With the success of both the Xbox and PlayStation 2 , Microsoft and Sony had proven their chops in the industry and were gearing up to make it big ; to dominate the next console generation with promises of HD graphics and improved online functionality . And yet against the backdrop of all this chaos , another contender innocuously emerged on the horizon . A revolution was nigh .

Or more specifically ,

a Revolution . Capital R . See , hot off the reign of the GameCube – which , while not selling spectacularly well , would later go on to be hailed as an overlooked gem with a wonderful library – all eyes were on Nintendo , a company known for their repeated innovation , to come up with something ground-breaking to resuscitate their prospects a little .

Preceding the Wii ’ s reveal at E3 2006 , details on the little white gamechanger were remarkably slight , with only a leaked development name – the ‘ Revolution ’ – for the

Internet to work with . Rumours flew back and forth about the possibility of motion-based controls – at the time an essentially unprecedented notion – and were only fuelled by the odd breadcrumbs of information dropped

by less-than-careful Nintendo employees which all seemed to point towards this being the case . As April drew nearer , gamers ’ collective hype levels were on the up-andup , with even fans fiercely loyal to other systems turning their heads in interest . The community was truly abuzz , on literal tenterhooks waiting to see

what kind of bombshell the Big N would drop .

And then E3 rolled around . The Wii was finally brought out into the open , in all its glossy , tennis-racket swinging glory , and the effect was immediate . Despite Reggie Fils-Aime ’ s best attempts to insist that the name ‘ Wii ’ symbolised the social togetherness ( as in ‘ we ’) the system would promote , it didn ’ t take long for the dam to burst . Puerile jokes about the obvious toilet humour to be derived from the name

flooded message boards , and the Wii ’ s reputation took something of a pre-release

knock as a result .

Those who chose not to indulge in such immature mockery ,

however , generally fell into two camps : one which turned their noses up , branded the new Wii Remote controller a ‘ useless gimmick ’ and condemned Nintendo to an early grave , and one which remained adamant the Wii would be the ideal thing to attract a casual demographic and put them back on top . By the time the console ’ s

November release date loomed , the latter camp had , more or less , managed to drown out the former , which all thought bod-