The Wii must devolve to evolve

I've been skeptical of the Wiimote since the announcement that Nintendo's next gen system would be motion sensitive, fearing that all their games would end up being gimmicky and the whole thing would get old fast. I wish I could say that Nintendo has allayed these fears more than a year after the Wii's launch but, unfortunately, they haven't. The Wii has been a magnet for trash shovelware, phoned in remakes with tacked-on waggle and games that would be good if they didn't shoehorn motion sensing into them.

What can be done to fix the Wii's problems with game quality? Nintendo seems to have been the first to find the obvious solution: If you don't need the Wiimote - don't use it!

The upcoming first-party games Super Smash Bros Brawl and Super Mario Kart will both support a Wiimote turned on its side, a Wiimote and Nunchuck combo, a Wii Classic Controller and Gamecube Controllers. This is a great move on Nintendo's part since playing Smash Bros would get old real fast if I had to do an interpretive dance every time I wanted Link to throw a bomb.

This announcement should serve as a message to all of Nintendo's third party developers: Motion sensitivity is encouraged but it is optional.