This article on Joystiq illustrates exactly how I’ve grown to feel about the Wii since I picked one up in January, and frankly what I suspected before I tried them: the Wii Remote is a cheap gimmick. They just don’t provide nearly the level of control that they’d like you to think. Take Wii Bowling for example. At first, you pick it up, and you get the feeling that you’re bowling like a pro. You can aim wide right and spin the ball left with a flick of the wrist, curving it in for big strikes. But if you aim wide left and spin left, it still curves right! Try that swing with no spin from wrist flicks. It still spins! With Wii Boxing, there’s no control at all. You just flail your arms like a maniac. Swinging the remote in Zelda makes Link swing the sword, but there’s no connection with how you swing it to what Link does on the screen. It’s barely separated from pressing a button.

The trouble with all this, and the reason the Wii is selling like mad, is that at first, it does seem like you’re in control. Games are immediately fun. You get really excited and run out and get yourself a Wii (like I did). The problem is that once you get to know the games, you realize that the control is an illusion. This makes the games much less fun.

I hope “real control” is something they can provide in future Wii games, but if not, I predict a lot of Wiis collecting dust, like mine is.