According to Seattle PI, a newspaper and web site, Nintendo will be launching the Wii in North America on November 19, which just happens to be the Sunday before Thanksgiving. The price? $249.99. According to them the system will include Wii Sports, a compilation of games including tennis, baseball, golf, and bowling. 25 to 30 games will be available for Wii this year, including the Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess and Excite Truck. All first party games (and most if not all) third party games will be priced at $49.99.
Virtual Console downloads of games will run $5 to $10 each and include about 30 classic games to download on day one. Oddly, the site claims that there will be a photo channel to allow users to display didgital photograps on the TV. In addition, there should be an interactive news channel and a weather channel and the Wii will be able to surf the Net out of the box.
All of this news seems legitimate, but we're still waiting on official confirmation from Nintendo. If this news does end up being true, I must admit I'm a bit shocked that Nintendo didn't come in at $199.99 like every other Nintendo console has in the past. It's nice that Wii Sports will be bundled in and one has to wonder how many controllers will be included. If there's 2 in the box then the price is much easier to swallow. As for the date, it's shocking as well because many assumed Nintendo would beat the PS3 to the market. Since it's launching on Nov. 17, Nintendo will arrive at retail 2 days after Sony. Will this hurt or help them? It's hard to say.
Nintendo's US press event is just 7 hours away and Japan is supposed to take place in just a few minutes. We'll update with more news soon. As of now, treat this story as pretty reliable, but still speculation until official confirmation can be obtained.
RSS
