After numerous hours of playing on my Wii and dreading the short span of cord between the Nunchuk and the Wii Remote, I thought to myself that it would be nice if there was some way to not only untether it but still be able to use it normally. Usually, third parties would solve this by making their own devices that try to copy the functionality. Luckily, I found one that doesn’t attempt to be a clone. Always on the lookout for unique and quirky accessories to enhance game play, I stumbled upon this gem.

The Nyko Cord-Free, while not winning any creative name awards, is a good solution to the Nunchuk tethering issue. It solves this by converting your standard Nunchuk into a wireless one. The package includes an adapter, the wireless grip attachment and 2 AAA batteries.

Setup

It’s fairly straight to the point to set up out of box and shouldn’t give you any troubles. Attach the adapter to the port on the bottom of the Wii Remote. It’s powered by the controller itself and you’ll see that it’s working by pressing any button. It’ll blink a blue light occasionally to show that it’s trying to find the grip.

Then, attach the Nunchuk to the grip and wrap its cord around the provided storage area. It’s designed so the cord will fit nicely and still attach to the provided port. Toss in the AAAs and press the power button on the base of the grip to start searching for the adapter. When the Wii is powered on and the Wii Remote is all set to be used, the grip and the adapter will blink together to show they’re working. It reminds me a little of runway lights at times if you have more than 1 Wii Remote set up this way.

Construction

The plastic the Cord-Free uses seems to be the same as what’s used in the Wii Remote & Nunchuk so it’s fairly durable and thick. It is also very lightweight and adds just a slight bit of weight when attached. The “eject” buttons on the adapter, however, do seem a bit oddly placed and may give those of you with big hands (myself included) problems during heated game play. As for the grip itself, the cord storage could use some work as the final wrapping doesn’t seem to fit properly. The battery life is great. I’ve tested 4 games extensively off the 2 AAAs it came packaged with and they have yet to die on me.

Price

This is a fairly cheap alternative to the Nyko Kama for those of you who are like me and don’t want to take a chance with a third party Nunchuk alternative. I managed to find mine at GameStop marked down from $19.99 to $9.99. $9.99 seems a bit more reasonable for a device that is meant to enhance a device rather than be a replacement.

Compatibility

I managed to try it with a few different games just to get an idea how well it handles. For the most part, it works flawlessly. Only a few slowdowns occurred but I think that’s something to chalk up to either the game I was testing or radio interference from the wi-fi network.

Elebits

The game worked as it should. There weren’t any noticeable problems since it’s a fairly basic control scheme.

Red Steel

Unfortunately, I’m one of the early Wii adopters and happen to own this piece of trash thanks to launch day game selection. Regardless of that, the controls seemed just as sluggish and unresponsive as they do normally. I guess I can count this as a plus for the Cord-Free.

Wii Sports – Boxing

This is one of the games that always bothered me with a dangling cord. Not only did I manage to beat my previous record by using the Cord-Free, I put myself at the Pro level. The game still suffers because of its weak controls but the lack of a cord does make up for it.

Mario Strikers Charged

Now this is a game that could make or break this accessory for me. Not only does it manage to work perfectly for some of the later tiers of season mode, it actually made the game seem much better to play without the cord getting in the way. One of my problems with playing it has been that I hate the cord dangling when I’m trying to break the CPU’s meters. It would always feel like I’m going to yank the Nunchuk out of my hands. The Cord-Free setup has earned its spot next to my Wii.

Overall

I was pretty skeptical about buying the Cord-Free considering that my last Nyko device was the poorly-designed GBA Worm Light and that was a HUGE letdown. However, after giving it a chance, I have to say that I’m pretty impressed. It delivered exactly what I hoped it would and managed to do so in a low-profile manner. I’ll definitely be buying another set or 3 of these. Now if it works well with the Nyko Perfect Shot, I’ll be impressed.

Stay tuned for a review of the Nyko Perfect Shot.

From StoneCypher’s blog:

ICANN has announced their intent to allow the registration of new gTLDs in a repeated auction process, starting for the princely sum of $100,000 for a handful of letters. In IRC in debate the question came up how many vanity 1st level domains (hereafter vanity 1ld) would be purchased.

