Frank Price and Marge Burgess don?t fit the profile of the typical video game player.
Before last year, the Oak Crest Village retirement community residents had never picked up a controller or played a game of “Super Mario Bros.” But now, thanks to the Nintendo Wii, they and other Oak Crest residents are logging about 10 hours of video games a week together.
In that sense, maybe they are like your average “gamer.”
“It?s fun, and we enjoy the camaraderie we have with the group all the time,” Price said this week in the middle of a game of “Wii Bowling” with about 10 other residents. “This is the first and only game I?ve played, but it?s just like the real thing.”
The group gathers three or four nights a week in a small sitting area of the 2,000-resident Baltimore County retirement community. There, teams of two or three battle it out with personalized video bowlers on a 60-inch, flat-screen television. Using the Wii?s controllers, the players swing their hands as if they were throwing a bowling ball ? the character in the game mimics the player?s throw.
It?s a new “hands-on” approach to gaming, one that has transcended all age groups and returned Nintendo to the lead position of the video game market. The console, which retails for $250, was the must-have gift during the holiday season, selling out of all stores and priced on auction Web sites for two to three times the retail price.
Nintendo expects to sell more than 23 million Wiis by March 31, the end of its fiscal year, which would outpace sales of Microsoft?s Xbox 360 and Sony?s PlayStation 3.
The Wii first came to the Erickson retirement communities in December 2006, when residents at Erickson?s Sedgebrook community were testing popular holiday toys for their grandchildren, said Kate Newton Schmelyun, an Erickson spokeswoman. The residents enjoyed the game so much, now all 18 of Erickson?s communities have at least one Wii for residents to play.
AWAY Wii GO
As of Friday, the Nintendo Wii was sold out of about 80 online retailers and on backorder for six others, according to www.wiitracker.com, a site that follows Wii?s availability online. The video console, along with several games, was available at one site for $570.
