Possible Wii upgrades and a new Wii channel

by John Bardinelli { Mar 12th 2007 at 6:58PM }

Your Wii may soon get a voice of its own. According to Nintendo's Takeshi Shimada, the company is working on a text-to-speech tool that can read news and weather headlines out loud. The feature can also be used to read e-mail and system messages while you kick back and enjoy your (momentary) superiority over machines. Let's hope Nintendo includes a game where you can argue with your Wii via the microphone.

Also from Shimada, Wii motion sensing could get an upgrade that learns from your movements and predicts your next action. It won't play Twilight Princess for you, but a few shortcuts in the menu interface could be helpful.

Finally, a new Wii channel was revealed that lets users vote for their favorite Miis. Pairs of Mii characters strut into the spotlight and you choose which one you like best. The Mii Popularity Channel will launch in late April, though it's unclear if this is worldwide or Japan-only.

Soon the Wii could be talking to you, listening to you, predicting your movements and humiliating you with high school popularity contests. Is this the precursor to the Man vs. Machine war we've been warned about?

[Via NintendoWiiFanboy, WiiNintendo]

Tags: channels, mii, nintendo, upgrades, wii

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Wilbur @ Mar 12th 2007 7:06PM

Stop wasting your resources Nintendo.. give us ONLINE PLAY!!!!11

J @ Mar 12th 2007 7:07PM

"POS" indeed.

Good for Nintendo. Nice to have free upgrades.

Uh Yay......

Rubang B @ Mar 12th 2007 7:12PM

Oh no, Nintendo was Skynet all along!

Hey, anybody here seen that video of those guys that controlled a giant robotic arm with the Wii remote? First they had it hold a tennis racket and they actually hit balls with it. Then they armed it with a sword... we're all gonna die.

Colin @ Mar 12th 2007 7:12PM

maybe you can have a wii-atar, like a drivatar in Forza. Your wii can predict all your moves for you, all you have to do is watch and drink beer!

umm....hello??? @ Mar 12th 2007 7:14PM

yeah. watch out for the Nintendo SkyNet supercomputer that will start a nuclear war.

the text-to-speech sounds cool, and it'd be very inline with making the internet accessible for older people (think nursing homes/retirement centers)

dunno that I'd really care for it to learn my habits, I'm pretty random with what my friends and I play/use on the Wii, so it'd probably be an added frustration (although maybe Sony's Online Store could use this addition...for anyone that read the comic from the previous week about adding money to your wallet to buy a game...are you really really really really sure you want to purchase this game?)

anyways, I'd rather Nintendo spent its time on either getting online play or at the very least, making the "friends code" crap easier. I'm sure it has something to do with keeping children safe from pedophiles and other stuff, but there's gotta be a better way!

Mr Khan @ Mar 12th 2007 7:23PM

Now, if they can do text-to-speech, then why not the reverse (as was rumored once)

Why couldn't the Wii Microphone could become a tool for Online messaging?

I have a feeling that the Wii Online network is already there, but Nintendo's waiting to unveil it, stupid stock sale (if there's anything to unveil, it might just be WiFi Connection)

required @ Mar 12th 2007 7:38PM

The overwhelming allotment of Nintendo "news" this site upchucks daily is really starting to get silly - especially seeing as they have redundancies with dsfanboy and wiifanboy - joystiq is clearly just another name for nintendofanboy.

Satertek @ Mar 12th 2007 7:39PM

Miyamoto mentioned the Mii popularity contest at GDC, so hopefully we'll see it over here.

Rubang B @ Mar 12th 2007 7:55PM

Joystiq is clearly teh biased towards video game news.

I think the text-to-speech application could be hilarious in a game like Animal Crossing. You type in your message and then your character speaks it to your neighbor in a cute voice no matter how vulgar your message is. This way they could also store 902175092175 NPC responses in text form, and let the text-to-speech software do the rest, as opposed to only recording a couple hundred responses and saving them on the disc. Mmm.... procedural...

