[August 27, 2008]

The Bakersfield Californian Herb Benham column: Herb Benham: Still don't know the whys and wherefores of Wii ? but i know I broke it

(Bakersfield Californian, The (KRT) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) Aug. 27--For some of us, fools maybe and bad sports certainly, it's almost a badge of honor to say we've never played a video game.

"I've never played a video game," I've said many times, searching for something that would distinguish me from the teeming masses although the teeming masses who play video games seem to be pretty happy doing so.

I can no longer say I've never played a video game because now I have. Recently, a neighbor invited me to his house because one of his daughters had received the game Wii as a birthday present. Playing it seemed a painless way to deal with my video game virginity as well as honoring the advice older people give younger people about staying young:

Learn something new every day. I hadn't learned anything new that day or the day before so Wii would have to do.

I can't tell you much about the game except that it involves your TV screen, a console that you plug into the TV and a remote with which to hit a baseball, golf ball, tennis ball or whatever game the player chooses.

"You can get a really good workout playing this game," said 10-year-old Maggie.

A workout? I thought video games were supposed to be a rather sweatless enterprise. Something you did in a dark, air-conditioned room until all hours of the night. If I wanted to sweat, I could go outside and sit in my car.

I chose tennis because I've played tennis and when you're playing a video game for the first time, you want to limit your losses. I didn't want to be embarrassed by a 10-year-old girl, or worse, her father.

Without going into numbing detail, you take the remote, and start swinging at a ball that appears on the screen. I don't know how any of this works and I'm not even really curious. I just didn't want to make a fool out of myself.

Lord, you can get a sweat going, especially when you have a serve and a set of ground strokes as powerful as mine. However, even with my obviously exceptional game, I managed to lose the first set to a sixth-grader.

OK, maybe I'll swing harder in this next game. I bent my knees and I lunged toward the screen. Crack. I had backhanded the TV screen with the remote.

I pushed the start button to activate the next point. Nothing happened. I pushed again. Still nothing. I handed it to Maggie because she is a kid and she understands these things but she couldn't get the remote to work either.

The room became quiet with the sound of dashed expectations. It appeared that I had broken the remote and ruined a little girl's birthday present. If I would have had a rope and a lick of self-respect, I would have hung myself from the oak tree outside their family room. I looked online to see if there were other problem players like myself. This is what I found.

"We have received some reports that when consumers swing the Wii Remote with the original version of the wrist-strap using excessive force and accidentally let go, the cord connecting the controller to the wrist strap can break, potentially causing the Wii Remote to strike bystanders or objects."

There was nothing about breaking a little girl's heart.

I wrote the friend a check for $40. That may or may not cover it. I've learned something about playing video games. You can sweat and they're not cheap.

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