Nintendo Wii Fanboy

Playing the Wii and cutting people open are the same things, really. Okay, not really. But, according to science, playing Wii games can help improve one's surgical skills.

Studies showed that trainees performed better in virtual reality surgical simulations after getting in some Wii time first. Those who played the Wii before testing their surgical skills scored 50% higher in the simulation than those who didn't.

Of course, not all Wii games are fashioned for improving dexterity. We don't imagine that Wii Boxing, for example, would be good for anything except tenderizing organs. Titles that require delicacy and precision, though, like Marble Mania, had positive results. We're curious to know whether or not Trauma Center would be useful to blossoming surgeons, but unfortunately, the game was not mentioned (and perhaps not used) in the study.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in!]

Studies into how effective the Wii is for shedding pounds are not new. Earlier this year, one gamer committed himself to a six-week regime of playing Wii Sports for thirty minutes a day, and came out nine pounds lighter. Not only that, but you should spend a day here at the Wii Fanboy offices -- it's all well-oiled, rippling biceps, bulging pectorals, and washboard stomachs. Sort of.

Anyway, the scientific community has finally followed suit, with two UK-based researchers testing exactly how much of a workout Wii users are getting, compared to Xbox 360 gamers. Using teenagers as their subjects, the pair discovered that playing on the Wii burnt off an extra 60 calories per hour than gaming on the Xbox 360. Their conclusion? That while the Wii certainly helps with weight loss, it probably isn't an ideal substitute for regular exercise, cruelly scuppering our plans to work off post-holiday season pounds with some lengthy Wii Tennis sessions. Their findings were published in the British Medical Journal, no less.

Admittedly, these results tell us little that we didn't already know, thanks to the experiment we mentioned in the first paragraph. But now that the same process has been carried out by the white coats, rather than Some Dude on the internet, some may claim it has an extra layer of credibility.

[Via BBC]

Folks at the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center are of the mind that Wiimotes aren't just for playing games on your Wii. Oh no, inside the bundled mass of plastic, wires and miniature unicorns that make the Wiimote so wonderful, there is something else, something magical (besides the unicorns): hope. Hope for a brighter future, hope for a more perfect world and hope for a device that can do more than just help you get a wicked game on.

In setting the controller up to operate with BigBen (PSC's 4,000 processor, 21-teraflop Cray XT3 supercomputing system), the students used the Wiimote to play Buckyball Bowling. This WiiMD technology will hopefully "offer scientists an easily usable tool to gain insight into simulations" and provide "an entertaining educational outreach tool to help interest students in biology, chemistry and physics." More Wii in the classroom is something we can definitely get behind.

[Via Engadget]

When students in Queensland, Australia recently attempted to make exercise bikes interesting to use (surely an impossible feat if you ask us, but good luck to them), they turned to the Wii's unique controller for a helping hand. Their idea was straightforward enough: place a giant screen in front of the user which shows them merrily zipping through the countryside and other virtual vistas as they cycle.

But for this to work effectively, two Wiimotes were required -- one strapped to the cyclist's helmet (so that turning the head would allow users to take in scenery around them), and one to the leg of the cyclist (meaning the device could detect what speed users were travelling at, and adjust the on-screen image accordingly).

They're calling it "virtual exercise," and say the next step is to take the image from the screen and have it projected into a pair of goggles, before selling the idea to gyms. Presumably they'll have found an alternative to the Wiimote by then, but if this does show up in your local sweatshop in the future, know where the inspiration came from, eh?

[Thanks, Maddles!]

Being entirely unable to understand Japanese, we haven't much of a clue about what's going on in this kooky Super Mario Galaxy Science trailer, but we're guessing it's something to do with gravity, and how our hero manages to stick to the underside of all those weird spherical levels.

Makes us wish we'd spent more time at school actually concentrating during double physics, rather than drawing on the back of Kevin Lomax's blazer.

The Nintendo Wii, a stunning system aimed at totally immersing the player in the gaming experience like never seen before, has turned a few heads since its unveiling a few years ago at E3. Since then, through excellent first-hand impressions and a strong marketing campaign, the system has received quite the buzz. For good reason, as not only is the motion-sensitive controller just about the stuff dreams are made of, but a robust Virtual Console service holding some of the greatest in retro titles on an owner's system, allowing for play at any time is another feature not worth overlooking.

Popular Science recently bestowed their award of Best of What's New 2006 on the Wii. They lauded its approach, of how the Wii took a step back from photo-realistic graphics and the raw processing power of its competition. Instead, they imagine the Wii as being the present reincarnation of gaming from old; a mixture of a simple control scheme and simple graphics, which together are sure to equal big fun.