News: Wii Movie, Anime Downloads Launch

Posted by Tom "Tphi" Phillips - Nov 23rd 2009 02:09

Nintendo begins paid video downloads on Wii!

Japanese Wii gamers are now able to pay to download movies, anime and other paid content via their Wii no Ma Channel. The Channel, which launched in Japan earlier this year, has to date only provided free, advertising-funded content, which can also be streamed to a DSi handheld for viewing on-the-go.

Disney, Pokémon, Warner, TV Asahi, NHK and Toei are just some of companies providing downloadable content for the service, which is paid for in Nintendo Points. For example, an episode of the Kirby anime series will set Japanese gamers back 100 Points.

The Channel is built around a virtual living room, where your Miis can gather and watch the content on a giant TV. Currently only available in Japan, Nintendo have expressed desires to expand the Channel to the West if it proves popular.

Would you be interested in Nintendo launching downloadable video content on Wii? Let us know your thoughts below!


Source: Andriasang



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Comments

GCTonyHawk7 Says: 
November 22nd, 2009 at 22:58 || Total Comments: 174
Cool to see Nintendo getting into this sort of stuff. Too bad it would have to be SD though. Big flaw the the Wii right now, eh?
VaatiKaiba Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 00:32 || Total Comments: 269
For this to be any use to me personally, I'd need to be able to move the films / episodes from my Wii to my Mac, and then again to my iPod... But I do like the move, and would probably get some films anyway!
Pod Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 02:59 || Total Comments: 1037
Does this channel remember what you've bought as well, so that you can re-download them?
Solitanze Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 04:02 || Total Comments: 1655
All the more reason for WiiHD. Must be absolute plum now to be announced at E3 next year...
Darkflame Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 05:41 || Total Comments: 961
This would be a perfect way to get some Japanise content accessible to the west at low cost.
Anime DVD imports (aside from Ghibli) are pretty darn expensive, having a DD solution could give fans a really big incentive to get a wii and make regular use of it.

I dought Nintendo would be sensible enough to do it though. Which is a shame...Id happly pay quite a bit to own Dennou Coil.

"Too bad it would have to be SD though."

Much of the content would be SD anyway at this stage.
Id be more concerned with price/value, easy of use, and selection.

Oh, as well as compression quality.
Pointless asking for higher-resolution if the bitrate itself isnt high enough.
(sadly a lot of actualy broadcast cable stations still seem to overcompress stuff too though :-/ )
Mr_bogus Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 07:51 || Total Comments: 224
It may be streaming, like the vids on Nintendo channel...?
Hellfire Says: 
November 23rd, 2009 at 08:13 || Total Comments: 735
Like Darkflame said, most of this content is SD anyway or uses some kind of faux-HD, besides HD also means bigger filesizes, so you can see the problem.
The problem with using this to bring Jap content to the West is that the licensing companies are totally different, meaning it's pretty much a completly new process than the one they took on with Wii no ma.
Critter171 Says:
November 23rd, 2009 at 21:02 || Total Comments: 79
sol is just a plan troll and has nothing better to do. Nintendo will not be adding any hd to the wii anytime soon. So just drop it already.

next home console will have hd. Cool to see Nintendo getting into some other things.
Darkflame Says:
November 24th, 2009 at 04:47 || Total Comments: 961
Yes, fair point, new licensing arrangements would have to be made.
But its still far less "risk" to release Anime on DD for download then to make 100,000 DVDs and for them not to sale due to lack of demand.

And if something like Lupin3rd proves successfull, then they got about 100,000 eppisodes they could put up and profit from :P
CSP Says:
November 25th, 2009 at 05:51 || Total Comments: 316
I just don't get it. Every time we talk about multi purpose devices, we tend to forget that, if we try to add different uses to something not originally designed for this, then the result is mediocre. This has been proven on the homebrew schene with almost no applications designed for the DS being worth using (on the DS) and really, for someone who really wants good quality video, will he EVER settle for streaming?

Let's say the Wii could do HD. You would need a really fast AND reliable conection (that is no disconnections) to stream HD which is really stupid when you can download the video on your PC and with an HD media player (now sold for around 80 Eu) you can watch it on your TV.

My point is that you stream zero punctuation (because there is no other "ahem" legal way) and stuff from gametrailers. You do NOT stream movies, you download them first. This is a CASUAL approach to video viewing and while it is in harmony with Nintendo's approach, people who got a Wii for playing games, got a media player for playing video files, an MP3 player for playing Mp3s and generally buy stuff for specific purposes.

May I also remind you that the selling point of the PS2, the DVD player, is probably one of the worst DVD players ever to be produced by Sony (and probably the entire world)
Darkflame Says:
November 25th, 2009 at 08:22 || Total Comments: 961
" This has been proven on the homebrew schene with almost no applications designed for the DS being worth using (on the DS)"

I use Comic Book DS daily :)

"someone who really wants good quality video, will he EVER settle for streaming?"

No, but most people dont want great quality video.
They want convenience and entertainment.

Thats why MP3 won over CDs or Minidisk.
Its about convenience not quality.

And, perhaps more specifically, lowering costs enough for distribution of more niche products.

Of course dedicated devices are better then separate, but that dosnt stop things being successfull if you can increase the usefulness of an existing device.

Nintendos got the fastest to boot, cheapest, internet-linked tv device on the planet.
Its daft not to exploit it for other uses.

Also, personally, I think iPlayer channel works pretty good. Quality is fine for me.
If I could get a more diverse range of program for a decent price and definitely go for it.

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