The Wii lines
So this morning, I thought I’d get up at 6am to see if there was any chance whatsoever of getting a Wii. The Target store close by where I live had, according to the Net, an allocation of 80 units, and it opened at 8am. Plus, there’s a Starbucks next door. I grabbed my digital camera, figuring “Hey, even if it’s insane, at least I’ll have pictures I can put on the blog, right?” That turned out to be a good call. Nice big panorama pics after the jump…
As you can see from the line, I think some of the folks who showed up and were willing to chug Starbucks at 5am are probably going to be disappointed. As I walked into the Starbucks, I saw a parent I knew from the Cub Scouts walking away, and he said, “Hey there! You here for the game console?” with a knowing grin. I held up my digital camera and cheerfully said, “I’m just here to take pictures!” (But I was crying inside.)
Having seen the extent of it an hour before opening in a sleepy suburb right by a neighborhood of retired people, I figured I’d check the Circuit City on the main drag in Carmel Mountain, suburb full of families.
The Circuit City line in Carmel Mountain, at 7:15 am, for a store that opens in around 3 hours.
This store doesn’t open until 10am. And it’s only getting 20-odd units, according to the web. The level of enthusiasm and movement was significantly lower, perhaps because they were still a few hours from the finish line. Or perhaps because unlike the Target shoppers, the Circuit City folks mostly had chairs and could therefore sit to wait. Or they did the math on the length of the line, the number of people ahead of them, and the number of units available. It’s possible that many of the core market here picked up pre-orders at midnight at the GameStop across the street, too. Still, well over half this line will probably be disappointed.
The picture online is no prettier. WiiTracker shows it sold out basically everywhere. Amazon kindly opened sales yesterday without actually, you know, emailing everyone who signed up to be told (near as I can tell — at least, I didn’t get the email), and of course, there was the brouhaha when they decided not to do pre-orders at all.
At least there aren’t any incidents like the shootings, smashings, and near-riots that have occurred surrounding the PS3 launch. But getting a PS3 was completely hopeless, whereas with the Wii, you had a decent shot of finding one.
At least, so I had thought.
14 Responses to “The Wii lines”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
in front of the television, at 11 PM I turned off the television, put on my jacket, grabbed my keys, and drove to a mostly darkened strip mall to wait in line for my hardware. When I arrived at 11:30, there were nine people in line in front of me. By some reports
Read more »
I just don’t see how we can simultaneously witness this kind of “hard-core” fandom activity call the Wii is a mass market product. I’m not just referring to the lines and sell-outs that you refer to here, but also to the pre-order failures. The combination of time and will required to try for a launch Wii excludes almost all of the so-called mass market. Yet, at the same time, there was (and remains) nowhere online to pre-order a Wii. And when I say pre-order, I mean place an order and just have the retailer take care of th first-come first-served process. I think many people would like to order one, and they’d happily wait until it arrived without thinking much about it. But how many people are willing to adopt the purchase process itself as a lifestyle choice? Maybe the Wii will help change the demography of gaming, eventually. But I wonder if the combination of fandom hype around PS3 and Wii won’t actually discourage purchases from those outside the normal base of game buyers, precisely because it implicates the Wii in a kind of gamer lifestyle folly from which ordinary people will want to dissociate.
There could possible be some units out there. Did you try Sears, or maybe one of the smaller game chains like Gamecrazy?
[…] Pictures of Wii lines from Raph Koster’s site […]
I stopped by at Toys ‘R’ Us before going shopping for a snow board. I told myself before hand that I didn’t care and that I was just trying because I was coming up to go shopping for a snowboard. I was still bummed when all that was left in front of me was one person waiting to buy one and 3 people with preorders and the guy announced that they had sold out of non-preorders. If they had had 2 more consoles I would have gotten one. Just 2!
