US Wii Launch: Hardware Over Hype

news via spong

Today in the US, Nintendo launched the Wii console, not that you'd know it watching the news. In contrast to the lead-story coverage generated by last week's PlayStation 3 launch, mainstream news has largely ignored the Nintendo release.

Although the machine is a sell-out in most areas of the US, Nintendo lost vital publicity that it had hoped would hit its target of lapsed and non-gamers. These consumers, typically disinterested in gaming, simply heard that a new PlayStation had arrived and everyone seemed desperate to buy one. They have probably missed the fact that a Nintendo machine has also been launched, a machine they might very much want to play or at the very least investigate.

Calls to branches of Target, Best Buy and Wal-Mart today painted a picture of quiet and orderly satisfaction. Although actual allocation figures are well-guarded, it appears that regional Wal-Mart stores received 20 units, Target and Best Buy had around 60 available per outlet. In contrast to the PS3 launch, queuing began hours, rather than days, before stores opened.

Only Wii's New York launch event gathered a healthy amount of publicity, including mentions in the mainstream media's entertainment and tech pages. The coverage Sony enjoyed is not present, even though more machines reached more users.

In-store pre-orders for Wii sold out in minutes of going on sale. Follow-up pre-orders were available online only and comprised $700 bundles, and also sold out within minutes. Online actions saw pre-orders sell for around $1,000 in some cases and as far as anyone could see, the Wii was almost as hot at the PS3. However, allocations for both machines went in opposite directions, and the laws of supply and demand came into play.

The fact stands that more people have had a Wii today bought PlayStation 3 on Friday. More people have one hooked up to their SD televisions playing a greater library of games, some of which are actually very good. So what happened?

Despite its a $600 price tag, limited supplies of PlayStation 3 resulted in pre-orders selling at thousands of dollars over the RRP on auction sites. The US was initially expecting over 400,000 consoles to hit retail, but this figure diminished and by mid-week, it was largely accepted that only 250,000 units would be available at launch. This drove people onto the streets and by Thursday night, retail outlets across the country were besieged by little shantytowns comprising an estimated 70% scalpers and 30% gamers.

Compared to the last big camp out for the Xbox 360, more was at stake with the PlayStation 3 launch. It is a console that promises more than any other, it commands a higher retail price than any other, it is in desperately short supply and promises to be for many weeks.

PS3 also represents the best overnight investment ever in a games machine, with people netting thousands of dollars within hours of launch. Transactions were taking place in car parks, with scalpers seeing big returns for a working week out in the cold. There were sporadic shootings, stampedes and fights around the country, although SPOnG witnessed a standard trouble-free launch here. It was enough to drive blanket media coverage of the PlayStation 3 in almost every single news outlet coast-to-coast. Starting on Tuesday and building to a crescendo on Friday evening, anyone picking up a newspaper, turning on the television or tuning in their car radios was well aware that the PlayStation 3 was such a hot item. The result: Non-gamers and lapsed gamers became aware that everyone wanted a PlayStation 3. That's quite a seed to plant...

Stay tuned for some on-the-spot coverage of Nintendo's New York launch soon on SPOnG and be sure to let us know how you feel things went right and wrong in the US over what has been an amazing weekend for gaming.