This morning I turned on my Wii to play Mario Kart Double Dash with my two year old son (yeah, he plays). I pressed the power button and guess what, nothing happened! I wasfrustrated, it was a gift for my wife which I paid nearly $300 for. Now I know that the Wii is the cheapest of the next-gens and I should thank Nintendo for finally putting out a product with, while limited, backwards compatibility. I play it from time to time with my wife and son and seemed solid enough, but this isn't the first time I've had problems with it. Six months ago it quit reading discs. We sent it in and received a new one, free of charge, from Nintendo. This took nearly six weeks.

I also had the joys of experiencing the Red Ring from Microsoft about a month ago. I was on hold for over an hour when I finally reached tech support (who was actually very helpful). They sent me a box, postage paid, to send my Xbox 360 back. I have been without it for a month now and wont be getting it back before I leave for business (I travel for weeks at a time). While this is the first problem I have had with my Xbox 360 (thank god), this was a $550 investment. I've spent over $300 on games and probably another $200 on accessories. I pay my $50 a year for XBoxLive, and $24 a year for OXM, and this is the thanks I get.

I have been gaming for 20yrs. and have never had these kinds of problems with my gaming systems. They do so much now and have more power than I think developers know what to do with. The fact of the matter is "new" doesn't mean "good" anymore. They're sacrificing durability for bells and whistles that the gaming community isn't ready for. Graphics are nice, but gameplay is something so much more important. Who cares if the system on my entertainment center can achieve 65fps if it's going to just overheat and shutdown. Personally, I miss my first Xbox, I miss the GameCube, and I miss my Playstation 2. They might not have been Next-Gen, but they were reliable and always ready when I was. The only system I have left is the Playstation3, and lord only knows when that beast of all beasts is going to fail.

The fact is, individually, we're spending thousands of dollars in this industry and they're easier to integrate into our everyday lives. I used my Xbox 360 to chat over MSN to keep in touch with family, I use my Playstation 3 to watch and listen to videos, music, and pictures that I have loaded on either of my computers. I read news and check the weather when I'm short on time with the Wii. Would I miss them so much when they're being shipped here and there for warranty repairs if they did nothing more than just play games? I doubt it. While gaming is an important part of my life (reduce stress, exercise my brain), it's becoming more of a hassle than a hobby.

Three cheers for new technology, because we're the ones getting pwnd.:-|