A guided tour of the Nintendo Channel

28 Comments by Justin McElroy May 7th 2008 10:30AM
Filed under: Features, Nintendo Wii, Galleries

Many of you have probably already dug right into Nintendo's new Wii offering, the appropriately titled Nintendo Channel. For those of you who haven't grabbed it from the Wii Shop Channel though, we'd like to humbly present our guided photo tour of the service.

Maybe it's because the menus aren't hyper-intuitive or maybe it was because we thought some of you would be stuck at work and would like to see what that pulsating blue light boded for you when you returned home. Or maybe we just like taking pictures of our television. Either way, the fruits of our labor await.

Gallery: The Nintendo Channel: A Guided Tour

Tags: nintendo-channel

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(Page 1) Reader Comments

rthoma4: May 7th 2008; 10:37AM

Maybe they'll have game reviews in the future...although with Nintendo Power not under Nintendo's control anymore that's unlikely to happen.

Cool channel though, especially the ability to get some DS demos!

mr mobius: May 7th 2008; 10:46AM

The DS demos could cost me money. Could also be brilliant ways to fill a few hours if want to try out a new game. How big are the demos, such as a level or a few minigames etc, or slightly larger?

Fernando Rocker: May 7th 2008; 10:53AM

The DS demos are like the ones in the DS Download Stations in stores.

It's generally a full level. Or sometimes is the full game, but time based.

Shadow Hog: May 7th 2008; 11:05AM

Actually, you can rate games you've played for an hour or longer. I rated Gunstar Heroes as an awesome hardcore gamer multiplayer title, for instance - although I couldn't find anywhere on the individual titles' pages to display the outcomes of the reviews.

Gewurztraminer says: R.O.B. is the last Cylon!: May 7th 2008; 10:47AM

DS demos? Nice.

Now if only they took it a step further and allowed for VC titles to download to the DS. I've been hoping for that since day one, not that it's likely.

Curtis the Claw:XBL - supapaypamawio: May 7th 2008; 12:21PM

What would be the point in playing a VC game within the range of your wireless network?

Gewurztraminer says: R.O.B. is the last Cylon!: May 7th 2008; 12:50PM

Once the game/demo is downloaded to the DS it stays put until you shut it off. Sleep mode wouldn't erase it. I did this with Animal Crossing NES games and the GBA often enough that I still like the idea for the Wii & DS.

mr nimblewick: May 7th 2008; 10:48AM

I'm excited to get to try out ninja gaiden. It's not a game that I would typically buy myself.

Tim The Enchanter: May 7th 2008; 11:09AM

Same here. I wouldn't buy it without trying it, so this is ideal. Maybe using SD cards, we can has wii demoz too plz?

TheOverlord#2 can has Mario Karts?(MK:2578-3517-9859): May 7th 2008; 5:58PM

The NG:DS demo has 3 difficulties, just beat one and you get to get the next difficulty.
(Normal, Head Ninja, Master Ninja)

Shogan: May 7th 2008; 11:08AM

This channel should make the Wii a whole lot more useful.

PojoMofo: May 7th 2008; 11:50AM

DS demos you get off your Wii??? hmm???

Sony says "Welcome to 2007..."

D_Average: May 7th 2008; 12:00PM

"Ridge Racer!!" ......cough.....silence...."Its Ridge Racer!!""....still more silence....

Fernando Rocker: May 7th 2008; 12:06PM

Again:

This Channel was released since last year in Japan. So, 2007.

WiNG [Life in a Game]: May 7th 2008; 11:57AM

I'm pretty sure you can't see the reviews. Instead, the channel will recommend games to you based on your feedback and the reviews of others.

Van Faulk: May 7th 2008; 12:03PM

See this is the kind of stuff we should have had at launch.

That said it is an improbably well put together feature for a wii channel. keep putting out more like this and we may just forget about check mii out.

Webslinger: May 7th 2008; 12:04PM

120something blocks free to download the channel... 126 blocks free just to be able to run it! i hate deleting my VC

Nicholas Sulikowski: May 7th 2008; 12:35PM

Could be worse, you could have 125 blocks free, forcing you to delete stuff just for that one damn extra block of space needed.

cold school: May 7th 2008; 12:09PM

So..... DS demos then....
exciting stuff.

