Nintendo Wii Before the Games

For game consoles, by and large, it's all about the games, and that's a perfectly fair way to look at pretty much any console, despite the fact so many of them seem to want to be so much more than game consoles.

But the high-technology industry is still, for some reason, trying to achieve the legendary state of "convergence" wherein there will be one uber device that does everything.

Nevertheless some of these consoles do have some interesting features before their games are considered, and the Nintendo Wii is no different. One of its most popular features, believe it or not, in the crowded environment consisting of the eight square feet in front of the living room television, is its size. The Nintendo Wii really is quite compact and well designed to unobtrusively take up a very small amount of space.

Second, the Nintendo Wii has kind of a desktop application which operates when the machine is first powered on, and presents a number of "channels" for the user to select from. Channels point to games naturally, but there is also an "Internet Channel" which allows users to use the web and check e-mail, a "Weather Channel" which presents current weather on a global map. There's also a "Wii Shop" channel and a news channel, along with a display of the current local weather. Also included is a "photo channel" which allows users to display their digital photographs.

Third, this console has wireless connectivity, so it can act as sort of a PC to TV media center, allowing a computer to stream movies, videos and music to the television, something similar to what Apple is doing with their iTV box. The Nintendo Wii can be in an "always connected" state so it can receive updates whenever necessary. This is all handled automatically if the console has network access. The Wii also supports the excellent Opera web browser.

Then, there are the Miis. Miis are customizable avatars that players can build and then incorporate into their games, such as Wii Sports. Aside from the obvious major new feature of this console: motion control, these avatars seem to be a favorite feature.

One of the more promoted features of the Wii is the "Virtual Console" which supports older games such as the original "Super Mario Bros." on the Nintendo Wii. The channel interface gives users access to the Wii Shop where these games can be purchased and downloaded. The channel interface is really a great way to promote this feature, and it is likely a very large number of games will be purchased through the Wii Shop.

As with most new products, there are still some things that need to be worked out, but according to the early reviews at least, the Nintendo Wii has already scored a lot of points for its convenient size, easy interface and moderate number of good, and most importantly, working features. If Nintendo continues to build on these successes, it will only mean better and better value for both new and veteran gamers.