Its family-friendly design has no Internet capabilities and does not play Nintendo GameCube games.
Counting the companion version released for Nintendo GameCube, Zelda sold 1.5 million units in less than seven weeks, making it one of the top five best-selling games of 2006.
That might have frustrated a boy, but a 6-footer will find it a natural fit, especially when compared with the tiny controllers of the Sony PlayStation 2 and Nintendo GameCube.
For his last trick, he showed off some previously unreleased footage of the Legend of Zelda adventure for the Nintendo GameCube, widely anticipated to be the most sought-after game on any console this year.
ENGADGET: Nintendo Revolution to include backwards compatibility and WiFi
Each time a PlayStation 2 or Nintendo GameCube makes its way atop another television, or another family subscribes to an online game service, what passes for entertainment today--our movies and our stars, the Steven Spielbergs and Meg Ryans--fades just a bit, and we edge just a bit forward from our position as couch potatoes into couch possibilities.
All three game machines roost in my house: Xbox, PlayStation 2 and Nintendo's GameCube.
Since launching its first console in 2001, Microsoft has sold 22m units worldwide, putting it in distant second place behind Sony's PlayStation 2 (which has sold 92m units since its launch in 2000) and just ahead of Nintendo's GameCube (which has sold around 19m units), according to figures from Forrester.
The Wii took everyone by surprise at launch, as most of the industry had counted Nintendo out after the GameCube failed to connect with gamers.
Nintendo is developing a successor to the GameCube, dubbed Revolution, for a likely late-2006 launch.
Many are quick to point out that the Gamecube underperformed as well, as Nintendo survived that.
FORBES: Analyst Predicts Bad March for the Wii, Worse for the Wii U
Heavyweights Microsoft and Nintendo released next-generation consoles in November (Xbox and GameCube, respectively) to compete with Sony's PlayStation 2.
Why else would it emphasize that the Revolution will play GameCube games and downloadable games from Christmases past: Nintendo 64, Super Nintendo Entertainment System and even the two-decade-old Nintendo Entertainment System.
With the launch of the Xbox in Japan, Microsoft will be taking on Sony's bestselling PlayStation 2 and Nintendo's hand-held Game Boy and its bigger GameCube, in their home markets.
The Wii was compromised pretty early on to be able to play burned discs and GameCube homebrew such as Linux, but until now Nintendo has managed to isolate Wii hardware such as the extra horsepower of the console and wireless connectivity from hackers.
In his characteristic candidness (at least by Nintendo's standards) he apparently confessed that yes, shortly after the GameCube came out they did realize it seemed incredibly toy-like compared to the competition (honestly, that was the least of our complaints about the GameCube), and alluded to a "visually tweaked" DS in the future (thank god).
ENGADGET: Reggie's latest Revolution spiel: low-cost and no HD
But considering the fact that GameCube is almost 10 years old, is this really bad news for Nintendo?
For example, Nintendo internally developed hardware that would allow players to enable 3-D on the GameCube, which was the home console that preceded the Wii.
应用推荐