IANA / ICANN Gambling! Place your bets, be a psychic

My bet is 840. What’s yours?

It’s been a little over a year since my first analysis of the Wii feature set and I believe it’s time for me to take another look. We’ve seen quite a few firmware updates since then and a lot has been added feature-wise. The current state of the Wii is still weaker than the rest of the consoles in this round and I still have a lot of the same complaints. There’s also the complaints I have in my analysis of Mii usage However, a lot of stuff has been addressed from my last post.

Channels

We’ve seen very few non-VC channel releases in the past year. While they’ve ranged from the useful to the completely useless, it’s still a bit mild compared to what’s available on other platforms. Most of what is available currently still suffers from the same thing: disconnection of its users from each other. Channels like the Everybody Votes Channel or the Check Mii Out channel are good attempts at connecting Wii users but they’re still faceless to each other, even people on their Wii friends list.

There are some good attempts to deliver content to the users at least, such as the Metroid Prime 3 Preview (a good start but worthless) to the upcoming Everybody’s Nintendo Channel. With the Everybody’s Nintendo Channel, however, it adds something users have been waiting for for a while: Nintendo DS demo distribution. Now we don’t have to lug our DS systems to the store whenever we want to try an upcoming game release.

Message Board

Ahh, the Wii Message Board, my old nemesis. How you like to taunt me with your usefulness and then fall short. There have been some updates that have fixed some of my complaints. USB keyboard support in most of the available channels as well as the message board have earned a thumbs up from me. Also, the fact that you can click on a URL in a message and spawn the Internet Channel is a bit of a cool factor. There’s still some things that need to be addressed but most of these lie in the cosmetic additions or tie-ins with games and other channels. Super Mario Galaxy is a good start but the messages seem to lack that custom flair they deserve. If you get a few messages a day from people as well as from the game, there’s nothing there to make the game-related ones stand out.

The Message Board is getting better, it just needs to give us more to work with. One thing I would like to see is an alternate message listing interface. It’s hard to sort your messages out when you have a Post-It Note board that can cover other messages. Give us the ability to choose between a list view and the normal Post-It Note board we’re used to. Custom stamps to the Mii icon could be a nice touch. While they’re at it, they could finally allow us to save images from messages to the SD card. Why they didn’t do this from the beginning, I’ll never know.

Wii Shop

The Virtual Console downloads have flourished since launch and we have a nice library of games to choose from. Nintendo has even started giving us “out of region” games at times which is a nice effort on their part. There’s just a few things here I would fix. For starters, they tell us we should use a PC or the Internet Channel to view previews of the games before we download them. This is what strikes me as odd. The Wii Shop is using a tiny version of the Opera browser to display its pages. Why not improve the channel and allow us to view the videos from inside the shop, or better yet, how about letting us try trial versions of games like they do in Super Smash Bros Brawl. Granted, I’m sounding like the rest of the drum-beaters here on this topic but it needs to be addressed.

Another thing the shop could benefit from is a rating system. With the upcoming WiiWare launch, something like this could benefit not only the VC titles but also the new content we’ll be seeing from companies such as 2D Boy, Telltale Games and even Nintendo themselves. A lot of us hold onto what Wii Points we do have and don’t feel like spending almost 1000 points per title only to find it’s mediocre.

WiiWare

Which brings me to WiiWare itself. Now this is what a lot of us have been waiting for. The Virtual Console titles are nice and all but some of us have played these games to death and want something fresh. Sure, we may start seeing the same fate as XBLA with the ports of games we’ve played to death but there’s a lot of new and innovative ideas coming. Hopefully Nintendo doesn’t drop the ball on this one and allow its developers to not only release games but also content channels Wii users can find fun & interesting.

The only drawback I see here is that it still requires you to be an official Wii developer in order to produce content. While this may seem like a weak point, it has its reasons. I, for one, appreciate the fact that these requirements are in place. It acts as a content filter. We’ll see less noise with WiiWare than you see on similar services in terms of content quality.

