A new Wii-Linux distro is out from developer Bert Jan. It's has the existing Debian/Whiite package as its foundation, but it has Xorg running on top of it. The distro is appropriately named xwhiite. Details after the link.

 

With Samus Aran's debut on Nintendo's latest console still a few days away, it's not hard to imagine the hype amongst fans to finally see their beloved blonde goddess in armor back on their TV screens where she belongs, following their every whim and fancy through their controllers.

However, through a cunning Firefox workaround, those same worshippers of the blue-suited beauty have found proof that the red carpet may be rolling out for Samus sooner than we thought, in the form of Metroid and Super Metroid coming over to the Wii's Virtual Console. Yours truly presents Exhibit A and B - namely, the two screenshots placed above this article.

One of the first games to introduce a nonlinear game experience, as well as have a female character as the main protagonist, Metroid harkens Samus fans to the time when they first stepped into her shoes to fight the metroid menace. Super Metroid is yet another blast to the past, this time with improved visuals and gameplay mechanics - as well as epic boss fights that had you at the edge of your seat.

Here's hoping that Nintendo really has these two great titles in store for Wii owners everywhere - there can never be enough of the legendary Samus Aran, even with her own title on the way, as well as her appearance on Super Smash Brothers Brawl. Developments as they happen, so keep it locked right here!

Independent video game developer Quest Engine Inc. announced today the opening of WiiPicross.com, an online site featuring logic puzzles and other mental fun challenges that can be accessed through Wii's Opera Browser. Those who don't have the console can also join the fun in their PC units through Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Aside from the games, another good thing about WiiPicross is that it allows users to make their own personal doodle into a challenging logic puzzle through the fully-featured online puzzle editor. Those who are interested to try this may use the Wiimote or the PC mouse in creating puzzles.

Anyway, WiiPicross is also home to other fun-filled activities like a daily Puzzle of the Day, a how-to-play guide, 16 exclusive feature puzzles designed to build puzzling skills from scratch, as well as custom made Link Puzzles.

If you're puzzle is really that good, Quest Engine might even feature it in the Puzzle of the Day section. Our Read link below will take you to WiiPicross' online site. Enjoy!

What we have here looks to be something that combines the feel of Mozilla's Firefox with the Wii's Opera browsing capabilities, and best of all is that it's in video form. It's called Wiiminder, and it's trying to tout itself as the best place to start your Wii browsing.

According to the video, Wiiminder will basically allow for a souped up implementation of tabbed browsing. It allows for automatic-hiding of the tabs to save space, a set of favorite sites to visit (the aforementioned Wiiminders), and even allows you to listen to music while you surf through a variety of Wii-enabled music sites.

All in all, Wiiminder looks to be pretty interesting. Just check it out with the Wiibrowser whenever you feel like going online. For now, here's the video of its features. Enjoy!

  

Birds of a feather flock together. And if you were wondering what your fellow Wii owner's taste is for online videos, perhaps this update may help. StumbleUpon is a web-based finder that hooks up to your default browser (for example, Firefox on your PC). What it does in essence is streamline websites to match your personal taste and the taste of your StumbleUpon community.

What does this have to do with a Wii?

StumbleUpon has just announced that there is now a Wii-fied version of their Stumble Video feature which, much like its site-sorting counterpart, should help Wii owners with their Opera browsers by helping them pick out their personal favorites over at YouTube and Google video.

Moving into a little more detail (for first-timers), Stumble Video does so by asking viewers whether they give any video they see a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" (see the screenshot above). Based on the viewer's ratings, Stumble Video sorts future video line-ups according to the user's taste, which streamlines the search process.

Better yet, readers may want to try out the WiiCR app, which should should turn your console from a spectator into a potential video stream server. Then there's the recently Wii-fied search engine to round out this pack...

  

Since there's no actual way to represent a Firefox-Wii combination, allow the above bit of humble Photoshoppery to suffice. We're still calling this a rumor until verified, but according to one site, Firefox is headed the way of the Wii.

Gaming Phreak's Jeff Couret wrote an article saying, "The popular free browser is coming soon to the Nintendo Wii, says Satoru Iwata." With the exception of the hack that allowed someone to check out the Wii Shop Channel using Firefox, we haven't heard anything about this.

Couret also mentions that some rather interesting features. They'll be implementing a new scrolling method they're calling "motion-browse," which lets you do specific browsing tasks by moving the Wiimote in a certain fashion. There will also be predictive text input to speed up writing to around 50 words a minute, says the article.

