Today has been all about Nintendo and their announcements from the Fall Media Summit.  They’ve announced the new DSi, a new Punch Out!!!, the new “Play on Wii” line of games, and a new semi-effective storage solution for all the geeks and otaku out there.  One of the last announcements was that the Wii Speak microphone will be getting its own channel.  The channel will be a free download for players who buy the $29.99 Wii Speak microphone, and will allow up to 4 gamers who have exchanged friend codes to chat.  The chat interface will utilize Mii’s, which will mimic the lip movements of the person speaking.  In addition, the channel will allow you to leave voice messages with other gamers, and submit voice narration for pictures.

Since its unveiling at E3, I’ve been skeptical of the Wii Speak microphone.  This channel is nothing terribly unexpected or surprising, but one wonders how one-on-one voice chat will work when there’s more than one person in a mic’d room.  Also, if the mic is unable to or ineffective at filtering out background noise, such as the TV itself, it could make for a whole lot of “Wait, what did you say?” moments online.  It would also be nice if we could log into the Wii Speak channel, set up our chat, then start a game and keep the chat going. I have no idea if that's in their plans, but it wasn't mentioned, and, sadly, it just doesn't seem like the kind of thing Nintendo is likely to do.  The service will launch on November 16, so we won’t have to wait too long to find out just how effective it is.


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