Ok so like the majority of the country when they were first released I was as excited about the Nintendo Wii, as the next person.. However, being a poor student at the time I resigned myself to the fact I wasn't going to get one for a very long time, well at least until they came below a hundred pounds or when Nintendo released the next console.. Which saddened me slightly..

Then.. One of my best friends got one, my boyfriends mum got one, one of my parents friends got one and I got slowly more annoyed because I wanted to play..!

What is it with consoles and bringing out the child in us all..!

Anyway.. The temptation kept growing until I could resist it no longer.. I saved and saved.. (By using my review money.. Not sure if I'm meant to admit that..!)
And finally on Monday I was shopping with a friend, went into Woolworth's nearly had the shock of my life when I saw 'Nintendo Wii £159.99' I was very excited.. Like a child..!

So I did the inevitable..

And bought one..!

One of the best decisions of my life..!

Its amazing how much more people want to come round when they find out you have a Wii..!

Who are Nintendo..?

Nintendo are a large company based in Japan, originally founded to produce playing card, the business ran off in several directions, with the inevitable outcome of the company becoming a gaming corporation. It has internationally become one of the biggest companies, with its estimated market value of around $85 billion..! And that's a lot of money..!

This year it has been revealed that the company had sold 460 million hardware units (consoles to you and me) and 2.7 billion video games..! To be honest that it a lot of space needed to hold all those games..! Of all of them I have 5..! Contributing slightly there..!

A bit of Nintendo history..

There are a lot of consoles that Nintendo have made over the years.. Some of them I would imagine have been in most peoples houses at one point..

The company had the 'Colour TV game' system.. With a few different games, during the 70's and 80's.. Including Donkey Kong that I think everyone has heard of..!

There is obviously the hand held of Nintendo's consoles.. The Gameboy, the game boy, colour, advance and Advance SP.. The one with the flip screen.. Now we have the direct follow on with the DS and DS Lite.. Which are also very entertaining..!

The newest Nintendo consoles we have probably had our paws on have been..
The Nintendo 64.. Which enabled us to play four player instead of just two..!
The Game cube.. Which I remember having and not liking so much compared to alternative consoles, but it did give the opportunity to not use the extra cartridges for storage.

Which brings us up to today.. Where we have the Wii..!

(The list of consoles I have listed is not an exclusive list there are others, but I've mentioned to ones everyone knows..!)

What is the Wii?

An amazing console..! But that's just my opinion..!

Released in 2006, the console was tipped to be one of the most exciting and innovative consoles of the past few years.. When first announced the world became a little excited about its imminent release..

Originally the console would have been overly similar to the DS with a touch sensitive interface but that design was rejected and the Wii design we have now was created..!

Strangely enough the creators have some odd explanations about the name but all I can say is it's a name that has created a few jokes in my house and in others I would imagine..

The little console..
Is 44 mm (1.73 in) wide..
157 mm (6.18 in) tall..
And 215.4 mm (8.48 in) deep..!

The smallest Nintendo console and it is so thin it fits neatly in most tight spaces on selves and down the sides of televisions..

There is space for a SD card to input your own photo's and provide extra memory to the consoles already built in 521mb..

The Wii Remote and Nunchuck

To be honest I'm so very technological I like things to work but don't know how they do it..!
The remotes as far as I know work on infra-red and detect movement through the beam.. The console and remote however are connected through blue tooth which is quite a coincidence as the button lights up blue on the remote and on the disk drive..!

The Nunchuck itself can be connected into the Wii remote, as you have probably seen on the Mario adverts, and used for games where you need both..

The remotes themselves have a jacket and a wrist strap to stop people smashing the remote into their television sets which used to happen quite often when first released..
Which can't be a bad idea because TV's aren't exactly cheap..!

Other bits

There is an internet connection.. Where the BBC are actually streaming their BBCi player on the Wii via the Internet Channel..

The Mii Channel if connected to the Wiiconnect 24 can mingle with other peoples Mii's which is pretty funny from what I have seen.. With a Mii parade.. Another amusing function the Wii offers..

Its not as good as the xbox live.. With messenger, but you can still leave messages on message boards for others in the Wii network..

In the box

The little white console..
Both controllers; One Remote and one Nunchuck..
The stand..
Wii Sports..
Some cables..
A scart connector..
Some batteries..
Instruction manuals..
A sensor bar..
A sticky stand for your sensor bar..
That's about it..

(There might be other things but right now I can't remember what..! Sorry!)

The Set-up

I think this console is the easiest thing to set up since.. Well something that comes fully constructed..

Plug in the three separate cables for output, into the start provides and into the back of the console and television..
Plug the sensor bar into the Wii..
Plug the power output into the Wii and the plug socket on the wall..
And you are ready to play..

Well once you have turned on the console and agreed to safety bits and pieces and turned parental controls on these bits can be changed later on if you want too..

My opinion..

To be honest along with the majority of my family and people I know this console is a big success.. Is a lot of fun and takes up a lot of time, with competitions between family members..!

It is such an easy machine to input on your television it takes a matter of minutes rather than hours looking for tiny bits to put together and set up..

Plugging it in is all it takes to work basically..

The creating a character function is very cool, you pick a name, a colour for your top.. Which is fairly pointless considering they change every game you play, you can pick a face shape, colour, eye shape, colour how tall or fat you are..
Talk about making your self desirable to play games with..
Although once you have created your Mii's they can communicate with others when connected to the internet..! People can visit your Mii plaza, which is like a new more interesting version of face book, without actually seeing what people really look like..!

To create a name on the machine with the controller is a pain.. I ended up pressing so many wrong letters to spell my simple 5-letter name.. The controller rumbles as you roll over each letter so you can easily get confused as to which button you are pressing..

When you switch the machine on every time you wish to play the disk drive flashes blue which is your playing in the dark as I was not so long ago does seem quite bright.. The blue light to indicate what number controller you have is also quite bright in the dark.. So I advise not to stare at it!!

Okay so the main thing with this console is the pain caused.. Not a bad thing because so many people have lost weight playing it but even now I have a really really sore arm.. On the game includes.. Wii sports.. There is tennis, baseball, boxing, golf and bowling and I have to say they all give your arms a really good work out, and make them sore for days..

Although despite this, the console is so much fun, pubs are making Wii tournaments for people to compete in its that popular.. Despite the hefty price tag at first it is soooo much fun, the competitions between family members and the arguments it causes..

The range of games at first was slightly poor but are getting better, the sports games will be ever popular with the Wii, especially with the introduction of the Wii fit. But the games like Splinter cell are a completely different experience played on a totally wireless interactive console such as the Wii.. I'm hoping the new star wars game comes out on the Wii because I can imagine using 'the force' and the controller as a light sabre..! Anyone else think that's might be quite cool..?

The picture quality of each game depends on the television you own, I personally have a HD television so I'm guessing the quality might be a little better on that..

Oh and seriously they give the warning of needing as much space as possible for a reason.. My room isn't tiny but I still hit my knuckle on my wardrobe playing bowling.. And my god did that hurt.. So please be careful if you get one soon..!

Prices and Availability

Depending on where you buy the console from depends on the price.. Its getting nearer to Christmas so they will soon be a little more scarce, as they were last Christmas..!

Play.com .. £179.99
HMV.. £179.99 - £219.99 depending on package
Argos.. £179.99 - ? Depending on offers and package
Game and Game station.. Vary but average around £179.99 depending entirely on pre-owned or new and package details..
Blockbusters.. £199.99 with 3 games is a great deal
Woolworth's.. £159.99 with one game.. A special offer so get it while you can..!