(see update below)

Knibble.com has been getting a little bit of buzz in the last few days for releasing “5000 Flash games for the Wii”, at wii.knibble.com. I’ve always figured that a small industry of Flash games targeted specifically to the Wii would develop over the next few years, since there a so many Wii’s happily integrated into living rooms all over the world. The market is there to be filled, it’s just a matter of someone working make a decent product. Take for example my favorite Flash application specifically designed for the Wii, moowee.tv. The interface of this social video application fills up the screen nicely on the Wii, doesn’t require any zooming in a out, allows control via Wii Remote buttons and just works.

Sadly, wii.knibble.com is not like this at all. The “5000 Flash games” are not in fact specially tweaked for the Wii, but are just recycled Flash games targeted at bored PC users (ie “softcore casual gamers”). This is evident since the font sizes used are rarely legible on a TV screen. The games are embedded into a web page with Adwords at the top (again, with font sizes not even legible on a TV) and “Normal/Widescreen”, “Reload” “Add to Favorites” and “Pick Random” buttons at the bottom. To even have a chance of playing these games properly, you need to zoom in, cutting off the extra stuff on the page around the actual Flash game. I gave up after cycling through about 10 random games, one of which gave an (illegible) dialog box asking permission to save data to my computer (not sure if this works on the Wii .. the game certainly didn’t even after I clicked ‘Yes’). About the only thing that makes this site “Wii specific” is that I presume they have selected 5000 games from their library of 10000+ that can be played only with a mouse and don’t require a keyboard.

All in all, wii.knibble.com looks like a pretty half-arsed effort to cash in on the popularity of the Wii, and very little effort has actually gone into providing a fun gaming experience. I doubt the designers have even viewed their site on a Wii. My only hope is that since the site is still in ‘beta’, it will improve over time … although I have my doubts.

Update:

21st Septemeber, 2007 — It looks like wii.knibble.com has done an update, and the new site has improved … a little. The overall interface is now better suited to viewing on the Wii, and you can now pick from a scrolling list of thumbnail games at the bottom of the screen rather than just being thrown any random game. Unfortunately my main gripe still stands; the Flash games still do not take up the whole screen when being played, and those that I tested (ie 4 or 5 I played before I quit) do not have readable fonts on my TV. Fun games like “Stackopolis” are unplayable since you need to be able to read the “blueprint” fonts to complete each level. So while it’s improved, wii.knibble.com still smells of a site jumping on the Wii bandwagon without being prepared to create something that practically works well on the Wii.

Update 2:

18th November, 2008 — Looks like wii.knibble.com is now down, with an “Under construction” sign. Either they’ve given up since they feel the wave of Wii hype has passed, or they are working on producing a decent set of Wii-friendly flash games. The second option is what I’m hoping for. We will have to wait and see if they re-launch in the future …..