Gaming peripheral maker Nyko today announced an adapter that promises to cut the cord on your existing wired Wii Nunchuks (metaphorically, of course). Not to be confused with the standalone wireless Nunchuk Nyko announced last month, the new adapter will connect to an existing wired Nunchuk, allowing it to communicate with a Wii remote up to 15 feet away (handy for people with a 15-foot wingspan!).

Don't worry about the Nunchuk cord drooping limply across your leg either -- according to the release, the adapter comes with a "self-standing Nunchuk sleeve" that has "a convenient compact cord management system keeping the existing Nunchuk cord organized and out of site [sic]."

The adapter, including two required AAA batteries, will retail for $19.99, making it $10 less than Nyko's standalone wireless Nunchuk (though the whole package is $10 more when combined with a $20 wired Nunchuk). Wire-hating gamers who already own four Nunchuks might want to look for it in February.

Nyko's wireless nunchuk peripheral was awarded CNET's best in gaming at CES this year. The wireless nunchuk "connects" through a dongle attached to the bottom of the Wiimote (seen above) and runs off two AAA batteries which allegedly provide 30 hours of use; the cost is $30 and should be out by late January or early February.

Nyko actually introduced many new peripherals at this year's CES. Coincidentally this would be the second year in a row that Nyko introduced a relatively useful product for the Wii, last year they came through with the Wiimote charge station which we're told has sold very well. Of course, not every Nyko product has to be reasonable, the Wii Party station is still one of the most atrociously awesome things we saw in the past year.

Harmonix's Rock Band store is mostly full of unnecessary merchandise, but there are a few things that might help in protecting your $170 "music platform." As the drum set taking up a square meter of real estate in the living room grows into an eyesore, the one handy thing the store has is the Rock Band drum bag.

The $50 drum bag is an easy storage solution when "company" comes over. Nobody likes the first question out of a new visitor during the holidays when they see the drum kit to be, "What the hell is that thing?!" There are also guitar and drum stick sleeves, plus new drum sticks and stickers in the store that are neat, but the drum bag does feel like an obvious solution to something that will be an issue in time. Disassembling the kit and putting it into a Bloomingdales Big Brown Bag just seems wrong. But if someone finds other DIY storage solutions we're all ears.

Games Radar has put together a little piece comparing the difficulty of Guitar Hero to Rock Band. Their basic conclusion is that "Guitar Hero III hard = Guitar Hero II expert" and "Rock Band Expert = Guitar Hero II hard." They say that Guitar Hero is tough to jump into and Rock Band may be too easy at the medium level for seasoned vets.

Having had significant time with Rock Band on a visit to Harmonix on Tuesday, we can say that when comparing the guitar portion of the game, Rock Band on hard feels close to Guitar Hero II on medium -- except you do have to deal with that pesky orange button, so in essence it feels the same. That doesn't mean that there isn't a challenge in there for the average player, it's just a point of reference for jumping in. Now that's just the guitar, we're not even talking about the beasts of drumming and singing, nor the extreme joy the social interaction of the game provides.

Answers are slowly starting to emerge about the mysterious dongle the PS3 uses for wireless guitar capabilities in Guitar Hero III. The over-simplified version is that even though PS3 and Wii both use Bluetooth, the Wii guitar plugs directly into the Wiimote hijacking the signal, while the Sixaxis doesn't plug into the guitar -- hence the USB wired dongle as a wireless bridge.

Before we go any further, this isn't just a GH III problem. Rock Band will also use some sort of PS3 dongle. This might also explain a lot about why there isn't a Wii version of Rock Band announced yet. Although it's completely disputable, here's our basic idea: Two USB ports on the back of the Wii for the drum and mic (which are wired on every console), then if Harmonix wants the guitars to be wireless they need to design a guitar modeled around the Wiimote to plug into so that Rock Band does the same signal hijack that GH III accomplishes.

Apparently Sony doesn't feel up to talking about why these dongles are necessary as they stonewalled 1UP when the site went looking for answers. Maybe Sony will give Red Octane and Harmonix the tools to make their guitars work dongle-less one day, but to get things done for this holiday season this was the only (or most cost effective) solution available.

Update: We were trying to avoid bringing the Xbox 360 into this, but considering there is some confusion, the Xbox 360 version of Guitar Hero III is "dongle-less." Meaning a direct connection is made between the guitar and Xbox 360. Regarding Guitar Hero I & II support on PS3, Red Octane wrote us: "In regards to your other question about GH and GHII (on PS2), they do work on PS3 (w/ both SG and Kramer), though they will require an appropriate adapter for the guitar controller."

