Wii Channels
The Wii menu is built around the Wii Channels navigation system. Each channel is a specific application that you can run on the system. You'll see the Disc, Mii, Photo, Wii Shop, News, and Forecast channels when you first turn on the console. The News and Forecast channels aren't active yet, but you should be able to visit channels to see world news and weather forecasts as soon as those services are up and running. According to Nintendo, the Forecast channel will go live on December 20 and the News channel will be ready on December 27. More channels appear as you make Virtual Console purchases since each game will get its own channel. Individual channels load very quickly, and shifting between channels is nearly instantaneous.
The Disc channel is the first available selection in the channels menu. It will display the name of a game if you have a game disc in the machine. Select the channel and press start to launch the game.
The Mii channel lets you create your own Mii, a personal avatar. You can use your Mii to play as yourself in Mii-compatible games such as Wii Sports. You can customize your gender, face shape, skin color, hair color, eyes, eyebrows, nose, mouth, glasses, height, and weight. Each individual facial feature has its own customization options that will let you set colors and move features around.
You can transfer Miis to another system by saving them to the Wii remote and bringing the controller to a friend's console, or you can connect the two systems online via WiiConnect24. Foreign Miis will show up on the Mii Parade screen where you can grab them and place them in your personal Mii Plaza. Once a Mii is in the Plaza, it'll appear as an option in Mii-compatible games.
The Photo channel is where you view photos and play slideshows from an SD memory card. The photo-browsing screen displays thumbnails of all the photos you have on the SD card. You can zoom in or zoom out on the menu to increase or decrease the size of the thumbnails, and the screen will dynamically shift thumbnails as the screen width increases and decreases. The Wii offers several music soundtracks for slideshows, but you also have the option to play an MP3 from the SD card. You can post photos to the Wii Message Board and send them to friends.
There's also a "Fun!" menu option that lets you apply mood filters, doodle on images, or transform images into a puzzle that you have to put back together. We were able to use the channel to load up JPEG images, and we even got an AVI video to work.
The Wii Shop channel gives you access to Virtual Console games and Wii Ware software programs developed specifically for the Wii. The Wii Ware section is empty right now, but it does have a coming-soon notice for the Wii's Opera Web browser, which may or may not be a free download when it does come out.
The shop uses its own Wii Points currency system similar to the one Microsoft uses for the Xbox 360. You can buy points online by credit card from the Wii Shop, or you can buy prepaid Wii Points cards in retail stores. The conversion rate is approximately 100 Wii points to $1. We say approximately because there are always ways to use sales or coupons to get discounted point cards from retail stores. Buying Wii Points from the Wii Store can become a chore since you have to enter in your credit card account information every time you want to buy points. There's no way to save your credit card information on the system.
Wii Hands-On: Hardware, Wii Channels, and Virtual Console
Hands-on with the Wii! We explore the system, check out the difference between component and composite cables, test the Wii Channels, and play Virtual Console games.
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