Tech: The Great Wii Drought

While admittedly many are only now receiving their Nintendo Wiis (like my two cousins), for people who've had the console since launch, not much has been released worth parting 50 smackers for. Sure, there's WarioWare and Elebits, but both of these were slated to be launch titles anyway, and now, deep into February, we are finally starting to see the edge of a vast desert...of nothingness.

There are encouraging signs, though. While the Wii is still getting a lot of hand-me-down PS2/PSP ports, that's still a lot better than the later stages of the GameCube's life, where the ports never appeared at all. I can live with a soupedup version of "The Godfather" or "Manhunt 2," if only to give me something to play in-between Mario and Metroid.

The worst offender here, of course, is Ubisoft. While "Rayman Raving Rabbids" has proven to be a solid WarioWare-esque title, "Red Steel," "Far Cry," and "GT Pro" have all...well...sucked. The upcoming Prince of Persia game is merely a port of "Two Thrones" with added Wiimote control. If all third-party companies start behaving like this, spending as little as possible on Wii development, Nintendo fans could be in for a bad time of it.