This may sound hard to believe but as of March 8th the Wii will have been on the European market for four months, that's a third of a year, and I can't believe it has been that long since the stories of console shortages and flying controllers hit the news. For those that live under a rock, the Wii is Nintendo's fifth home console, following in the footsteps of; NES, SNES, N64 and Gamecube. I say following in the footsteps, but in the sense of 'what comes next', the Nintendo Wii took a giant leap that needed to be taken in order to keep Nintendo in competition with Sony and Microsoft. They created a console with a motion sensing controller.

Wii was always coming, because you can always be sure that as long as there is going to be a next generation of computer games, Nintendo shall be involved. Nintendo aren't used to battling though, and when Sony's Playstation sort of trampled the Nintendo 64 a bit, and then the Playstation 2 embarrassed Gamecube, I'm sure it came to a shock to everyone at the Japanese company. Nintendo were in trouble, and Microsoft releasing the Xbox wasn't going to make life any easier. Their reputation was in tatters, and slogans of 'kiddy' began to follow them around where ever they went.

"The PS2 was released a year earlier," one Nintendo fanboy defending themselves against the onslaught of Sony fanboys. Microsoft's follow up console would take a leaf out of Sony's book, as they got their 360 out a year ahead of the competition - and to this date Sony still haven't got their Playstation 3 out on the European market. One market Nintendo were still strong in though as the handheld, that was until Sony decided to threaten with the Playstation Portable (PSP) although Nintendo battled by unvieling the Nintendo DS (Dual-Screen) and it was that innovation that keeps them ahead of Sony in the handheld market to this date, but it was going to take even more of that lateral thinking and innovation to grab a hold of the bigger market again.

Afterall the home console market is worth billions, as pretty much everyone has one if not more. Nintendo would drip feed us information on the new console, showing us boxes but no controllers, unfinished one handed remotes and then confuse everyone by dumping codenames like 'NES5' and 'Revolution' to go for the odd title of Wii, apparently inspired by success of such other strange names turned huge products, such as the iPod and Google. This thinking outside the box has put Nintendo back in pole positioned at this early stage of the new 'console war', but is the Wii just a new toy and a fad that people will get bored of - or have Nintendo created the real deal?

December 8th 2006, I had preordered my Wii ready for this day through GAME and luckily I had got my preorder in time because many people who have ordered with other companies were receiving bad news emails and preparing themselves for the disappointed children on Christmas. Enter the parents and fanboys doing all they can on eBay, where Wii's would run for triple the price. How tempted I was to leave my box sealed and throw a picture of it on eBay to make some big money, but that's what I did with my Xbox 360 and I wasn't prepared to let my Wii go the same way. The money might have been nice, but surely playing Twilight Princess straight away would be nicer.

I won't comment on the service of GAME too much, because that's not what this review is about - this review is about the Wii and I'll start with my first impressions when picking up the box. I had seen the pictures on the internet before, but holding the sleak white box was quite something. They had obviously taking a leaf out of Apple's book, whether it had been for the packaging design or the logo design - there was alot in common. If anything though I would say the box is surpisingly plain, usually I'm used to seeing pictures of games and things on the back of a box as a way to entice people to buy it, but all the Wii box shows is the system and the main controller (what has been dubbed the 'Wiimote). It doesn't even show the 'nunchuk'.

What's on the inside counts most though, right? I wasn't surprised to see how tiny the Wii console actually is after being incredibly surprised by how small the DS was when I owned one, and that was the original - not the downsized Lite version! Smaller is better in this day and age, something that makes me feel better about myself. I find it so easy to set up things, probably because when I was younger I used to watch my brothers attatching and reattatching consoles to the TV because in that day and age we only had one good TV, not all this HD stuff we have now. If you've never set something like this up before you probably should consult the manual, wouldn't want you breaking anything, but it is all pretty straight forward.

Having said that when I got my Wii hooked up to a power supply and the cable connected to the TV, I turned it on and the Wiimote didn't seem to be responding. What on Earth had a done wrong - AH! I'd left the sensor bar in the box. The sensor bar is a pretty much unknown piece of equiptment when it comes to the Wii, Nintendo don't really show it to the media that much. It connects up simply to your Wii and can be placed either above or underneath your TV. It's not big or ugly so you don't need to worry about that, but playing games you're not going to be able to get away with not having it connected up.

