Wood classes up almost any gadget. Even simple USB drives. But when you give the Wii a woodgrain makeover, the result is simply awesome. It’s as if the the old Atari woodgrain consoles merged with the Wii. Much better then boring Wii white. For now it’s just a concept design by Joe D, which is a shame. Nintendo would sell a ton of product.

Joe’s concept apparently has a layer of woodgrain veneer on the Wii-Mote, Nunchuk, even the Classic Controller and Nyko Perfect Shot. That’s sweet enough, but he also gave the controllers get some bright white backlit buttons and black paint to bring out the wood. Once you see design like this it’s hard to come back to reality and pick up your white wiimote.

Hackers will get a machine to do all kinds of things that it should do, but doesn’t. Correcting the oversights of those damn lazy companies. We want things the way we want them. That’s why some Wii coders have made it so the Wii can have DVD playback.

It’s done by installing a hidden channel on the console, which gives it a DVD access library so you can watch all your favorite dvds with the MPlayer application, an open source media player. The install file works on both modded and unmodded Wiis. They are apparently experimenting with playing media from SD cards as well. Now you’ll be able to watch any DVD you want one last time before Blu-Ray creeps into your life.

Apparently it’s a true story, even though it sounds more like a comedy movie. A kid named Yang from China wasn’t to happy that his parents refused to buy him a Wii. So he found a couple of lowlife friends and faked his own kidnapping.

The ransom they demanded was $1,400 USD. The geniuses got nabbed trying to withdraw it from an ATM machine. Yang’s cut of the money would have bought him a Wii for sure, although I’m certain it would have been suspicious that he suddenly has a Wii right after.

The company that worked with Nintendo on the MotionPlus controller add-on, has now released a video that demonstrates the capabilities of the new hardware using 3D tools called LiveMove2. Turns out that the 1:1 tracking is really 1:1. Also the response time is pretty instant.

Before you know it they’re playing with lightsabers and fighting off Seeker Drones, then tossing around a 3D dummy with the lightsaber. All in all a lot of fun. The end result is that this technology can map incredibly complex motions to even more specific commands then before. It’s pretty damn impressive.

This is the second Wiimote charging station we’ve seen in a week’s time. First Sanyo’s Eneloop, now this 4x charging station from Penguin United hits the scene.

This one has Li-ion batteries that promise to give you 13 full hours of playtime from each Wiimote. And it juices them up in just 4 hours, with LEDs to show you charging levels. They’ll cost you $44.99 and insure that you always have a Wiimote ready.

Canoing is supposed to be about the great outdoors, exercise and relaxation. But for nerds, canoing is like anything else, it needs to be modded for laziness and the end result should be a lot like sitting on the couch and playing a game. Mission accomplished.

This guy made a small electric motor that’s controllable via a Wiimote. The result is that the canoe is steered by finger movement. Sure it would have been cooler to see him control the rowing by wiimote, or have the canoe walk itself into the water, but I’m sure this is just a geek stepping stone to bigger things.

Here’s something else to complain about when it comes to Nintendo’s constant need to keep things away from American hands. A new partnership between Nintendo and Fujifilm is spawning the Wii Digicam Print Channel, which is immediately available for Japanese Wii consoles to access.

It lets owners upload images from SD cards and get customized prints, photo books, business cards, and more in the mail. I’m not entirely sure why they feel the need to waste resources on this one when people can just use their computer, but I’m sure one or two people will love it. Probably the same people who bought the gameboy printer. It will likely hit North America and Europe at some point in the future.

When the Wii game console could only play media on external discs the issue of storage was not a problem, but now that owners can download, store and play games online the issue of storage, as with competitor consoles such as the PS3 and Xbox 360, has suddenly become an issue.

Sure you can store some data onto SD cards and swap things in and out of 512MB of internal Wii storage, but that capacity is quickly becoming inadequate and is putting a damper on those wanting to download a lot of games not to mention the ability for Nintendo to sell more games online.

Settle down now. I didn’t mention Batman or Spiderman, now did I? A Japanese joint venture between several comic loving entities will be distributing digital comic books to the Nintendo Wii through the Internet. Again, settle down. The service will be available to those in Japan only.

In fact, the digital content delivery service has already begun, and they are working on being able to transfer the data to the DS Lite platform down the road. This means that it’s only a matter of time until we can get actual Marvel or DC comics delivered to our Wii. And that is the most awesomest thing ever. But for now, just settle down.

We love the Wii, but we hate throwing away batteries. It’s not good for the environment and it’s costing you a lot of money. That’s why Sanyo is offering the Eneloop charging station with a battery pack replacement for your Wii remote and a charging base that holds up to four controllers.

Your remotes will charge in 220 minutes and the cool thing is that they charge in order, one after another so you don’t have to wait to play. It’s priced at $73 and is an import, but I’d be surprised if this didn’t show up in North America very soon. Go get the calculator and add up how much you’ve already spent in batteries. This is a real bargain.

If you want to feel like you’ve just downed a 2-liter bottle of I don’t know, say LSD, have a look at the freaky video below that shows off Wii Music. Does it have what it takes to become a best seller? I don’t know, but it’s gotta require some level of skill right? Should we love it or should we hate it? All I know for sure is that the video below is like a nightmarish, trippy Mii music video that seems to want to get into your head and convert you.

Nintendo’s Wii has now surpassed the Xbox 360 as the leading console in U.S. homes among the latest generation of video-game players. As of June, U.S. consumers bought nearly 10.9 million Wii consoles since it’s introduction, which makes Nintendo top console dog. In fact, the Wii has been the top-selling console in all but one month in the U.S. since it launched, according to research firm NPD Group Inc.

Nintendo is projecting that worldwide, the Wii’s annual sales will surpass the number of consoles that Sony sells for the first time this fiscal year. The formula seems pretty straightforward. Get people actually in the game with motion control and Miis, appeal to all ages and keep the price somewhat reasonable.

Looks like Wii Sports Resort, which is basically Wii Sports: The Next Generation, will come bundled with the MotionPlus accessory, when it becomes available next spring. The MotionPlus attachment gives you 1:1 motion mirroring on your Wiimote.

No word yet on the price of the MotionPlus by itself, but the thinking is that people will buy Wii Sports Resort just to get the accessory just like with Wii Play.

Another new Wii accessory fresh from E3 is the WiiSpeak community mic and speaker that will let you chat with friends and enemies online. It’s not like an Xbox 360 headset since the emphasis is on group chatting and since it resides not on your head but on top of your TV. It will come bundled with Animal Crossing City Folk and will be out later this year. Pretty cool no? I’m not sure how it will filter out game sounds and such, but it must be pretty good.

Nintendo just announced Wii Music, a new music game that will let you use the Wiimote, Nunchuk and the Wii-Fit Balance Board to create music. It’s not like Rock Band or Guitar Hero, which are based on precise timing. Instead, this one lets you mash buttons and swing the remote around like a crazy Jedi to create some original tunes. Your motions and button mashing will make beautiful music.

It’s like Beamz but with a wiimote. Hopefully less dorky. Users can play different instruments and their are a lot of options like guitar, drums, saxophone and violin. Plus you’ll be able to create music videos as well. You like? I’m not so sure it can compare to pure rocking like Guitar Hero. We’ll see.