We’ve had the wii since last summer when I bought it second hand off a friend who found he wasn’t playing it enough to justify having it. I played it off and on again for a bit, and then I bought the wii fit. Since then, Amy and I have been playing several times a week (we like competing against each other) and have expanded our game gallery to include several games the WHOLE family can enjoy (Dogs, Disney Princess, Game Party) and have been staying up late many nights out of the week trying to best each other at Skill Ball (Ski ball), Shuffleboard or Darts.

An article on engadget recently about the latest wii update and the “hole” it patched piqued my curosity a bit about hacking the wii, but since this console was one the whole family enjoys (emma and grace like making mii’s) I figured I wouldn’t bother.

Until I came across this little gem. Granted, I still do not know if I really want to hack the wii and add the homebrew channel, but I do have Legend of Zelda (though pilotg2 is playing it right now…) and it might be fun to add more games to the box (like duck hunt!) I just don’t know if I really want to try it.

Has anyone out there hacked their wii yet? Was it successful??

Oh and if you shoot me your WII ID I’ll send mine and add you to my friends list….

I’ve never been on the cutting edge of gaming technology. I bought my first nintendo second hand from a friend years after it first came out. We had a Sega Genesis that I never really did much with and Amy and I still have an original Play Station that we fire up once a year for Scrabble or a Super Puzzle Fighter match. Otherwise, I’m content to not game too much. Except for the wii.

I bought the wii last year from a friend who found that he played his xBox more (xbox is still the ruler for FPS like HALO) and I’ve played it a bit. Downloaded the free stuff and even bought Super Mario Brothers for it (talk about OLD technology). I was surprised when I tried to locate a Wii Fit online last Wednesday when it came out, that I was able to order it no problems from Toys R Us.com. They even had a deal where I could get We Ski on sale at the same time, so I went ahead and got it as well.

The wii fit came yesterday. Amy’s having a Heritage Makers Celebration at the house tomorrow, so we said we’d put the Fit away and clean the house. Maybe pull it out on Sunday. Well, after a night of cleaning, I sat down on the couch to unwind a bit before bed and I pulled the box out and started opening it. Amy didn’t object. What followed was a hour and a half session of Wii Fit and Super Mario Brothers.

I have to say, I was pretty impressed. So far, the only thing I don’t like about it is the fact that you have to sync it with the wii for EVERY game that works with it. So I had to sync it for the wii fit game, and when we finally open We Ski, I’ll have to sync the board again. Its not too much of an issue, just a pain, but I can understand why it does that (it uses the 4th controller location, and if it sync’d permanently, then you wouldn’t be able to use the 4th wiimote). We setup out mii’s and were checked out in no time.

According to the Fit, my BMI is about 18 and amy’s is higher (but we knew that for the most part). My wii age is 39 (only 9 years off) and amy’s is again, higher. Not too much of a surprise. Amy was the first to go and she tried the yoga, needless to say, we weren’t dressed right, for it, but it wasn’t hard to follow and the basic exercises were easy to do. After amy got done with the yoga, I tried my hand at the balance games. Talk about hard.

The game where you are head butting soccer balls, is near impossible on the beginner level and the shoes and panda heads don’t make it any easier. The downhill slalom is fun as well and will take a little bit of time and the ski jump is pretty cool as well. Table tilt was by far the one balance game that was the best workout, as you really had to stay on your toes to drop the balls through the holes. We haven’t tried the strength training or the aerobics yet, but if they’re anything like the other areas, they’ll be pretty good as well.

Nintendo has done an excellent job with the wii fit. The package was nicely put together and the board seems sturdy enough (its rated up to 330 pounds). It came with 4 AA batteries, which is nice as thats what it wants and was pretty easy to get going. We’re going to keep track of our improvements over the next couple of months and I’ll post updates….