they feel about the new controls.

Here's my little anecdote.

The other day a non-gamer friend and I decided to play some Xbox and GC games. Immediately I noticed he was struggling. He wasn't overly bad, but it seems like it was all to much for him sometimes.

I noticed this, and asked him "How do you feel about controls these days?" He quickly replied with "It's just too complex. There's too many buttons - it's too hard to take in all at once".

I quickly asked him how he felt about swinging the controller like a tennis racquet in a tennis game. He said "that would be easier, because it's more like what you do in real life, rather than pressing buttons", as well as claiming it "would be more fun".

Naturally I went on to explain Wii and the controller. I could definitely see how happy he was with the controls. "I recently wanted to buy an Xbox, but the controllers are just too much for me. This Wii thing sounds a lot easier to play." He asked me when it would come out and at what price, and quickly stated that he was going to buy one.

This is a true story folks, and it definitely proved to me that Nintendo are heading in a unique, but effective direction. By making things easier and more natural, people who refuse to play games can now be enticed to start playing.

What are your stories?
 
Shogmaster said:
So how much does Nintendo pay marketers these days? :lol

Dude, this is not made up in any way. I was definitely sceptical about Nintendo's approach with Wii to increse the mass market through enticing non-gamers to starting playing games, but this exact conversation really showed me that they're taking the right path in doing so.
 

Jeff-DSA

Member
I don't feel like typing out a long post on the subject, but I've found that non-gamers are way more interested in what I've had to say about the Wii than any other console.
 
Alkaliine said:
Dude, this is not made up in any way. I was definitely sceptical about Nintendo's approach with Wii to increse the mass market through enticing non-gamers to starting playing games, but this exact conversation really showed me that they're taking the right path in doing so.

Well shit.... If you put it that way, I'm totally convinced! *tosses the now useless X360 out the window*
 

jesusraz

Member
Alkaliine said:
What are your stories?

My mum certainly likes the idea of it, since whenever she used to play Mario Kart she'd lean to one side when going round corners, turning the controller like a steering wheel and feeling foolish! Now it'll actually track her controller movement she's quite pleased...

:)
 
Alkaliine said:
Dude, this is not made up in any way. I was definitely sceptical about Nintendo's approach with Wii to increse the mass market through enticing non-gamers to starting playing games, but this exact conversation really showed me that they're taking the right path in doing so.


I will support you and state that my sister said the same thing, although she put more focus on the interactivity of the console as the reason she was buying it. She has never liked the way traditional games are played.
 
Shogmaster said:
Well I'm convinced! *tosses the now useless X360 out the window*

360 is a great machine, no doubt about it. I'm not comparing Wii to any other next-gen machine in terms of quality, I'm just showing an example on how the Wii should be a viable entertainment option for non-gamers.
 
Alkaliine said:
What are your stories?

Just the other day I wanted some lunch, so I went down the road to this fish and chip joint. The large man behind the counter greeted me, I looked at the menu, oh! HAMBURGER. "Plain hamburger please" I said. He nodded his head and fell to the ground. "Oh my" I replied, quickly eating all the bubble gum they had to form a balloon. A balloon for his safety! "GET IN" I screamed, into a megaphone, at a small child. He cried. I laughed! Setting the store on fire to quickly cook all the meat patties for a delicious massive food type creation, I overheard some woman talking about Grand Theft Auto for 32X. "MAN DIS GAME BLOODY GOOD AWWW YEAH AW YEAH GUNZ 'N SHIT". I asked her what she thought of Wii. She unzipped my pants, we had a good time.

Playing Uno. On a boat. In the sky.
 

impirius

Member
I talked to a kid yesterday and asked him if he was getting a Wii, and he said he'd never heard of it.

I started crying and had to excuse myself.
 

Hyoushi

Member
roflcoptersapocalypse.gif
 
Infernal Monkey said:
Just the other day I wanted some lunch, so I went down the road to this fish and chip joint. The large man behind the counter greeted me, I looked at the menu, oh! HAMBURGER. "Plain hamburger please" I said. He nodded his head and fell to the ground. "Oh my" I replied, quickly eating all the bubble gum they had to form a balloon. A balloon for his safety! "GET IN" I screamed, into a megaphone, at a small child. He cried. I laughed! Setting the store on fire to quickly cook all the meat patties for a delicious massive food type creation, I overheard some woman talking about Grand Theft Auto for 32X. "MAN DIS GAME BLOODY GOOD AWWW YEAH AW YEAH GUNZ 'N SHIT". I asked her what she thought of Wii. She unzipped my pants, we had a good time.

Playing Uno. On a boat. In the sky.

:lol
 

Papi

Member
Infernal Monkey said:
Just the other day I wanted some lunch, so I went down the road to this fish and chip joint. The large man behind the counter greeted me, I looked at the menu, oh! HAMBURGER. "Plain hamburger please" I said. He nodded his head and fell to the ground. "Oh my" I replied, quickly eating all the bubble gum they had to form a balloon. A balloon for his safety! "GET IN" I screamed, into a megaphone, at a small child. He cried. I laughed! Setting the store on fire to quickly cook all the meat patties for a delicious massive food type creation, I overheard some woman talking about Grand Theft Auto for 32X. "MAN DIS GAME BLOODY GOOD AWWW YEAH AW YEAH GUNZ 'N SHIT". I asked her what she thought of Wii. She unzipped my pants, we had a good time.

Playing Uno. On a boat. In the sky.
Woah! That happened to me the other day.
TWINS!!!
 
