Engadget has talked with Nintendo's Reggie Fils-Aime and found out that online Wii gaming will debut around March or April of 2007. No details on what it will be like but Engadget says Japan is currently playing an online Wii game called Pokemon Battle Revolution.
Assuming that Reggie wasn't referring to the second quarter of fiscal year 2007 -- which ended, like, a few days ago -- when he made the commitment on SpikeTV's Game Head show, it sounds like the first, unnamed online titles will begin trickling out in the March/April time frame. As you're probably aware, Japan's already had a taste of networked Wii gaming in the form of launch title Pokemon Battle Revolution, but Reggie kept the details about future multiplayer games close to his chest -- those titles will be revealed early next year, he said. Reggie also let slip the fact that new Wii channels are in the works, though once again, he omitted any real concrete information concerning either their content or scheduled rollout. So there you have it: if all goes according to plan, we should be able to hold a Gears of Peace-style event for the Wii in early spring; still, we can't promise that pwning us in Mario Kart will be quite as rewarding as draining our Crimson Omen with a hail of machine gun fire.
Wii sales have been very strong. Nintendo sold 600,000 Wii unites in eight days and expects to ship 4 million units by the end of the year.
