So far in my life I’ve witnessed the tail end of one real revolution in the way humans interact with computers (HCI), the introduction of the mouse into every-day computing. Sure, the mouse was invented before I was even born, but it didn’t really take off till a few years after I first started using PCs, when Windows became the dominant OS. I can remember, just, being a computer user in the days when the keyboard was your only input device. I remember moving to Windows and discovering the mouse. There have been a few occasions since when I thought I was seeing the start of another HCI revolution but none of them ever really worked out. The touch-screen has had a minimal impact but it hasn’t really taken off. Perhaps it will some day, probably when the multi-sense variety become common, but not yet. However, this week I got to use a computer in a whole new way, using a device that is, as we speak, winging it’s way to countless millions of homes. I am of course talking about the Nintendo Wii, or more specifically, its controller.

[tags]Wii, Nintendo, HCI[/tags]

If you haven’t heard of the Wii, it’s a games console recently released by Nintendo. The console itself is far from revolutionary. In fact, specs wise it’s behind the competition (Sony’s PlayStation 3 & Microsoft’s X-Box360). What makes the Wii revolutionary is it’s controller, the Wii-Remote (or Wiimote). It has buttons like a regular game-pad and it has a rumble pack, but it does something else that no other controller does, it can sense motion, and use that information to control games. You play the Wii by moving around the Wiimote. To play tennis you swing it like a racket, to play golf you swing it like a club, it couldn’t be simpler! And it gets even better, there is an additional attachment you can add on so that you have two independent control points, one for each hand. This makes for a really fun boxing game!

I’ve never used a computer input device that’s more natural or more intuitive. I watched children and adults alike pick up the wiimote for the first time, and get comfortable with it within minutes. This contrasts dramatically with my memories of trying to teach people to play golf games with a keyboard, mouse, or regular game-pad. In only an hour or so of playing time I was proficient at multiple games. The bowling took only a go or two to get into and after half a match I was not just comfortable with the game, I was becoming a power-user, applying spins to the ball and everything!

I can say without a shadow of a doubt that the Wii with it’s Wiimote are the biggest revolution I’ve seen computer input devices. What really impresses me is that I didn’t see this revolution on tomorrow’s world, or as a prototype at some HCI conference, no, the Wii is in sitting rooms around the world NOW. It’s being used by ordinary people, young and old. You might expect this revolution to come at a high cost but no, the Wii is the cheapest of the new consoles on the market by a mile. The other new consoles all have more power and and out-perform the Wii by all the old metrics, but that doesn’t matter, because the Wii has something none of the others have, real innovation. The PS3 and the X-Box360 will be little more than foot-notes in the history of computer gaming, the Wii will be remembered as the start of a whole new era. No one will remember that the other consoles were faster and more powerful, people will only remember the Wii and its Wiimote. Oh, and perhaps that some people were stupid enough to let go of the Wiimotes and embed them in their TVs!