Conclusion

All in all, the Wii is improving from where it stood a year ago but it still has a few points where it falls behind. I won’t go into the rest of those here as I’ve covered them in previous posts. The next year seems to be promising and I hope to see a lot of good things coming out of WiiWare as well as what they have in store for us in firmware updates. Now if only Nintendo could get rid of that silly little friend code obsession they have with games…

So with the launch of WiiWare coming in May, a lot of people in the community seem to have a lot of questions remaining. There’s been no solid information for potential developers available in any of my searches on how to enroll in the program so I’ve contacted Nintendo about this matter. They have pointed me to their Wii developer application page.

First, let’s go through what we do know about WiiWare. GDC 2008 has opened up new information that gives us a little more insight to how things work.

Large & Small Development Teams

Even if your team consists of 1 or 100 people, you’ll be able to develop titles for WiiWare. A good example of a small team is 2D Boy with their World of Goo title. If you have a game that you want to publish on WiiWare, you won’t have to sell your soul to become licensed. You are your own publisher if you so choose.

Console Features

No restrictions as to what features you can use on the Wii. Do you want to use an SD card? Go for it. Online play? Of course. Have an interesting idea that uses Mii data? Have at it. Nintendo is allowing us to use it all.

Size Limitations

Nintendo has stated that WiiWare games will not be restricted in size. However, they encourage us to make sure our games are small enough to be manageable on the platform. If you have hopes of making some massive game with large amounts of resources, think again. Remember, the system has its limits until Nintendo gets on the ball and gives us a hard drive or something.

Demos

Unfortunately, you won’t be able to demo games before you download them. This is one of the flaws of the service. They seem to think a gameplay video or a video of people playing in front of a monitor is enough to judge if a game is worth spending points on or not. I guess we’ll only be able to rely on the Everybody’s Nintendo Channel before games get pushed to the shop for purchase.

Region & Rating Requirements

With the way the submission requirements will work, the games will be region-specific. This doesn’t mean you can’t release in a load of regions, however. You just need to submit your game for each region you want it released in, based on their criteria. Also, from my understanding of how things will work, you’ll need to get your game rated pending submission. This means if you’re submitting for the USA market, you need an ESRB rating. If you want to release elsewhere, you need to get a rating for that region as well. I’ll post links to resources for those interested.

Application Requirements

A big catch a few will find is that the requirements for getting authorized to develop for WiiWare is the same as they are for normal Wii development. For starters, you need a secure physical office location separate from your residence. They won’t accept home offices. Another thing is that you’ll need to purchase development hardware, which can range between $2,500 to $10,000. For some, it might be a better bet to get involved with someone already doing Wii or WiiWare development. However, if you’re able to set up an office somewhere and afford the kit costs, it seems to be easy to apply. For more information, the Wii page at WarioWorld should be helpful. That page covers North America, Europe, Australia and anything else that’s not Japan or Korea. For Japan & Korea, you need to get in contact with NCL themselves (if anyone has an address for their developer application page, please let me know).

Project Development

Some companies are starting to step up to the plate to help people get their products out quickly. GarageGames has decided to release their Torque Engine & Builder for the Wii with help from Pronto Games. This could be a good option for those of you who don’t have a preexisting library ready to adapt for WiiWare titles.

For the most part, the service seems to be a great way to get your ideas published on the console. Aside from my minor gripes about demos, this looks fairly worthwhile.

Regional game ratings boards

USA: ESRB
Europe: PEGI
Japan: CERO
Germany: USK
Australia: OFLC AU
New Zealand: OFLC NZ

Note: If you know of any I’m missing here, feel free to let me know.

Passed to me from a source I would like to keep unnamed for now. These were found through means uncovered in the past month or so and are no way taken from any official source.

X-Wii-AltName:
X-Wii-AppId:
X-Wii-Cmd: %08X
X-Wii-DWCId: %08X
X-Wii-Download-Interval
X-Wii-Download-Span
X-Wii-IconNew: %08X
X-Wii-Id
X-Wii-MB-Delay: %02X
X-Wii-MB-NoReply: -
X-Wii-MB-RegDate: %04X
X-Wii-Mail-Check-Span
X-Wii-Tag: %08X
X-WiiFace:

I’m just listing these as I see them. I should make an effort to label their use as well.

