By Terri Schwartz

Passers-by the Gainsborough Garage Monday afternoon might have wondered what was causing the gray trailer parked in the lot to be rocking vehemently back and forth.

But none of them knew the true horrors of what was occurring inside its metal exterior: three journalists struggling to do the “Tree” yoga pose on Wii Fit, in front of two laughing Team Nintendo members with video cameras.

This was a part of Nintendo’s Mobile Tour, in which the company travels around the country in a van and showcases new products and old favorites.

Since the Wii debuted in the United States during the 2006 holiday season, Nintendo has been working on new, inventive ways to make use of the system’s “Wii-mote” and Nunchuck technology, said Deanna Guay, a Team Nintendo member in the press van. This year Wii Fit and Wii Music will be a part of Nintendo’s big holiday game lineup that the company hopes will redefine the gaming world, she said.

Nintendo’s sales seem to be doing well – the Wii is the highest selling system out of the current generation of home consoles, besting the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, Guay said. Wii has 33.58 million copies sold globally, Xbox 360 has 21.5 million copies sold and the PS3 has 15.97 million copies sold, as of Oct. 18 from the VG Chartz website.

The Nintendo DS also seems to be succeeding in the handheld console market with 82.48 million copies globally, compared to the PSP’s 39.04 million copies sold, according to the site. In July at the annual E3 Media and Business Summit, Nintendo of America president Reggie Fils-Aime announced that Nintendo expected to sell over 100 million copies of the DS globally by March 2009.

With the popularity of the Wii’s motion-controlled games, notable in Wii Sports where players are forced to roll a bowling ball or swing a baseball bat like they would in real life, some fear that more classic Nintendo console games like Super Mario Brothers could be phased out.

“I think that they should keep doing both,” said sophomore health sciences major Kelsey Moore. “If they stick to just one, they’re going to exclude a lot of people who don’t like [that type of game].”

Guay said Nintendo plans to come out with games that engage players to try and gain a wider audience. She said an example of that is Wii Music, released Monday, which is Nintendo’s family-friendly alternative to competitive music games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band.

On the other end of the spectrum is Animal Crossing: City Folk, the third installment in the Animal Crossing series, which will be released in November. Guay said this game is meant to stay true to the original game for the Nintendo GameCube. The game developers even passed on the opportunity to have the player motion the Wii-mote as a fishing rod to fish in the game or swing the Wii-mote like they would a net to catch a butterfly to keep it similar to the original.

The Wii Fit, released in March, was released to help Wii owners stay in shape, Guay said.

“It’s fun,” said sophomore finance major Frank Patel. “People are just going to get fat [playing video games].”

Patel also pointed out it can help senior citizens stay in shape.

“They use it in nursing homes,” he said.