A couple of things. First, while this is plausible, the article has no source to back it up. Second, the Firefox browser will supposedly be a free download. Wouldn't that be counterintuitive, seeing as Nintendo already has Opera? Furthermore, if this is such a big thing, why doesn't the Mozilla Foundation have any update on this development?

Lastly, and perhaps more importantly, how many "Burning Wii" jokes will we endure as a result of this rumor? Till we find some answers, this is definitely one piece of info going into our rumor mill.

We recently checked the blog of one rather industrious script-maker, and we were surprised to see that he had another set of scripts up. Ethan, maker of the Virtua Tennis and Ocarina of Time GlovePIE scripts, came up with another one for DOOM 3, and another script for use with two of the most popular web browsers on the market.

The first script should presumably let you play Doom 3 using a Wiimote, though you'll really need a copy of the game to test it. He does link to a demo of the game for you to test it on, though, so we encourage everyone to give it a try. Also, he's put up another script that allows one to browse the web using Mozilla Firefox, Internet Explorer, and Windows Explorer, calling it the "WiinExplorer" script for short.

That's some nice little bits of code with a lot of functionality there, and it's good to see people finding even more uses for the controller which some used to think was simply a gimmick.

As always, make sure you have GlovePIE installed so you can use these, and you might want to check the developer's blog of Carl Kenner for instructions on using GlovePIE, as Ethan doesn't have a strict readme for these beyond the basic directions.

View Ethan's instructions after the Jump!

Download: [Ethan's Doom3 and WiinExplorer Scripts]

We're reporting this as objectively as possible. No opinions. No spins. No nothing. And with lots of " ". As soon as this gets posted we're ducking safely out of the line of crossfire.

Remember the Bill O'Reilly article we posted some weeks ago? The one where he called gamers "junkies " and game consoles, particularly the PS3, as a "big, big problem" because "people get addicted to it, just like opium, just like drugs and alcohol."

Shortly after that, the "culture warrior" appeared on Oprah to air his views on the war that's tearing up America. The "culture war " is between "Traditionalists" like him who believe that "America is a noble country." On the other corner are the "Secular-Progressives" who he says think America is a "deeply flawed society that needs changes in every area."

And yes, we read it. Twice. And no, he didn't say anything about video games.

Anyway, this is not about the O' ranting on the O. This is about this video on YouTube featuring a little girl sassing back at O'Reilly's stand on video games and rap music. After watching this video we thought Cher donated her brain and this kid was the (good or bad) recipient. It turned out the girl was an actress and the whole thing was an ad for a band called The Bastard Fairies.

But that's not the end of it. Go check the rest of the story out (and a couple more videos as well) by clicking "Full Article"!

Think of this post as the almost complete reverse of this post. With that said, let's move on folks.

Okay, let me ask you guys, what can you do if you've got skillz, a WiFi packet sniffer, and a Wii? You figure out how to surf the Wii Shop Channel using Firefox of course! If in case you're interested, here's a short things of things you'll need. Just Firefox and this.

This trick involves fourteen easy steps, ending in you typing some URLs on your Firefox address bar. Now since we don't - and let me quote from fellow Blogger Victor B. - "want to wake up next to Nintendo's lawyers tomorrow", we'll leave the URLs unmentioned. But in case you're curious, here be the simple steps:

1. Open Firefox
2. Install the User Agent Switcher
3. Click Tools
4. Click User Agent Switcher
5. Click Options -> Options
6. Click User Agents
7. Click Add
8. Description: wii
9. User Agent: Opera/9.00 (Nintendo Wii; U; ; 1038-58; Wii Shop Channel/1.0; en)
10. Click OK X 2
11. Click Tools again
12. Select User Agent Switcher
13. Select wii
14. Put one of the Wii links (if you're lucky to stumble upon 'em) into Firefox and visit it.

How'd the source get the URLS? I already said he had a Packet Sniffer right? Oh and just in case you're curious, you can't download Virtual Console games into your PC. As the source said, "How are you going to download games without WiiPoints?"

Curious curious.

Yup, remember that old Bleach Wii teaser site which only featured a white screen and Ichigo's silhouette and has been around since June? Well, the people from Sega have finally gotten rid of that and replaced it with something much nicer.

The now-official Bleach Wii Shiraha Kirameku Rondo site currently features several sections for fans to peruse while we wait for the game's Japanese release this coming December 14. At the moment, the site contains sections regarding gameplay as well as a portion that contains some character profiles as well as videos which show the character in action. The story section is still closed, but the last area allows fans to peek into more of Sega's Bleach projects.

A slight warning though, would be that we noticed that the site doesn't load very well on Firefox, so viewers may want to use IE instead when viewing it.

Bankai!! (I just HAD to do that...)