Nintendo Wii Fanboy

On the 20th of this month, the Japanese iTunes Music Store will be invaded by the Space Invaders Get Even soundtrack. The album, which costs 1,500 yen, contains new orchestrated and electronic music from Taito's house band Zuntata. Some of the songs on the album apparently won't be featured in the game, which to us suggests remixes.

While it's not terribly likely we'll see this album in the U.S. -- although Square Enix, Taito's parent company, makes some soundtracks available on the American iTunes store -- it's still great news for us (provided we even get Space Invaders Get Even over here). It means that we'll get a full soundtrack of Zuntata Invaders music in the new game, at least, which should excite any Space Invaders Extreme player.

The news that Helix would be gracing WiiWare got us to thinking about other rhythm-based titles on the download service. It seems like all the competition gets the love when it comes to the genre. Steam has Audiosurf. Xbox Live has Rez. Even iTunes has Phase. Guess we'll see if Helix becomes the Wii's killer music-based title ...

But, we digress. Aside from the obvious (uh, Rez), what music-based game would you like to see available for download on WiiWare? Any of the ones listed above? A different franchise? Lay it on us!

Many may profess that iTunes is the ultimate application for listening to music on the PC. For us, Winamp has always been (and probably always will be) where it's at. And, we're quite happy to report that Winamp now works with the Wii.

Users then can do a little thing here or there, point their Wii's web browser to here and stream music directly from their internet-enabled PC. You can also allow other users to stream content from your PC set up on the Wii, allowing them to check out video and music from your host machine.

Technology, ain't she grand?

If we could, we'd cut down on all the remotes we have lying around our family room and operate everything with our Wii Remote -- televisions, DVD players, our downward-spiraling lives, etc. -- but so far, the white wand hasn't been too useful outside of playing video games.

Mike Anderson's BlueTunes application adds an extra feature to the remote, allowing you to mess with the controls on media players like iTunes, Winamp, and Windows Media Player. Once you've installed the program on your computer and detected the remote as a bluetooth device, you'll be able to execute a number of playback functions by either pushing the controller's buttons or waving it around.

Unfortunately, if you're like us and have a playlist filled with nothing but Bel Biv Devoe's "Poison," using an application like BlueTunes to change tracks wouldn't make much sense. Really, there's no reason why you should ever skip "Poison," unless, of course, you want to listen to more "Poison."

[Via DCEmu]

As the console is generally hooked up to a far larger sound system than the computer, it generally behooves the player to make use of a system as a music- or movie-playing device. We admit, the 360's streaming capabilities put it in a class of its own, but the Wii's easy-to-use internet browser has landed it at the center of many a drunk YouTube gathering. We'd previously reported on the success of Last.fm on the Wii, but now you can get your own music collection playing through your five point one, via iTunes.

The process is a bit lengthy, but it's very step-by-step. Would any readers like to test this out for us? It's kinda early, and there are gentle hobos living in the attic; we don't want to wake them, you see.

[via GoNintendo]

Courtesy of a nifty little program called Dot Tunes, one can stream music from their iTunes library to their Wii. Now, we must confess that we aren't very big on iTunes or Macs in general (although some of us dig them), so this isn't something we can go ahead and try out. But what about you, fine reader? Do you wish to give this a spin or have you already?

If you have a video of it in action, or perhaps some screenshots, feel free to submit them.