As confirmed by GamesIndustry, Nintendo will be launching the Wii Mini in the U.K. on March 22nd of this year. The console first launched exclusively in Canada, so it's interesting to see Nintendo make the decision to ship it to the U.K. as well. Is there something about the Wii Mini that will do particularly well in the U.K. market, or does Nintendo just have a lot of spare stock to shift?
The Wii Mini is supposed to be a budget version of the Wii. Nintendo has removed both the wireless functionality and ethernet port that would allow you to connect the console to the internet, and you also can't play your old GameCube games Nintendo is clearly going for a family-friendly concept, trimming the popular Wii to its core features as far as young kids are concerned and eliminating the need for parents to worry about internet security.
Mini suggests a substantial difference in size, but the Wii Mini is actually not much smaller than the original white box we all marvelled over back in 2006. It does look different, however, with a red and black matte design. It comes with a red Wii Remote Plus and Nunchuck, which means the controller set will be the most attractive thing about it. Otherwise, cover up the Wii insignia and you've got something that looks a lot like an old cassette player.
It'll be the price that sells it in the end. The Wii Mini launched at $99.99 in Canada, but we never get things at the exchange rate over here so I wouldn't want to guess at what that means for us. It'll have to be cheap to compete with the vast amounts of pre-owned Wii consoles available in high-street shops and online.
