Just Play Some Records, You Twats

According to 'a man on the radio' (Nick Gillett from the Guardian), the upcoming Nintendo Wii is for a completely different audience to the X-Box 360, because, 'Microsoft is for gamers'.

Thanks for clearing that up.

It's bad enough when you get this kind of guff in some fanboy forum or the letters page of some tatty partisan games mag, but it's another thing when it's in the mainstream media (alright, 6 Music).

Whatever you think of Nintendo, it would be difficult to make an argument that they didn't have the enjoyment of gamers in mind when they create new products. Almost every genuine innovation in gaming can be traced back to a piece of software or hardware that emerged from their Kyoto HQ; the original NES controller which set the standard for joypads to this day, analogue thumbsticks, wireless controllers, rumble paks, battery back-up, and now the Wii remote.

For the first time in ages I find myself genuinely excited about a new console.

The slightly dispiriting prospect of having to upgrade your machine just to play the same games, but with slightly more realistic eyebrows on characters has been pushed aside by the mouthwatering prospect of a whole new way of playing games.

Given the seemingly endless possibilities this presents, to dismiss Nintendo's new console out of hand like that would appear to be the attitude of someone who either a) is an astounding graphics tart or b) has a grudge against Nintendo, possibly because he once got touched up in a lift by Hiroshi Yamauchi.

I shouldn't get so annoyed though - to date, the mainstream coverage of videogames has mostly consisted of screaming headlines about how Sonic the Hedgehog bummed a child through the TV screen, or how Grand Theft Auto made a kid go and shoot someone's head off because he would never have realised what all those guns that were lying around his house were for otherwise.

Some papers that don't decry games as the handiwork of the Devil (and hilariously some that do) sometimes try cozy up to them, occasionally dedicating half a page of ill-informed, out-of-date copy to them every now and again - my local rag once gave Driv3r 10/10. I wish I'd kept that.