A world’s first! Weather information exclusively for a game machine

TOKYO, Dec. 20, 2006 — Weathernews, Inc. (based in Tokyo, Japan), the world’s largest publicity-traded weather information provider with business bases in 16 countries, began providing “Forecast Channel” service to Nintendo’s next-generation home-use game machine Wii via the “Wii Channel”. “Forecast Channel” is individually designed for each of the three regions in which Wii is sold—Japan, the US and Europe—and provides detailed weather reports for each region.

Forecast Channel enables the user to check weather information for his/her place of residence or any other part of the world using the Wii. Weather reports includes weather forecast, maximum and minimum temperature for that day, the next day or the coming week, and the probability of rain is displayed at three-hour intervals. Local base areas including towns, cities, villages and wards such as Minato-ward, Tokyo in Japan and Los Angeles, California in the US can be registered, so that user can check the latest weather report for his/her immediate area via the Forecast Channel each time the Wii is turned on. In addition, the channel offers a “Weather Report for Today’s Life” corner, in which “Laundry index,” “Pollen index,” “UV index,” and other detailed information closely related to daily life is available (this function is limited to Japan). Further, using the exclusive Wii remote controller, weather reports for places around the world can be seen on a real “globe” that seems to be rotating, giving this function an entertainment factor as well.

Nintendo’s Wii features a remote controller that the user moves to play a game and includes a function based on a new concept—“Wii Channel.” With “Wii Channel,” the game’s top screen shows a list of channels, e.g., “Games,” “News,” “Internet” and “Shopping.” The desired channel may be selected in the same way that a user selects a TV channel, so the user can enjoy playing a game, shopping or finding information.

*”Wii” and “Wii Channel” are trademarks of Nintendo
*”Forecast Channel” is only available when Wii is connected to the Internet.