*.wc24.wii.com

rcw.wc24.wii.com – Seen when message polling
mtw.wc24.wii.com – Connection test maybe?

*.wapp.wii.com

weather.wapp.wii.com – Weather data per location
cfh.wapp.wii.com – Usually seen when a message is being pushed to the Wii Message Board
miicontest.wapp.wii.com – Seems to be used for retrieving data for the Check Mii Out channel
miicontestp.wapp.wii.com – Same as above but for sending
vt.wapp.wii.com – Voting channel data retrieval
vtp.wapp.wii.com – Voting channel data submission

*.shop.wii.com

ecs.shop.wii.com
nus.shop.wii.com

It seems a few firmware updates ago, the processing of messages sent to a Wii user changed. Most, if not all, of the header information I’ve posted about in the past, while still valid, no longer applies to anyone other than Nintendo. That means: no more changing your displayed name & no more hiding the reply button (boo, was great for site mailings).

In my opinion, it would be nice to give users access to these things as they really don’t harm much and actually allow content creators to create unique applications using such features. To me, the message board is collecting dust and while I see Nintendo making advances to use it (the Check Mii Out notification opt-in/opt-out stuff is a good start), it’s still under-utilized.

I was pondering on some ideas for how Nintendo can use the Mii system for something other than using them in their own games. It seems a bit silly to me that the Mii aren’t used for much else right now. I propose some sort of new channel (I’d even pay for it if this became a reality) that would give the Mii a bit more personality. Now this may come with whatever they decide to do with Animal Crossing but its at least letting me get my ideas out there.

Online support

Yes, this will continue to come up until something is done about it but it needs to be said. The network infrastructure is there thanks to Nintendo partnering with Gamespy again so it can be done.

The way I see it working is that upon joining the channel, you are brought into a world login screen where you choose from a Mii residing on your Wii. It could work the same way it does in Wii Sports, for example. Upon using a Mii for the first time, you’re asked if you want to make a profile for it. It is then tied to your Wii Number as a profile specific to that Wii. This then allows people to have similar Mii running around but not exactly being your Mii on the lower level.

On one hand, I’m thinking this channel model should be limited to only those on your friends list. This saves you from dealing with people outside of your circle. However, this also stops you from dealing with people outside your circle. On the other hand, doing a global world via this channel is a bit much. An idea to solve this comes from the Mii Parade.

Your Mii Parade consists of, at least my understanding of it, “friend of a friend” or “six degrees” links. Pretty much every Mii you see in your parade comes from someone you have in your friends list, which, in turn, comes from someone on theirs & so on. This channel could benefit from that in that the channel is limited only to those you know or someone they know.

Now, using this info, we need to build the channel itself. I think it’d could be some sort of virtual world where the only thing Nintendo needs to do is add content. We already have the user base installed via our friends list. The only thing that needs to really be managed is the content of the world and our interaction with it. I don’t want to see this become some There, Playstation Home or Second Life variant but given the nature of the Mii system, its something that needs to be considered. Considered very deeply, seeing the success of Animal Crossing.

Now let’s delve deeper into this virtual world idea. Like I had stated, Nintendo would only need to maintain content. As nice as user-created content can be, it tends to make ideas like this bigger than they should be. We need to start off small here. First, your Mii need a place to call home. A home, in this case, says to me we need an apartment complex idea. The reason this makes sense is that it allows each Mii residing on your Wii to have their own living space as well as a shared space. I’ll describe what could be done with each part of the apartment complex first.

Apartment Suite

The living space for your Mii. You furnish this place as you would your own home. It doesn’t have to be a full blown apartment suite, just a space that your Mii can personalize to their own desires. We can also use this for personal accomplishments via rewards & such received from the games. For instance, say Wii Sports 2 has basketball. Along with getting a message in your message board, you are given a trophy in the shape of a basketball for your accomplishment to put in your apartment. This opens a lot of potential for in-game rewards. Catch a fish in a fishing game, get a fish tank. Get a high score in a racing game, get a stack of racing magazines with your Mii’s picture on it. The possibilities are endless.

