Wii

[magid]

Who chose the name of this thing, anyway? I end up feeling like I'm in first grade when I talk about it. "Do you want to Wii with me?" "Let's Wii." "Have you Wiied yet?" (Or should that be Wii'ed? Or Wii'd?) "Wii, wii, wii, wii, all the way home." Oops, wrong story. Really, though, it's a stupid looking name, and the pronunciation doesn't match the spelling. Once it's verbed, you sound like a schoolkid, and the gerund not only sounds like a potty-mouth, but has the unpleasantness of a triple i, which is just wrong (heck, even skiing sticks to two). Wiiing looks like a typo, which leads to the possibility of using an apostrophe (Wii'ing), which is little better, and I start thinking it's some strange alien name in a science fiction novel.

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Queue invited me over to play using his new Wii (see, the name really does lead to awful sentences). I had no clue what to expect, having not bothered to see what they were in advance. I mean, I knew it was a gaming system, and it involved movement, but not much else.

Queue showed me how to hold the doohickey, with the strap around my wrist, and once I'd made an avatar, how to play some of the games. I played "tennis," "bowling," and "baseball." I can see the appeal; it's fun to watch what happens on screen when you choose how to play, and the little extras get excited when you do well, bouncing up and down without limbs, like excited Fisher Price people.

However, it's not really like any of those sports, because the decisions are so few compared to live play. In "tennis," for example, I have to figure out the timing of when to hit the ball. In meatspace, I'd also be figuring out where to be on the court, judging whether I could get there in time (with my bad running knee), deciding front or back hand, and so on. Not that I'd be on a tennis court in the first place (see that bad knee), nor would I make it through three sets if I were.

It's definitely movement, but given how the hand-held doohickey works, it's all sports with lots of arm movement. Which is better than sitting at a computer screen madly hitting an H key (or just typing :-), but it felt unbalanced. My arm is still sore, a couple of days later. For actual aerobic exercise I think DDR is a better solution, though the graphics are much less appealing.

Still, it was fun, and I could see playing again, though I would like to make an avatar to play left-handed with (yes, a separate one, because I'm just competitive enough to want to keep the ratings earned as a righty (which I assume will be better than anything I can manage lefty) intact), for balance.

Happy 05/06/07 (USian). I'm not staying up until 02:03:04 to say it, however.

Comments

[alandd.livejournal.com]

I have one too so if you're interested in playing, c'mon over. ;-)

[magid.livejournal.com]

I might just take you up on that :-)

[cnoocy]

W2, with gerund W3ng?

[scholargipsy.livejournal.com]

Isn't your grumble technically more an orthographic one than a grammatical one? Using Wii as a verb (a time-honored process known as enallage; or in Calvin-speak, "verbing") is hardly ungrammatical; what you seem to be objecting to is the infelicitous letter combinations that result therefrom.

In other news, I want a Wii.

[magid.livejournal.com]

You're correct, but grammar grumble alliterates much better. And my other complaint is that talking about it at all makes me feel perhaps as old as a first grader, which is not grammar, either. It's not analagous to 'wee,' since that's an adjective, and 'Wii' is used either as a noun or a verb... and we all know what 'wee-the-verb' means :-).

I'm so not surprised you want one. Are they any cheaper over there?

[magid.livejournal.com]

Too l33tspeak-ish in look for me, and gives no clue about pronunciation for the clueless. Not that 'Wii' is so helpful about clues, either.

[alandd.livejournal.com]

You definitely should!