Striderhayasa @ Mar 12th 2007 7:56PM

@ rubang B

LMFAO! Dude thats some funny ish!
----------------------------------

Meh, can I just get online play and some better games...really...

Kye @ Mar 12th 2007 8:02PM

Well aint that cute? BUT ITS WRONG!

Please please please, stop with the fuck already Nintendo.

Microsoft has been feasting at the online-gaming table for years, and there you are still pointing at cloud animals.

Please stop with the retarted distractions and put some meat on the Wii's bones.

I swear to all that's holy and a few things that aren't that you'd better bring something good to the table or else.

By the way; Im a Nintendo fan so please don't think im a hater. I've always defended them but there's only so many times you can defend a losing team (who seem to enjoy losing although they have a team with winning potential) until you admit they suck, let them die and move on.

Fix up, or else.

Fin.

perfectchaos @ Mar 12th 2007 8:19PM

i think you guys fail to realize that not everyone at nintendo is working on new mii channels...ever stop to think that one group is working on wii channels, another on actual games, and another at implementing online support?

and i'm sorry, but why are people complaining about the amount of coverage nintendo gets? if it's news it's news. i personally don't think they're covering nintendo more than anybody else out there really.

ele©tro @ Mar 12th 2007 8:21PM

"Pairs of Mii characters strut into the spotlight and you choose which one you like best."

Oh great. "Am I Hot or Not" for Mii's. Or is that Amii Hot or Not?

Skippy @ Mar 12th 2007 8:40PM

I found the pic hilarious. Good up the good work.

Steve @ Mar 12th 2007 9:47PM

I'm very afraid that my Wii will start speaking like Mario:

"Wooh-hoo! Yippie! Welcome to the yah-hooh! Weather Channel! Yah-oh-wah-oh-wah! Hoot! Hoot! Mama Mia! Yah-oh-wah-oh-wah! It will be hoo hoo! 85 degrees to-wah-oh-wah-oh-wah-morrow! Yippie! Hoot! Hoot! Yah-hooh!"

They're going to make the thing talk but all I want is a feature to specify my own button mapping on VC games!

REUYL @ Mar 12th 2007 10:05PM

How about speech to text, or... *gasp*... voice chat!

Seriously Nintendo, jump on the online bandwagon already.

RoboJoel @ Mar 12th 2007 10:13PM

Yeah, my Mac OS X Tiger based MacBook Pro, PowerMac G5 Quad, and Powerbook G4 line of Personal Computers from Apple Computer inc. speak to me with the touch of a button or roll over of a mighty mouse.

I wish my Wii would just play some decent games... Miis were popular for about 10 minutes, and then, I realized I had a much better level 27 Mii in Oblivion for 360.

Silver @ Mar 12th 2007 10:23PM

"The overwhelming allotment of Nintendo "news" this site upchucks daily is really starting to get silly" - required

Perhaps because there's nothing truly interesting to talk about in the 360/PS3 world? "Hey look, everyone, ANOTHER hi-def formulaic shooter game!"

Yawn.

majortom1981 @ Mar 12th 2007 10:29PM

A lot of nintendo bashers that don't have their facts straight.

Nintendo has sppech to text. They are working on a system where it translates your speech to text and takes out all the curses .It also highlights certain words.

majortom1981 @ Mar 12th 2007 10:31PM

Also I know my spelling stinks. I am doing three things of once and this is not an english class.

J @ Mar 12th 2007 10:42PM

TEH BIASED!!!! TEH BISED!!!! Tobias? No TEH BIASED!!!!

Charron @ Mar 12th 2007 10:46PM

I actually think I'd like to have the voices be Nintendo characters. Hell, let's theme all the system sounds to character voices if we want to! We can have a Mario theme:

*starts up game*
Mario: "Let's-a go!"

Or a Star Fox one!

*tries to play M-rated game with Parental Controls on*
Peppy: "Don't do it Fox!"

