Wii

The Wii family line is a series of system produced by Nintendo. It succeeded the Nintendo GameCube and was succeeded by the Wii U.

The main feature of the Wii line is the use of a wireless controller called the Wii Remote which has built-in accelerometers for tracking and responding to motion. It also comes with an infrared sensor which, when pointed at a sensor hooked up to a TV, can interact with elements on screen in real time.

Variants

Controller

The console uses a motion-tracking remote controller called the Wii Remote (also referred to as Wiimote) via an accelerometer. This feature is incorporated into many Wii games, prompting players to either shake or move the remote in a certain direction to perform various actions. By shaking the Wii Remote in Kirby's Return to Dream Land and Kirby's Dream Collection Special Edition, Kirby can perform a Super Inhale, as well as charge up/use a special attack from a Copy Ability such as performing Hyper Tornado from Tornado or Needle Burst from Needle; these actions can also be inputted by mashing the directional pad in random directions.

The Wii Remote also uses infrared detection sensors at the front end of it to allow the player to point at the screen and interact with elements on the screen similar to a computer mouse. This feature is only used in Scope Shot in Kirby's Return to Dream Land and Kirby's Epic Yarn during the Train metamortex sections and when decorating Kirby's Pad.

A Wii Remote can also be turned horizontally to be played with sideways; this is the only way to play any of the Kirby series games released on the Wii with the exception of Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Wii Virtual Console games, and the New Challenge Stages from Kirby's Dream Collection Special Edition.

In November 2010, Nintendo released the Wii Remote Plus which contains the Wii Motionplus accessory inside of it which more accurately reads complex motion. These Wiimotes are indicated by the curved text at the bottom. Many Wii bundles after 2010 started releasing with a Wii Remote Plus instead of a regular Wii Remote.

Features

Channels

The main interface of the Wii family lines, officially referred to as the Wii Menu, use applications called Channels. These function the same as any general application; the idea was derived from the experience of one looking at a row of televisions and deciding what to watch. On the bottom of the GUI are three options (from left to right): the Wii (Setting menu) button, the SD card button, and the Wii Message Board button.

Wii Shop Channel

The Wii Shop Channel was an online service that allowed players to purchase funds and redeem certain game titles. These titles range from original WiiWare games (games only released on the Wii Shop Channel, similar to the Nintendo eShop-exclusive games), to Virtual Console games, and other miscellaneous software. Wii Virtual Console games that were downloaded appeared in their own seperate channels.

Game updates were also received via the Wii Shop, though this was only known to have happened four times before the channel's discontinuation on January 30, 2019. One of those updates was for the Wii Virtual Console version of Kirby 64: The Crystal Shards on August 24, 2008 which only improved the emulator that runs the game.^[1]

Club Nintendo

Users can connect to their Club Nintendo account on the shop. Whenever a user downloads applications from the shop, points are distributed to their account which they can use as online currency to purchase exclusive Club Nintendo products. By building up points with the Wii Shop Channel and the DSi Shop, users could purchase various Kirby-related products such as the Kirby Wii soundtrack and other themed merchandise.

Nintendo Channel

The Nintendo Channel was a service that allowed users to watch various trailers, interviews, and other types of videos about various Nintendo games. One form of media that was present on the channel was a web show called Ultimate Wii Challenge hosted by Ben and David where they would play other Nintendo games besides their usual New Super Mario Bros. Wii content and create fake challenges for them to beat. An episode featured the two playing Kirby's Epic Yarn where the challenge was to beat Pyramid Sands, Lava Landing, and Hot Wings all while making sure they collect every piece of treasure, earn a gold medal before they clear the stage, and collect every Bonus Star. The two managed to clear all of the challenges in the episode despite what it appears to be their first time playing the game, however Lava Landing took them five attempts. The episode can be watched here.

The channel also allowed Nintendo DS system users to download game demos on their systems via DS Download Play. Kirby Mass Attack is the only Kirby game to have a demo download this way. The service ended June 27, 2013.

Wii Message Board

The Message Board allowed users to write letters to family members or other Wii users via internet. Most games will also send the user updates or commemorative photos taken within their respective games to the Message Board for the user to read and view. Kirby's Epic Yarn is one example of being able to send an image to the Message Board when the player takes a picture in Kirby's Pad and decides to send it to the Message Board; players can also send these images online to other players.

Data Management

The Data Management Menu allows players to access the save data for each game they have played within the Wii's internal memory. Depending on the amount of save data accessing options on the system, the title of accessing these saves are different: "Wii" for internal and SD memory saves to separate from GameCube save data, "Save Data" to separate from Channel memory, and "Data Management" to seperate from the Wii Settings. Each game has its own unique save data icon and banner sometimes accompanied with a short blurb. All Kirby games feature an animated icon for their respective save icons.

Games

Below is a list of every Kirby game released for the Wii family line.

Other games featuring Kirby

Below is a list of games featuring characters from the Kirby series.

Game demos

Below is a list of demos of any of the aforementioned games, all of them are only playable at various real-world events.

Wii Virtual Console games

Below is a list of Virtual Console games—for Kirby series games or those featuring characters from the Kirby series—for the Wii family that were available on the Nintendo Wii Shop.

Other related applications

Kirby TV Channel

The Kirby TV Channel was a downloadable application from the Wii Shop Channel only released in PAL regions that launched June 23, 2011 which allowed users to watch episodes of Kirby: Right Back at Ya! for free. Users could also receive messages from the service about new episodes that were available on the current queue.

Wii no Ma

Wii no Ma was an online multi-service channel released only in Japan. Many Kirby-related features have been distributed in the service such as watching every episode of the Kirby anime (as well as Kirby 3D), buying series merch, and being informed on other related Kirby news. It ran from May 1, 2009 to April 30, 2012.

Trivia

• In PAL regions, copies of Kirby's Adventure Wii were bundled with a Wii Family Edition and a Wii Remote Plus. Around 10,000 to 50,000 of these bundles were made.^[8]
• The Nunchuk, one of the more prominent Wii Remote accessories that many Wii games require to have to play or have as an alternative controller option, cannot be played with any of the Kirby games for the Wii as all three of them are meant to function with just the Wii Remote itself; inserting a Nunchuk into a Wii Remote while playing any of the aforementioned games will cause an error and a pop-up telling the player to remove any unsupported extensions from the remote.
• Oddly enough, the artwork for the Wii used in Kirby's History in Kirby's Dream Collection Special Edition that appears in the 2006 blurb when the Wii debuted uses a Wii Remote Plus (as indicated by the curved text at the bottom on the remote) which didn't release for Wii consoles until four years later in 2010.

Artwork

References