MTV's Multiplayer blog has posted answers to frequently asked questions regarding the corporate fustercluck (MTV/EA/Harmonix) published rhythm game Rock Band. We could bother to put the question and the answer, but if y'all can't figure out what the original question was you can hit up Multiplayer:

• No other hardware combinations have been announced yet beyond the standard (guitar, drum, mic) bundle. And yes, the bass guitar is just a second guitar controller which you probably have lying around ...
• ... because Harmonix will keep an "open platform philosophy" and games will be compatible with third-party controllers "that conform to the various platform controller standards."
• If you're short on guitars but want to play head to head, the online play will be both cooperative and competitive.
• The Xbox 360 gee-tar will come with a USB hub (remember the guitar in the bundle is wired).
• A Wii version has not been announced ... yet.

Now, we don't have insta-access to Rock Band like MTV's Multiplayer blog, but we can try to get some questions answered too -- we're scrappy like that. So if you have some lingering Rock Band questions (and there are plenty good ones still left), leave 'em in the comments and we'll try to get some answers. And automatic name calling to the people who ask questions already answered by bullet points above.

It's official folks, Rock Band will be $170 for Xbox 360 and PS3 and release Nov. 23. A Friday ... wait, Black Friday? Yes, more on that in a second. The PS2 version will release Dec. 10 for $160. Our spidey sense started tingling that something was up when we received info that Amazon was listing Rock Band for $169 -- a $30 reduction from the $199 they've had listed for months. Turns out that they received the official price today. The bundle includes the game (reg. $60, $50 on PS2), the guitar (reg. $60, but wired on Xbox 360, wireless is separate and $80), the wired drums (reg. $80), and wired microphone (reg. $30).

Now the big question: What were the powers that be thinking with November 23rd? Nov. 23rd is Black Friday, the day after Thanksgiving, the high holy "oh my gawd we're going to get trampled when the stores open" day of the year. Can you imagine what it's going to be like trying to pick up your game at retail on that day? Don't know about the rest of you, but if there were ever a time to get your game by mail -- this would be that time!

[Thanks to all those that sent info in]

Readers with good memories probably remember our annoyance at having a dangling remote and wire sitting on our lap when using the Wii's classic controller. So you'd probably think we're psyched about Thrustmaster's recently-announced wireless classic controller. But we're not.

For one, Nyko's classic controller grip pretty already solves the problem elegantly for less than half the price of Thrustmaster's $18 controller.

Secondly, this thing is a monstrosity, with ugly aqua blue rubber on the grips and analog sticks and a bloated design that reminds us of the PS3's scrapped boomerang controller.

Finally, the thing is really just a wireless GameCube controller with a modified button layout. Besides meaning less-than-perfect compatibility, this also means the unit requires an ugly dongle that hangs down from one of the GameCube slots on your Wii. At that point you might as well just go with the better-designed WaveBird, or just make your own solution. In either case, you can probably just skip this cash-in accessory.

[Via WiiFanboy]

In the latest OXM Podcast, Harmonix CEO Alex Rigopulos confirms that the Xbox 360 guitars for Rock Band are wired in the bundles. There will be wired and wireless versions available for the Xbox 360, but once again, the retail bundles will come with a wired guitar. The PS3 guitars are all wireless. The Xbox 360 bundle will also come with a USB hub for all the peripherals to plug into. On both the Xbox 360 and PS3 version the microphone and drum kit will be wired. Rigopulos says, "The cost of wireless technology on the Microsoft side is higher and to be able to offer those bundles at a price point that would be reasonable for consumers it was necessary ... on the 360 side we are also bundling a hub."

And no, there is no official price yet. It's starting to look like the $20 difference between the Xbox 360 wired and wireless guitar we reported after receiving an internal Game Crazy memo is holding up. So, that's that, the Xbox 360 bundle of Rock Band has a wired guitar and you'll get a little hub to plug everything in. Now comes the question if Microsoft will loosen their grip on the cost of licensing the proprietary wireless tech if the PS3 version of Rock Band sells stronger (comparatively given its lower install base) due to its wireless advantage. In the end, we don't blame Harmonix/EA/MTV for this wired issue -- although it was shady of them to hide it this long -- we're more upset that the consumer is going to get an inferior product due to an obnoxious licensing issue. It's deja vu all over again.

[Thanks sm0ke]

According to Red Octane COO Charles Huang "multiple territories ... will not see Rock Band this Christmas." Now remember, Red Octane makes Guitar Hero and is the competitor to the Harmonix developed, EA published, Rock Band. Huang believes Australia and New Zealand are out this year and expects those territories to pay $275 Australian for the game and peripherals. Speaking with Gamespot AU, he says possible release delays can be attributed to peripheral manufacturing output and that this could reach beyond the Asia-Pacific region. Huang says, "I'm not singling out Australia -- probably it will be multiple territories that will not see Rock Band this Christmas is my guess." EA Australia won't confirm the information, but GameSpot UK was told by their EA rep, "We don't think [Rock Band] will be released in Q4."

