Nintendo Wii
By: Assimilator

November is almost here, so what does that mean, the Nintendo Wii™ is almost here. Now long time readers will have come to the realization that I am a Nintendo fanboy, and while I do believe in giving all systems a fair opportunity, I have never really delved into that which is Sony. So with this said, I shall give a small preview on what I know about Nintendo's revolutionary system, the Wii™.

The Controller

Now first of all the biggest thing about the Wii is the way you control your games. You may have seen this many times, but here it is again. May I present to you, the Wii-Mote™. Yes, that is what they are calling the main controller. Now a quick description of the controller. The power button will be used to turn your wii on and off, the A button will be used in your standard Wii™ games along with the B button on the back. The D-pad, 1 and 2 buttons are (and this is my guess) to be used with original NES™ games that you download onto the system. Turn the controller sideways and it makes what is almost an exact NES™ controller. The home button will most likely take you to one of Nintendo's channels (more on those later). And hat leaves the + and - buttons. Again this is a guess but I would have to say that these are used to control the volume on the built in speaker on the Wii-Mote™. Yeah, that is a speaker just below the home button. Why put a speaker there, because they can, it seems gimmicky to me, but hey. Lets not forgot that the Wii-Mote™ is complete with rumble feature. Then there is the mysterious port on the bottom of the controller, what is this port for, a charger for the batteries, a direct connection to the Wii™, a way for aliens to make contact with us so they can kick our butts in the version of Wario Ware for the Wii? No, it is for peripherals!

What are these peripherals you will be adding to the Wii-mote™, what is the amount of extra money I will be feeding Nintendo so that I may continue my gamer addiction. I don't know, the only thing that they have announced that will go there is the Nunchuk™ controller. The Nunchuck™ will be indispensable in most games. It consists on and analog stick and two buttons, the C and Z buttons.

Ok, the controller has now had a more then needed in depth look at what the stupid thing looks like, so what, how does the thing work? Will it requires the use of this sensor bar thing, that will detect the wireless signal of the Wii-Mote™ and Nunchuck™ controller up to 10 meters (about 33 ft) from the bar. And as long as you are 5 meters (16 ft) from the screen the Wii-Mote™ works as a pointer. Ideas for how to place it and be seen here and here. Now this sensor bar detects the movements of the three-axis motion sensor that is in both the Wii-Mote™ and the Nunchuck™ controller. This makes for an original play style.

You want an example of this? Ok, one example will be in Metroid Prime 3, the grapple beam now lets you grab enemies weapons and pull them away, this is done by pushing forward with the Nunchuck™ and once connected pulling back, the motions will be reproduced on the screen. Also, in the new Zelda game sword fighting will be done by swinging the Wii-Mote™ while shooting an arrow will be the motion of pulling the Wii-Mote™ back and then hitting a button to release. You will hear the arrow go "twing" from the Wii-Mote™ speaker. Just a few examples are given there. And that is all I am saying in the controller (for now). And that should be enough, I mean, I don't write this much over a game review, and this was just for the freaking controller, dam.

The System

Ok, the system itself is small. as long a piece of standard paper is wide (8.5"), 6" wide and 2" thick, it will fit just about anywhere. Which is good, I have a crowded enough AV system. The media slot will work with both 12 cm disks (regular sized) and the GameCube™ 8 cm disks. Yes, the Wii™ is backward compatible with the GameCube™. It even has 4 controller ports and slots for GameCube™ memory cards on the top of the Wii™ (top being if the system is sitting vertically). Now the system does not have very much onboard memory (compared to 20 GB on the 360) with 512 MB of internal flash. There is a bay installed on the system for SD memory that will let people expand there memory. I personally like the fact that they went to SD memory compared to a proprietary card format. These cards are already in peoples lives more, mainly due to digital cameras and the such.

The system can also connect to the internet with a built in wireless connector and a system called WiiConnect24™. Kinda a mouthful if you ask me, but oh well. But Assimilator, I don't have a wireless network in my house, can I still connect. As long as you have a 1.1 USB network connector you can. Unlike the 360, there is no built in hardwire port for your network, just IEEE 802.11 is there. The system can also communicate with the Nintendo DS™ via WiFi. Lastly about the system physical specs, it does not really support much in the way of HD. A mistake? Maybe, but it saved Nintendo allot of money that way, the system does have AV output slot of component,, composite, or S-video, but they all come from the same port.

Virtual Console

Woot, the great a mystical area of the Wii™ that will allow you play games from times gone past. Original Mario Bros, Duck Hunt, and a slew of other games from the NES, SNES, Genesis, TURBO GRAFX16 and Nintendo 64. Yes, you will be able to purchase games (what, you thought it would be free, yeah right) There will also be games available from what Nintendo terms as Indie Developers that have great ideas, but not so much capital.

That is great and all, I can download The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. But the Wii-Mote™ will not cut it for playing SNES games. That is why they have a another peripheral! This one is shaped like a SNES controller. Wait, we still have the + and - buttons, maybe I am wrong about the volume thing, or it is hidden, eh, we will find out soon enough. Expect to see more controller copies soon for the downloads that you can get on the Wii™.

Wii Channels

Ok, here are the channels I mentioned earlier. There are 8 channels in total that should be available to Wii™ owners. Now it does look like all these channels will be free and most of them seem to just be gimmick that kids can use to get those with purchasing power to buy Nintendo's newest system. Lets look at each channel one by one, shall we?

Disc Channel
This channel will be what you use to launch the game, and my guess, where the home button the controller takes you.

Mii™ Channel
Use this area to create an avatar of yourself. Every Wii™ user can make there own avatar and store it on their own Wii-Mote™ to then take to a friends house. My question is, who is going to walk around with a Wii-Mote™ in their pocket?

Photo Channel
Here you can take pictures that are on an SD card and play then in slide show mode on the Wii™. There is also some basic picture editing tools here, nothing fancy, just some stuff to make then different. Basic mod's such as mosaic, brightening or converting to monochrome. There are some other tools, but I don't really fell like typing them all, and they again seem kinda gimmicky to me. On interesting thing is the Wii lets you add MP3 music to you slide show, so now you can add boring elevator music to you vacation slide show, really put them to sleep. Photos can also be added to the Wii Message Board this way.

Forecast Channel
The weather, enough said.

New Channel
Do I really need to tell you what this one is about, good lets continue.

Wii Shop Channel
This is where you will buy those game from gaming past. Actually, you will buy Wii Points and spend the points on the games. I think developers think we fell better spending points then actual dollars, but it gets annoying having to buy a bulk amount of points when I don't want to spend that much. You can also get the Opera browser for use in the internet channel here.

Internet Channel
Once you have bought the Opera browser you can access the internet via this channel, now I don't know if this is free or not, it says free in the forecast and news channels, but not this one, so I don't know on this one. But if you have no computer, why would you have internet access in the first place. I think the idea being able to surf the web via your TV is interesting, but it there is a charge involved with it, this channel might fail.

Wii Message Board
Welcome to the virtual fridge. You can leave messages for housemates here or for other Wii™ users. You can also send text messages to cell phone users. A great attempt to form a stable community.

So that is the channels and that is basically all I have to say on the Wii™. But I do have one main question left. The Wii™ is obviously a party game machine, it will have regular games, but it will shine in multi-player. So how well will the Wii™ in online multi-player. Lets hope we find out soon.

October 19, 2008
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