Or my favorite, Legend of Zelda!

*starts up the forecast channel*
Link: "..."

Rubang B @ Mar 12th 2007 11:12PM

Let's do an experiment. Which of these headlines interest you? Which of these headlines make you feel Joystiq is Tobiased?

Possible Wii upgrades and a new Wii channel.
Possible PS3 upgrades and a new PSN update.
Possible 360 upgrades and a new XBox Live update.

If the word Wii bothers you, you are a punk fanboy scalliwag bitch. Don't troll here.

Gavin @ Mar 12th 2007 11:17PM

"Perhaps because there's nothing truly interesting to talk about in the 360/PS3 world? 'Hey look, everyone, ANOTHER hi-def formulaic shooter game!'"

Yeah, while the Wii is "Hey look, another useless channel and another last gen port!!!". Yay, Nintendo!!! Online gaming is coming sometime in the future with a Pokemon turn based title that is little more than an slightly updated version of Pokemon Stadium from seven years ago. Whoop-de-damn-doo.

Kenofthedead @ Mar 12th 2007 11:27PM

It's amazing how much hate and dislike there is in the video game world.
It's not the games that is going to turn us all into killers, it's being fanatic about one idea or systems and the posts that come from that will.

Announcement, let's insult the company (doesn't matter which) for not doing something else/more.
Bad news, insult them for not fixing it before we knew about it or bring up old petty insults.
Good news, why didn't they do it before?
Nothing at all, why aren't they doing anything?
Just playing the games and having fun with them, not that important.

Rubang B @ Mar 13th 2007 12:08AM

Let's look at it this way.

Buying a Wii: $250.

Making Miis of all the convicted sex offenders in your zip code: priceless.

Psaakyrn @ Mar 13th 2007 1:48AM

Speech to text is nothing new. Similarly for that matter, text to speech is nothing new as well. And I'm talking about game-wise.

Any of you heard of this game by Sega, called "Seaman"?

Cuja @ Mar 13th 2007 2:38AM

What do Miis have to do with gaming? Nothing. Just like virtual pets. Cabbage patch dolls. A silly ideal. Get a life.

Alex @ Mar 13th 2007 2:50AM

Nobody said it was new. They just said it was happening.

MysticX @ Mar 13th 2007 4:14AM

I like that upgrade when I won´t deny that I want online play. Especially for the VC games. They will probably make some sort of a Kailera client for online play.

homebrew82 @ Mar 13th 2007 4:54AM

EVERY ONE of the new systems could use improvement. Wii needs to get it's online thing working in an adult manner, not a 'go ask an adult if you can exchange your console ID number" manner.

Just because you want some product like the Wii to reach it's higher potential doesn't mean you don't like it.

Squints @ Mar 13th 2007 9:12AM

Yeah, we need online play for a game to be good!

*goes back to playing GoW 2, failing to see irony like Sony fanboys*

jason @ Mar 13th 2007 10:12AM

who knew that nextgen consoles would mean the return of Dr. Sbaitso.

AJ @ Mar 15th 2007 6:43AM

I hope they do Jesus vs. Jesus and Jesus vs. Satan, omg please Nintendo

Josh @ Mar 22nd 2007 2:56AM

if you remember, it took microsoft like a year to release xbox live after the xbox launched

greg @ Mar 31st 2007 7:15AM

I agree we need to get online play, the faster the better, online play is the only thing that mite keep me playing the wii as i have had it for 2 months and im getting bored

jward @ Apr 21st 2007 9:57PM

I am not largely familiar with anything other than nintendo, however, what I know about nintendo is that what they do they do flawlessly (for the most part). I believe that when they let loose on the online community that the expierience will be outstanding for all ages and personalities.

Nintendo started out saying that their system would be for "everyone" and they will stick to the theme. If you are adultly independent then you want to see freedom in your online options regardless of content. If you are a parent then you want your children to be free from (what many would consider) harmful content. Nintendo will excel at maintaining true to "EVERYONE"