PSN: KillaKornbread (the shirt is a lie!): May 7th 2008; 12:29PM

ive been waiting for this. it will certainly get me to fire up my Wii and DS again. i have to find my DS and i havent been playing my Wii lately since ive had too much work and school to have friends over for any reasonable duration (we'll play this summer though). i just havent seen anything that has interested me for DS lately so hopefully ill see something on there that i missed before.

Jfk Aok: May 7th 2008; 1:07PM

This is horrible. It's just a giant advertisement for itself. I can see this being useful for a company that's struggling, but they're making money hand and fist and not putting ANY MONEY BACK INTO THE CONSUMERS and therefore making their brand name seem cheap and low-quality. Nintendo really needs to go back into their online games and FIX THEM first and foremost. They should make things like their Wiiware and Virtual Console awesome before venturing more into other crap. They should stop just taking their consumers money and leaving them out to rot.
Honestly, this is the only game company that can get away with what it does. They're the microsoft of gaming. Ironically and oddly, microsoft isn't the microsoft of gaming this generation.

nealpro: May 9th 2008; 12:57PM

It's all a conspiracy, man!

umm....hello???: May 7th 2008; 1:41PM

remember NintendoPower and Ninty's Official Seal of Quality?? that was Nintendo's way of promoting their own games--and was EXTREMELY successful. the "recommendations" thing is BS--that's easy marketing tabulations for nintendo--that's something most companies would have to pay people for.

If I recommend a game to someone it's by word-of-mouth or I lend them the game, I don't waste my time filling out stupid forms.

heck, that's why Amazon.com is so successful--they use marketing programs and customer feedback to make recommendations for other things you might like/want and then you purchase those things too.

and for the record, MS is still the MS of this generation. Nintendo's online component is free, I don't know which online game you're playing that you claim is "broken" but MarioKart and SSBB run just fine. and ALL THREE (Sony/Microsoft/Nintendo) gaming companies get away with LOTS of crap--ie-how much money have you put into extra controllers/rechargeable battery packs/etc??

the VC works just fine--you buy and download classic games--about the ONLY problem with the Wii is the lack of dedicated HardDrive and the ridiculous nonsense with the friend codes and lack of voice support--but really I don't want to hear ppl's screams of me being a cheater when I win a race in MK or a bunch of off-color remarks about my mom and BS like that.

umm....hello???: May 7th 2008; 1:30PM

the only thing I could see using this for is the DS downloads and maybe watching some behind the scenes/promotional vids...

...and there's been a number of channels that I haven't bothered downloading so they don't take up space on my Wii...which reminds me I'm probably going to delete the "my photos" channel and the "everybody votes" channel, and most likely my "internetz" channel...my Wii is for gaming, not casual crap--same thing for my 360/PS3...

Ridgecity: May 7th 2008; 1:42PM

Of course this is just the beginning. Nintendo idn't layoff all the Nintendo Power people, they are still with Nintendo, what could they be doing?

And maybe the DS demos may not be a big deal for the people here (since you probably already pirate every freekin' rom the moment it's available, but for regular people it's very nice, and very clever to turn every wii into a DS kiosk like the ones in stores... and yes, this channel is famous for getting so late after Japan had it since a year ago...

Alex: May 7th 2008; 2:21PM

I hope this channel is actually cool and not going to be deleting in coming days when Wii Ware and more VC games come out like how I had to delete my Internet, EveryBody Votes, and Check Mii Out channels.

pcwzrd13: May 7th 2008; 4:48PM

I love the ability to get DS demos without going to a store that has a download station. Here's a video of the Nintendo Channel here:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=BgOEsdE1DAY

Aaron: May 8th 2008; 4:37PM

I don't understand why all these articles have somebody taking pictures of their TV set. How ghetto can you get. The pictures always turn out totally unreadble.

A cheap USB video capture device is only like $40. Sit on the couch with your laptop. Plug your Wii into it. Take screen shots. Then, suddenly and with minimal effort look a million times more professional.

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