Shared Space (Recreation Room/Meeting Room)

The shared space idea allows for a place that all Mii in your apartment can share. First, you have a recreation room. This is where you can hold the records of apartment accomplishments. Something along the lines of a top 10 list or just apartment-wide record keeping. This is also a room that can be customized based on rewards you get or things you buy. I say things you buy because this becomes the perfect medium for small online games, such as those that can be purchased from the Wii Shop. Even Virtual Console games can be updated to allow for this. Let’s say you have a few VC games you bought with your Wii Points. You could then be given an object for your rec room related to this game. For example, buy a NES VC game for the first time, get an interactive NES (which could be activated to pull up a list of your NES VC games). Then you can choose whom you want to play from any of your other friends who happened to be logged in.

The Meeting Room (or should that be Miiting Room? I kid) could be used as a sort of place where you can communicate with your online friends. This becomes a smart idea for those parents who want to limit their kids usage of the PC. Parent on the PC? Load up your Wii, find one of your friends online and talk to them there. With the Parental Controls feature of the Wii, you can set this room to be locked to only those whom you allow in. With an updated Parental Controls tool, you can even set user levels here. This is good if you want to lock child A from talking at all, child B from talking to people outside of the immediate friends list and parent A to talk to everyone. You can even use the Meeting Room to setup challenge games for the Recreation Room.

Wii Shop

The Wii Ware area of the shop lends itself to being a perfect spot for customization of your Wiipartment (sorry, coining lame terms here). Want to buy a couch for your suite? A new wallpaper? Get it here. You can already buy games here, so why not expand it?

Achievements

An achievement system needs to be put in place as well. With XBL & Playstation Home, you have ways of showing off what you’ve accomplished in games. Going back to the apartment suite idea, game achievements can give you world rewards such as trophies and other furnishings but why not expand on that? How about if you complete a game, you can then be rewarded Wii Points or something. This can give the players an incentive to go out and buy a new game to see what new things it will give them.

Traversal of the World

The only thing I haven’t really touched on here is how to visit your friends. For this, I suggest making only the apartments able to be navigated. You activate the lobby door to your apartment to leave and it’ll ask you where you’d like to go. Then you are transported to your friend’s apartment building and can navigate it. The way I see it is by being only a lobby that you can visit. From there, you can navigate the lobby. Go to the meeting room and you’re able to communicate with people you have in common with whom you’re visiting on your friends list. Go to the rec room and you can check out apartment complex achievements. Head to the elevator and you’re prompted with a menu of residents of that apartment to which you can check out their living spaces.

Mii Customization

Something that could be overhauled here is the looks to your Mii itself. Clothes, accessories, etc. This is something a lot of people have pushed for but with the current system, it’s not possible without a major revamp.

Mii In-Game Usage

An idea I was toying with for using Mii in some games was using just the Mii information and not the Mii itself. Some games could take the data for the Mii you choose to use and use different features to map to in-game character creation. Wearing a blue shirt? Choose from a selection of blue shirt textures in the game. Face shapes and everything could be mapped to certain in-game features without actually using the Mii itself. Give a player a specific color item based on their favorite color. Give your player hat options if they have no hair on the Mii. Endless.

I think that sums up a lot of the ideas I’ve had recently on changes to the Wii which could draw a lot more people to it. It doesn’t have to be overly complicated, just give the users a better means of interacting with each other by using their Mii. Wii love Mii and it’s time for our Mii to love Wii.

さんまさん (Sanma Akashiya)(bio)
まつおかさん (Shuzo Matsuoka)(bio)

See the Japanese ad of the two here.

X-Wii-AppId: [App ID]
This one apparently is used to send data to specific apps on the Wii, eg. the Mii Channel. The first known use of this one is through NCL (Nintendo of Japan) to send custom celebrity Mii to their users.

So for that case, the message contained the following:
X-Wii-AppId: 0-48414341-3031

More info on the use of this as I look deeper.