EA confirmed with Joystiq that Rock Band is still coming to the US in 2007. Although there is still no announced release date, no confirmed peripheral price, and we've heard hardly a peep about the game from the corporate side since the good buzz generated by E3. And we know we were working with "prototype" peripherals that hadn't gone into mass production at E3. We've asked for comment from EA about what's going on with the game and its peripherals. We'll update as soon as we hear back.

Update: EA got back to us and said that "everything is on track to launch the game on time" in the US. They'd also like to clarify that no European or Australian ship dates were ever announced and "at this point everything else is pure speculation." They won't answer specific questions regarding US peripheral supplies, we asked if they can guarantee at least a guitar for every copy of the game, but they do say that they're "working as hard as [they] can to produce as many copies of the game as quickly as [they] can." And finally, in terms of a release date, "We're almost there! Rock Band will ship this holiday in North America for the PS3 and Xbox 360."

We've been working on getting answers to what's going on with Rock Band's peripheral pricing for a long time. There are still no "official" prices to be found, but there is one anomaly regarding the wireless Xbox 360 guitar that is really starting to kick up questions. This $20 difference in the prices between the Xbox 360 wired and wireless guitar, which Joystiq first reported on back in May, has come back around in a sneaky way with the Rock Band bundles. Both Amazon and GameStop currently sell the Rock Band bundle for $199, with one key difference: The PS3 version comes with a wireless guitar and the Xbox 360 version is wired.

So, for gamers looking to avoid the currently marked $20 difference between the PS3 ($59.99) and Xbox 360 ($79.99) wireless guitar prices, the bundle is apparently not the answer. We also spoke with Red Octane yesterday, following up on questions we had at E3 about the price point of their Xbox 360 wireless guitar. Given Red Octane's already dramatic history on this wireless issue with Microsoft, we wanted to know if licensing issues and cost to the consumer had been worked out for this guitar and Guitar Hero III's release. They couldn't officially answer at this time, but the GH III bundles are currently identically priced on GameStop's website.

"Officially" none of this information means anything at this point. Although consumers should be made aware that the Rock Band bundles they're currently purchasing on GameStop and Amazon for the Xbox 360 are officially marked as wired, while the PS3 version is marked as wireless.

[Thanks Zachary]

Wired's Game|Life passes along word from the Yomiuri Shimbun that "Japan's Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, and Transport plans to ban local wireless gaming from flights," because the Wi-Fi signal could allegedly interfere with airplane instruments. That's odd, because Lufthansa has been offering in-plane Wi-Fi service to its fliers since early 2003, and we don't remember hearing about any navigational problems or horrific plane crashes being caused by the system. The FAA agrees that in-air Wi-Fi is safe -- they approved a United Airlines plan to offer a similar service back in mid-2005.

We suppose it's better to be safe than sorry when dealing with potentially plane-crashing communications interference, but we'd still like to see some definitive evidence of the harm caused by our little portable systems before giving up our in-air wireless multiplayer.

Modder mavin Adam Thole wasn't satisfied with the wire dangling from his tilt-sensing Xbox 360 controller -- so he cut it off. Thole has now successfully applied his mod to the wireless version of the 360 controller, including a switch to seamlessly transition between the left analogue stick and tilt control.

Thole plans to produce a how-to video for creating your own tiltable controller using his tiltBoard. For the impatient or unskilled, Thole's selling a pricey pre-built unit on eBay.

[Via Xbox 360 Fanboy]

This controller is just a couple of millimeters larger than the Xbox's original controller, so if you're looking for a throwback to that, or something that can double as the monolith in 2001: A Space Odyssey, then look no further. Sibling site Xbox 360 Fanboy has posted a link to instructables.com, where you can learn how to make one of your very own to hold and to love, and to use as a bed.

When we say massive, we really mean massive. There is no doubt that they could have also housed a couple of 360s inside this thing, hooked it up to two TVs, and made a Gears of War/Halo 2 gaming machine all in one.. A controller at each corner of the box, embedded plasma screens, surround sou ... okay, granted that's taking it a bit too far.

In a day and age of miniaturization, it's nice to see someone maximizing things. We'd really like to see a DS Lite this big, aw yeah.

Hackmeister Übergeneral Ben Heckendorn has whipped up a handy (pun!) one-handed Xbox 360 controller, perfect for The Fugitive dude or folks who are busy multitasking. This isn't for the faint of heart, but if you've got a bit of a bug to try it out yourself, roll up your sleeves and give it a go.

Seriously, is there anything this guy can't do? The thing is wireless, AND has both rumble controllers inside of it (take that, SIXAXIS!). Between this and the Xbox 360 laptop, he's a one-man hacking machine. Really. We're convinced the guy is a robot himself, with no organic parts left inside.

[Via The Xbox Domain]