If the rumors are true, the next shipments arrive tuesday…
At least I got a snowboard. 🙂
GameStop sent us an email warning us it was going on PreOrder. Went to the local GameStop about 10 minutes from our house and arrived shortly after it opened on PreOrder day. I was about the 7th out of 16 they had allocated there I think. Some time later we brought in our GameCube and a bunch of games and accessories we never used anymore. Yesterday we called GameStop to check when they opened and they said they’d be open from Midnight to about 1AM and then again at 11AM. So we went over just after Midnight. I didn’t really want to wait outside because this GameStop is less than a mile from where the PS3 shooting was. (Nothing like seeing your local WalMart on National TV with Police Lines when you live in the sticks!) Not a lot of people at the GameStop, only letdown is that they didn’t get enough remotes. When we got to the front of the line I asked the guy for a Playstation 3. The look on the 3 employees’ faces really made my day. I’ll have a happy smile whenever I think of that moment. As we headed home with my son’s lap covered in Wii junk we saw at least one Cruiser posted outside the WalMart. Today we got a second Remote at the Best Buy about an hour from here but couldn’t find NunChucks anywhere. Overall positive and cool experience.
Ouch. I hope things clear up by next week. A work colleague is in the US to install some networking gear (we’re based in the UK) and I’ve given him three hundred pounds and orders not to return without a Wii and a bunch of games…
at least it wasn’t as bad as the ps3 debacle. here in kentucky people were shooting bb guns at each other!
After a late night last night I decided to sleep in. It seemed not impossible, at the time, that I could pick one up at 10am. That was a mistake. Not only was it worse than I’d imagined, across the US, but I think LA was just particularly bad for getting a Wii anyway. As far as I can tell, the Walmart’s and Target’s around here got around the same #’s of Wii’s per store as elsewhere in the US … only they serve a much denser/larger population per store.
I found a CompUSA that didn’t get their shipment yet. They said to just call them regularly until they do. Actually I already have more games than I have time. I just thought it would be fun to get a console on release day (I’ve never done that before). I guess I picked the wrong launch for that. 🙂
Ian, I think marketers are making the most of the temp scarcity issue due to demand creation and supply. I’m sure these lines and waits are worthy of local, national, and international news time.
Wii, unlike PS3, is designed to win the set-top space for those not already have a game console. Their market-innovative input device will appeal to a new crowd of players.
Grandma is getting hip to video games and I can picture gramdpa playing virtual tennis with grandson.
Frank
I just don’t see how we can simultaneously witness this kind of “hard-core” fandom activity call the Wii is a mass market product.
You could say the same thing about sporting events, concerts, and other media where the mainstream and the fans conflict. Of all of the large (stadium-sized) concerts I’ve gone to, I’ve never gotten seats up close. Does that discourage people from going to concerts just because the close seats are usually obtained by fans willing to camp out and to companies (like radio stations for promotions)? Not really.
I suspect once the “rush” is over, you’ll see more “mainstream” people go pick up the new console. They just won’t have the privilege of being “one of the first” when the selection of games is still a bit thin. Most “mainstream” people will wait for the first price drop, anyway.
My thoughts.
Got to love PCs for that at least: no waiting line 😉
I went and picked mine up at my Hollywood EB Games at 11am when they opened. I had a preorder so I wasn’t worried. However at 10am, the BestBuy next door still had many boxes left, and having breakfast in the food court I saw one person about every 15 minutes leave with one. However, most all the games and all the accessories were long gone.
I think chalked up with the best of statisticians, Nintendo didn’t map distribution accurately. Demand was probably still higher than supply by a league, but I do know many people personally who all got one. Contrarily, I don’t personally know a single person who owns a PS3 right now who isn’t part of the establishment press.
On getting mine I invited all my friends who didn’t get one and we played all Sunday. Even my housekeeper who isn’t a hardcore gamer was very excited about it after seeing it.
Keep trying, I’m sure there will be more soon. I’m curious to hear your opinions of the Wii once you get it as a designer and as a father.