Nintendo Wii > Reviews (545)

On opening the box of the wii you will find everything needed to hook up the console to your TV, the console inteself, wireless remote (wiimote), nunchuck adaptor, cradle for if you want the console to be mounted vertically and the all important sensor bar.

Aswell as coming with everything you need to set up the wii, it also includes wii sports, a pleasent surprise as very few games consoles come with games. Wii sports is a game which gives you the opportunity to play different sports including; tennis, boxing, baseball, bowling and gold. They utilise the wii consoles capabilities however you will need to purchase another wiimote (and nunchuck for boxing) for other people to play with you in games such as tennis.

The console itself is quite small and has 512mb of internal memory for storing things you may have downloaded such as games, aswell as save game files. If 512mb is not adequate for your needs then a SD card slot gives you the option of adding additional storage capacity without having to spend to much as SD cards can be found for a not too greater price.

The wii is simply designed, this means it is very easy to hook up to your TV. The back pannel of the console has five ports for the power adaptor, sensor bar, two usb ports and one for the AV cable. To set up just plug in the sensor bar and place above or below your TV, plug the video cable into your tv and the power cable into the wall and you're away!

Once the wii is started up you will notice a series of channels, the default channels include a channel to tell you the weather forecase, a news channel, photo channel, messaging channel and mii channel.
The Mii channel lets you creates and change your miis. A mii is an avatar with you create and personalise these are used to identify you online and in certain games such as the wii sports games.
The photo channel allows you to display and edit photos once you have loaded them through the sd card slot, this is a fun extra however it should be noted that the editing fuction is one that is more for fun rather than serious photo editing, it bears resembalence to paint on windows computers.
The message channel allows you to connect with other wii users and send them messaged by using eachothers unique friend codes, to e-mail your friends and to give you reports if there is a change in the system settings or about how much game play you have had on certain games.

You also have the ability to purchase games, these are purchased with wii points which can be bought via gift card or credit card, if I remember rightly £15 will get you around 2000 points. This enables you to buy games from older consoles such as the NES, Sega genesis , supernintendo and Nintendo 64. If you purchase games in this way they will be tied to your wii's network ID this means you cant putthem onto your SD card and play them on a friends wii.

What really does set this console apart from others is the wiimote controller. The wiimote contrainers accelerometers which allow the console to sense how the wiimote is beind held or if it is being moved and which direction it is being moved in.

It is extremeley sensitive which is a great plus as theres no shaking it ten times in one direction jsut to get a response!
The wiimote it really quite light so light infact that it feels quite odd when using it as a controller so this takes some getting used to.
The wiimote features a built in speaker which fives your feedback on your actions or extra sound affections, such as the noise of hitting a ball when you play tennis in wii sports. Also when you select something or go over something which can be selected it vibrates slightly.

The nunchuck can be plugged directly into the wiimote, it contains two buttons and an analogue stick. The nunchuck is used in many games or example in games to control characters movements.

So what can we expect from the graphics? The graphics are pretty stunning, however they are not the high defintion graphics you would see from consoles such as the PS3 so it really depends on what you're looking for as to weather you will be entirely happy with the graphics quality.

In conclusion, It all depends what you are looking for with the wii, hardcore gamers looking for amazing high definition graphics should look else however Nintendo haven't really created the wii to compete with such consoles anyway. If you want a console which delivers fun and a new way to play your games then this is certaintly the one for you!