I won't talk too much about my difficulties with the responsiveness of the Wiimote or any problems I had with nunchuk controller, because I have done separate reviews on Ciao in previous months on those two products. What I shall concentrate is on what you can expect from the Wii from the box. Starting with how you can display your Wii in your room it needs to be pretty close to your TV, although it's not really a piece of electrical equiptment you'd want to hide away anyway. This is easily Nintendo best and most adult looking console yet, and you can display it either horizontally or vertically. A grey slanted stand is provided so you can just pop your Wii in that, or you can keep your stand away somewhere and just put your Wii horizontally on top of your DVD player or something like that. Personally I have my Wii vertically next to my TV, and except for the wires you wouldn't really be able to tell it's a gaming console.

On the front there are 3 buttons labeled 'power', 'reset' and 'eject'. Although it says power, there is actually always power being transferred to your Wii so it's more of a standby button than anything. The colour of the dot changes depending on whether your Wii is on or off. The reason for the Wii being a console that's never really switched off is because it connects up to the internet wirelessly and automatically updates the software on your console. Personally I don't think this is a good enough excuse to waste power, so I do my one Green thing and unplug the console and then manually download the newest software when I read there is a new type avaliable.

Reset and eject are pretty self explainatory as they reset the console and eject the disc. Normal size discs are used in the Wii, opposed to the smaller sized ones that were used in the Gamecube. It maybe shocking considering we're in 2007, but this is the first time Nintendo have used normal sized discs whilst Sony have been using them since the Playstation. It shows who's further ahead technology wise really. When I first put a disc into the Wii I actually put it in the wrong way, although it did no harm and simply ejected. If you look at the way the console would rest if you stored it horizontally, it's quite obvious to work out how the disc should be inserted vertically.

Also on the front of the Wii is a flap, and underneath is stored a 'Sync' button that links up with the Wiimote to help sync them together, although this has already been done for you. On a couple of occassions some how the Wii and my controller have came un-synced, but it has been easy to repair the problem. Under the flap there is also a slot for SD cards, which is the Wii's version of memory cards. The Wii already has inbuilt flash memory, and I haven't came anywhere close to using all that up yet so I don't expect I will have to invest in SD cards - not anytime soon anyway.

The idiot in me and this SD card slot did not mix though, as on the first day of getting my Wii I thought, "I wonder if my mobile phones memory card is an SD card." Noticing the size of the card compared to the size of the slot were quite different, it didn't bother me to possibly ruin my Wii on the first day! I slammed my card in there, and when I realised it had no affect I quickly unplugged my Wii from all it's sockets and began shaking it profusely, but my memory card would not fall out. Great I thought, I've ruined my mobiles memory and my new console, that was at that time worth an inflated price, in the same day.

Using a small knife and celotape contraption I managed to eventually rescue my memory card, and what a relief it was. Yes I know you shouldn't put knives into electrical equiptment but I was desperate and didn't want to seem like a fool who can't be trusted with a Wii. To this day this is actually the first time I've shared this story with ANYONE, so you should feel privelaged. And take my advice - unless you're sure it's a suitable SD card - DO NOT PUT IT IN YOUR WII.

Exploring the rest of the white console (soon to be released in more colours apparently) there are two other flaps either on the top or the side, depending on the way you display your console. I suppose I could have mentioned this earlier but Wii is actually backwards compatiable with all your Gamecube games, meaning you're getting more than one console in one really - although the competition also allows you to play old games on it's new consoles. Gamecube discs are simply sucked into the same slot as the Wii discs, making it a pretty impressive disc tray. What does this have to do with those flaps though? Well one of the flaps hides two 'Cube memory card slots, whilst the other conseals four Cube controller ports.

I haven't used the Cube abilities on my Wii just yet, having gotten rid of all my Gamecube stuff quite a while before the release of the Wii - money and that, but I would imagine when playing Cube games it is easier to have your Wii displayed horizontally, so tugging of controllers can't force the Wii to collapse over to one side. For those who think the flap hiding the controller ports may get in the way, the flap is easily removeable as directions show on it. It's even easier to clip the flap back on, so don't worry about making your console ugly.

Just like any console these days you can set the time and date so it knows what time zone it's in and do things like tell the console when your birthday is, although it's not this that makes Wii the most interesting Nintendo console to date - it's the navigation screen that a Nintendo console has for the very first time. Everytime you turn the console on you are greeted by a grid of squares, don't worry it's not as ugly as it sounds, and in these squares are different possibilities of things you can do with your Wii. At this moment in time not all that many have been released, although there are SO many spaces it makes you wonder where Nintendo is planning on going with them all.