I've had exactly one conversation about the wii. It went as follows:

"Hey, they renamed the Revolution Wii"
"What?"
"They renamed the Revolution Wii"
"That's retarded"
 
I've never talked to someone like this before... I assume you paraphrased your conversation? It really does read like a testimonial.

I have shown them videos though. I've got the upcoming game reel, and videos of the browser, photo editor and virtual console on my video iPod. I've shown people that and gotten them interested I guess.
 

Stinkles

Clothed, sober, cooperative
Friends don't evangelize gaming systems to other friends.

Seriously. If I was a non gamer and you did that, I would be annoyed. Then I would evangelize having a girlfriend at you. They hardly have any buttons and they're easy to use.
Actually they're not easy to use

Anyway, THIS IS REALLY ****ING SAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
radioheadrule83 said:
I've never talked to someone like this before... I assume you paraphrased your conversation? It really does read like a testimonial.

I have shown them videos though. I've got the upcoming game reel, and videos of the browser, photo editor and virtual console on my video iPod. I've shown people that and gotten them interested I guess.

The quotes are from the conversation, yes.
 

Shig

Strap on your hooker ...
Do you actually use the name when talking about it? I've found that every time I say "the Wii" it's instantly followed up by "The what?", even if I've talked about it with them before. It's gonna take a bit for that name to catch on, methinks.
 
I gave my mom and dad who've barely played games before a 360 controller and asked them if "use this stick to move around, and press one of these buttons to do something" is too confusing for them.

They said no, and seemed to pick it up relatively quickly. Obviously, I'm not going to give them Ninja Gaiden and Splinter Cell as their first games to play, but they have no problem with the general idea of a basic controller. I then asked them why they don't play video games, and it seems that they're not really into the idea of "interactivity" in general. They don't want to participate in "gameplay". They'd rather just sit back and watch a movie or a tv show. Nothing about complex controllers. The idea of controlling something on a screen is just unappealing to them. And they're old, so they're resistant to new things by default.

this is partially made up
 

TheQueen'sOwn

insert blank space here
radioheadrule83 said:
I've never talked to someone like this before... I assume you paraphrased your conversation? It really does read like a testimonial.

I have shown them videos though. I've got the upcoming game reel, and videos of the browser, photo editor and virtual console on my video iPod. I've shown people that and gotten them interested I guess.

:lol :lol This thread is just toooo much!
 

Baker

Banned
Maybe you should get some friends with a higher IQ than my shoe size.

I'm not bashing the Wii. It's not hard to figure out the sticks move you and there's been six buttons on the controller since the 16bit days. Unless the two extra shoulder buttons now just take so much more brain power to figure out.
 
I called it "Wii", he called it "the Wii thing". He only said the name once.

It didn't seem to bother him too much, I think it just confused him a bit.
 
I've talked about it... yes...

One reaction was bad at the beginning when I described the Wii Remote (very little buttons, seperate, one handed, looks like a remote), but he thought it was cool that you could control games by moving your hand like in Red Steel.

Another reaction I got from someone who hardly ever plays games was that you look like an ass when you use the thing, he explained if he ever saw me through a window doing that stuff in front of a TV (aiming at things that are not there and swinging swords, etc) he would laugh his ass off. But he also thought it was kind of cool and I showed him the Red Steel video and he understood how the game worked and stuff. I also showed him the Channels and stuff and you can edit your pictures for example and he thought it was cool that you can do all these things with one device. And he was more or less impressed by the Wii's pointer functionality.
 

Y2Kev

TLG Fan Caretaker Est. 2009
I was just wondering...at what point did they tell you the DS has revitalized them as gamers?
 

bard

Member
A guy approached me at work a few days ago and asked if I'd heard about the Wii. He's a total non-gamer (hasn't even heard of Guitar Hero!), but he's going to GameStop today to pre-order the Wii. Flailing your arms to play video games is a surprisingly big draw.
 
perplexcity said:
Maybe you should get some friends with a higher IQ than my shoe size.

I'm not bashing the Wii. It's not hard to figure out the sticks move you and there's been six buttons on the controller since the 16bit days. Unless the two extra shoulder buttons now just take so much more brain power to figure out.

I was trying to get my brother to play RE4 the other day, and he struggled big time. He found it hard to remember which button was which and which button did what. It genuinely confused him.
 
Y2Kevbug11 said:
I was just wondering...at what point did they tell you the DS has revitalized them as gamers?

:lol

He's a non-gamer. He doesn't own a DS, though he is interesting in purchasing a gaming system. It's just that current controls are too complicated for him.
 

Baker

Banned
Alkaliine said:
I was trying to get my brother to play RE4 the other day, and he struggled big time. He found it hard to remember which button was which and which button did what. It genuinely confused him.

Disregarding menus or anything fancy, RE4 is played with the stick, the A button, and the right shoulder. Oooohhhh. And besides shooting, the damn screen tells you what the A button does.
 

DarienA

The black man everyone at Activision can agree on
You know not only is that ROFL Copter gif good in itself, but what really throws it in to high gear are the OMG missiles.... :lol :lol :lol
 
There are definately people that think controls are too complicated and find the Gamecube more simple to use. I don't know these people personally, though.
 
perplexcity said:
Disregarding menus or anything fancy, RE4 is played with the stick, the A button, and the right shoulder. Oooohhhh. And besides shooting, the damn screen tells you what the A button does.

I agree that's it's quite bewildering.

But this is what actually happens to many non-gamers in the world.
 

Scrow

Still Tagged Accordingly
Shogmaster said:
Well shit.... If you put it that way, I'm totally convinced! *tosses the now useless X360 out the window*
you've started walking down a path to a happier gaming life.

embrace the wii people. it's the only path to happiness.
 
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