I played a few Wii games lasat months at a retailer convention setup. My thoughts on the issue:
The Wii.....is neat. The controller is so lightweight you don't notice it's maybe 5 oz weight. It's TINY. No, I didn't get to play a Zelda demo, but I did get to play several other games:ExciteTruck is pure simple racing fun, with huge air attaintable, there were two playable tracks. The controls were simple-one button for gas, one for brakes, tilt the remote left or right to steer. Kinda fun, but nothing you couldn't do without a traditional controller, and it definitely didn't lend any extra driving sensation. The Wii controller is PERFECT for shooters like Metroid, Wii Sports, etc; and that is where it will excel-don't worry about arm fatigue (which happens quickly, no matter how in shape you are), because shooting from the hip works just as well and isn't tiring. Now, Tennis and Baseball are how I'm going to point out that the Wiimote aren't as intuitive as you're probably hoping. Tennis, could be fun, right? Swinging around? Well, sorta. It's really like only having two buttons-if the ball is on your left side, swing left. Don't worry about WHERE you swing-that doesn't matter, so long as it picks up a movement on the left side, your character will move to the ball and hit it-even if the ball is above you, swing to the left, swing DOWN if you like-it only tracks that it's being moved on a side. Baseball? Swing fast, swing slow, don't even "swing"-so long as it senses movement. Stuff like Red Steel, etc? No, you can't ACTUALLY sword fight. Certain motions are like buttons, so there's no "oh, I'll wave the controller in circles in front of me and the character will wave the sword in circles!". You only can do what it's programmed to look for/accept (a common sense fact that seems to escape most hypesters), and I think THAT is going to be the major disappointment for people-no one wants to hear that it's essentially a Power Glove with slightly more sensitivity. I guess the best analogy is this-imagine if your Playstation controller had to be moved to emulate the button you want to press-need to press Triangle, you have to wave a Triangle shape, X is an X shape, etc. It's not "virtual reality" or anywhere close. But it's still neat as hell.
It DOES take a little getting used to, and I never got particularly good with any of the demos-I suspect each game willl have their own steep learning curve. It's still fun fun fun, and a lovely system design. Too bad the graphics look like ass on any decent display, but such is the curse of 480.