These are what Nintendo have dubbed 'Channels', and it wasn't until I got my Wii that I really understood how much of a good idea these were. At the moment the Channels on offer are 'Photo', 'Forecast', 'News', 'Internet' and 'Vote'. There is also 'Mii' and 'Shop' although I shall go into them in greater detail at a later stage.

If I'm honest I haven't got my head around the Photo Channel yet, it seems you can get photos on to your Wii whether it be by means of SD cards or the Wii message board. Taking a look at it, the Photo Channel can simply work as a way to look at some old memories or a way to have some fun with pictures - whether it be by doodling on them or trying to arrange them back to how they originally looked in puzzle mode. All your best times for puzzles are recorded as well, a nice touch.

Forecast is quite clever, because it allows you to see what the temperature is anywhere in the World, including where you are. News is not designed very well in my opinion, however it still works by having all the latest news stories on there. And Internet, well Internet really impressed me because you can view pretty much anything on it - seeing YouTube on your home TV is quite something. Typing in addresses with the Wiimote is quite awkward, but once you're past that navigating is easy using the B button and you can zoom in and out with the '-' and '+' buttons.

There has to be a catch to these three big channels though, doesn't there? The catch is your Wii has to be connected up to the internet to use them, and that's quite awkward. You see Wii is a Wi-Fi device, just like the DS is, and that means for wireless online play. When Mario Kart DS was the first online game released I quickly snapped up one of the official Nintendo Wi-Fi Connectors off Play.com for quite a cheap price, considering the amount of play I'd get out of it. This connector also works for the Wii and is easy to set up, although sometimes I find that it doesn't work anymore and I have to go through the settings again to set the connector up. I'm not sure why.

The 'Everybody Votes' channel is the same, and it was only just released about a week ago, which is why I haven't had a chance to download it on to my Wii yet. From what I've heard it's basically just a channel where you vote on polls to share your opinion, doesn't sound like anything major.

The Mii Channel - now this is Nintendo's big moment. Mii's are basically characters you can design to represent yourself, you can edit the way they look, their height, their favourite colour (which is the colour of their t-shirt). Sadly Mii's aren't as customisable as they would be in an ideal world, but the idea of them works well. You see Mii's transfer as your characters in Wii Sports, and I'm sure other games in the future will take advantage of the Mii idea. Everyone in my immediate family has one, and they were great fun designing.

Shopping Channel is the final channel at the moment, and no it's not like QVC, it's a Nintendo shop! You see Wii has earnt a reputation as a 'Virtual Console' and that means that it offers many retro games from it's old consoles as well as some of Sega's old consoles. Every Friday new games are released on the VC and by using Wii Points you can download these games off the Shop Channel and play them. You will need a Gamecube controller or a Classic controller to play them might I add. Wii points can be bought in shops or over the internet with a credit card. I haven't bought off it yet, but when some of my all-time favourite games come out I'm sure I will, and the VC could end up being a major selling point for Wii.

What do I think of the Channels then? Well some of them are pretty poor, but the rest make up for them. Nintendo must have something else on offer besides channels though, and that's right - they do. The Wii Message Board is another part of the home page on your Wii, and there you can leave family members messages, see a record of your play history, as well as get messages from Nintendo and on Wii Sports if you set a new record a message is posted on there as well. The message board facility is actually full of potential, and apparently if you are connected up to the internet you can send a message from your Wii to a friends Wii! Nintendo Connecting People.

The Wii is so easy to pick up and carry it might be hard for you to let it go when you first get it, feeling so good in your arms. Ok, that's creepy I know, but Nintendo have pushed the barrier here like I said at the start of the news and there was even a report in a paper earlier this week saying that playing Wii makes you lose weight. A console that your whole family could use is what Nintendo planned on designing, just look at the advertisement shots they released with all ages and sexes playing, and I know that has applied in my family - especially over the Christmas period.

But now Christmas has been and gone can the Wii survive? Nintendo have never had any problem publishing fantastic games itself for its consoles, such as Zelda and Mario, but to keep above water they're going to need the sort of support Sony and Microsoft get from all these third party companies. Reports from America and Japan show Wii is almost killing the PS3 in sales already, but it's not always what happens across the pond that happens here, so come late March Wii could be history and PS3 could be the way to go. I've slowed down playing my Wii a lot lately, but I'm not prepared to let it go. If you ever liked the look of it before don't be prepared to put yourself off buying one, especially when you consider it's £180, I'm sure that works out a lot cheaper than the other new consoles - but don't expect to see the same graphics, or have DVD playback. Sadly Wii is not the media device some people would want it to be, but with a name like Wii you must have expected it to be different.