Despite claims of widespread piracy, dumbed-down gameplay, and DRM nightmares, Spore reportedly sold more than one million copies in the 17 days following its release. That's a remarkable accomplishment for a PC title, especially one based on entirely new IP. The length of its tail remains to be seen, but at this point Spore appears to be a major retail success for EA.

If Spore's ultimate accomplishment is nothing more than an impressive retail record, though, it will have been a tragic waste of talent and innovation.

In the last week and a half, Nintendo's new arrival and I have bonded over late-night sessions with Legend of Zelda: The Twilight Princess. I've made a fool of myself playing Wii Sports. I've purchased and downloaded vintage console delights. And I've even spent a few hours with Rayman: Raving Rabbids. Now that the Wii pre-launch anticipation has faded into comfortable post-launch familiarity, I'm ready to share some select thoughts about our special time together.

I'm sticking primarily to the hardware features, though. As much as I'd love to regale you with tales of my toilet plunger projectile accuracy in Raving Rabbids and my intrepid exploration of Twilight Princess' dungeons, the games deserve their own articles. The same is probably true of most of the Wii's interface and online features, which to date haven't even fully launched. So I'm focusing on the plastic and silicon, as well as the Wii's Virtual Console and backwards compatibility features. Read on for details.

Click. Wince. Click. Wince. With each gentle tap of my right index finger an electric ache runs across my palm and settles into a dull, throbbing sensation in my wrist.

Nestled between the terminals of my armbones lay the tendons that help direct my fingers as they flick across the surface of the mouse. They're irritable, these sinewed cords. Packed ropelike into a tiny channel, they've become inflamed by a thousand twitching motions and now they grind and press against my nerves as if to bully them into ceasing their demands upon my digits.

It will be almost a month after I cancel my World of Warcraft subscription before that feeling finally subsides, and I can once again drape my fingers across the mouse without my wrist protesting. In the meantime, I'm grateful for ibuprofen.

As a child I kept a small collection of found treasures in an old cigar box. It was an odd assortment, made up of such things as bottlecaps, a fake diamond ring, polished agates, a broken watch, a shark's tooth, a dog whistle, a Chinese coin, and a fossilized trilobite. While they all appeared mundane compared to any of my store-bought toys, each item still had its own particular enchantment, and I could easily while away an afternoon perusing the box's contents.

What follows is a similar collection: a hodgepodge of simple but immediate experiences, gathered from both recently explored and dusty corners of the Internet, and presented here for your consideration. Though they may at first glance seem to pale by comparison to the games that typically capture your attention, you might find that each, in its own way, still manages to offer something special.

Talking up E3 has become something of an annual pastime, as each year the size and scope of the event is inevitably related in breathless detail by exhibitors, media, and attendees alike. It's as if the sheer spectacle of it all, with the booth models, the swag, the towering LED displays, and the endless rows of plasma screens, endows the event with great meaning and purpose. The resulting image, of a bacchanalian celebration of gaming-related privilege, bestows upon E3 an aura of near-holiness.

For three days, attendees stumble about in sensory overload, on a single-minded pilgrimage for coveted trinkets and experiences infused with the importance of the event. The glory achieved by those who obtain such valuable gifts as inflatable swords and blinky LED pendants is apparently second only to the bragging rights granted by 10 minutes with a game demo that, amongst the din of the show floor, can't even be heard. It is at times baffling, and even disgusting.

And yet, despite E3's overblown, chaotic facade, there are moments when gaming's irresistible allure and the genuine enthusiasm of those in attendance transcends the tackiness and excess of it all.

In his 1883 essay Two Views of the Mississippi, Mark Twain described his experiences as an untutored observer of the Mississippi, and later as a skilled riverboat pilot. Twain lamented how his knowledge of the river eventually robbed him of the sense of mystery that once captivated him as he stood on its banks:

Now when I had mastered the language of this water, and had come to know every trifling feature that bordered the great river as familiarly as I knew the letters of the alphabet, I had made a valuable acquisition. But I had lost something, too. I had lost something which could never be restored to me while I lived. All the grace, the beauty, the poetry, had gone out of the majestic river.

Technical familiarity often diminishes aesthetic appreciation. It's a curious, somewhat tragic phenomenon, and though illuminated by Twain over a century ago, it applies to playing video games as well as piloting steamboats.

When I was a kid, my favorite toy was a Star Wars laser pistol, modeled after the one carried by Han Solo. Concealed within its plastic frame were two C batteries, which lent it a heft that made it seem more powerful and real. Held in my six-year old hands it granted me a sense of confidence and invincibility that was almost intoxicating. I wielded it with ruthless enthusiasm.

Gun violence was an essential feature of imaginary play throughout my childhood. My friends and I were experts in the use of handheld weapons - the more exotic, the better. Armed with crossbows, bazookas, and flamethrowers, we visited death and carnage upon one another without hesitation. We repeatedly died horrible, protracted deaths, clutching our chests as we gasped our final breaths in dramatic re-enactments of the scenes we'd viewed on television or in movies.