was a

Wii The Wii ( ) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released on November 19, 2006, in North America, and in December 2006 for most other regions of the world. It is Nintendo's fifth major home game console, f ...

channel Channel, channels, channeling, etc., may refer to: Geography * Channel (geography), a landform consisting of the outline (banks) of the path of a narrow body of water. Australia * Channel Country, region of outback Australia in Queensland and pa ...

that featured an

electronic program guide Electronic programming guides (EPGs) and interactive programming guides (IPGs) are menu-based systems that provide users of television, radio, and other media applications with continuously updated menus that display scheduling information fo ...

service developed by

Nintendo is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational video game company headquartered in Kyoto. It develops, publishes, and releases both video games and video game consoles. The history of Nintendo began when craftsman Fusajiro Yamauchi ...

and

HAL Laboratory formerly shortened as HALKEN, is a Japanese video game developer based in Chiyoda, Tokyo. It was founded on February 21, 1980 by Mitsuhiro Ikeda. The company started out developing games for home computers of the era, but has since establishe ...

and operated by G-Guide. The channel was launched on March 4, 2008, exclusively in

Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan and extends from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north to the East China Sea ...

, and it was available as a free download on the

Wii Shop Channel The Wii Shop Channel is a discontinued digital distribution service for the Wii video game console. The service allowed users to purchase and play additional software for the Wii (called Channels), including exclusive games (branded WiiWare), ...

. The service was discontinued on July 24, 2011, due to the end of analog broadcasting in Japan. It is the only Wii software to ever officially use the console's TV remote control function.

Overview

The channel displayed an electronic programme guide, featuring ongoing and upcoming programme information for all television channels for the selected

prefecture A prefecture (from the Latin word, "''praefectura"'') is an administrative jurisdiction traditionally governed by an appointed prefect. This can be a regional or local government subdivision in various countries, or a subdivision in certain inter ...

and region. Users could select from four categories of channels:

terrestrial Terrestrial refers to things related to land or the planet Earth, as opposed to extraterrestrial. Terrestrial may also refer to: * Terrestrial animal, an animal that lives on land opposed to living in water, or sometimes an animal that lives on o ...

analogue, terrestrial digital,

satellite A satellite or an artificial satellite is an object, typically a spacecraft, placed into orbit around a celestial body. They have a variety of uses, including communication relay, weather forecasting, navigation ( GPS), broadcasting, scient ...

analogue and satellite

digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Businesses *Digital bank, a form of financial institution *Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) or Digital, a computer company *Digital Research (DR or DRI), a software ...

. Guide data was retrieved from the G-Guide service, allowing users to check up to a week ahead of television programming. The service also offered detailed information for each programme, such as a description, a list of the cast,

aspect ratio The aspect ratio of a geometry, geometric shape is the ratio of its sizes in different dimensions. For example, the aspect ratio of a rectangle is the ratio of its longer side to its shorter side—the ratio of width to height, when the rectangl ...

and support for

subtitles Subtitles are texts representing the contents of the audio in a film, television show, opera or other audiovisual media. Subtitles might provide a transcription or translation of spoken dialogue. Although naming conventions can vary, caption ...

Features

Search

Users could search for upcoming programmes by either entering a keyword or selecting from a list of genres and categories. Programmes that matched the selected criteria would be highlighted.

Stamps

The channel allowed users to select up to six Mii characters. Each of these would have an 'interest stamp' (気になるスタンプ, ''Ki ni naru sutanpu'') assigned to them. These stamps could be used on upcoming programmes, so that the user could quickly focus on the ones they were interested in. Users could also register their mobile phone number or

email address An email address identifies an email box to which messages are delivered. While early messaging systems used a variety of formats for addressing, today, email addresses follow a set of specific rules originally standardized by the Internet Enginee ...

on the channel, allowing them to receive a notification 30 minutes before programmes they had stamped were broadcast. Through

WiiConnect24 WiiConnect24 is a discontinued feature of Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection for the Wii. It was first announced at Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in mid-2006 by Nintendo. It enabled the user to remain connected to the Internet while the console was ...

, users could also view programmes registered friends had stamped. Additionally, there was an option to view online statistics on stamped programmes, which allowed for viewing which programmes were the most popular amongst users and sort the results by groups.

TV remote control

A unique feature the channel also included allowed users to control their

television set A television set or television receiver (more commonly called TV, TV set, television, telly, or tele) is an electronic device for viewing and hearing television broadcasts, or as a computer monitor. It combines a tuner, display, and loudspeake ...

through the

Wii Remote The Wii Remote, colloquially known as the Wiimote, is the primary game controller for Nintendo's Wii home video game console. An essential capability of the Wii Remote is its motion sensing capability, which allows the user to interact with an ...

. Supported features included switching the TV on and off, scrolling through channels, changing the volume level and switching from the Wii signal to a specific channel and back. When not on the Wii mode, information would be provided to the user through the Wii Remote's speaker. This feature was not fully supported by all television sets, being only compatible with those belonging to

Sony is a Japanese multinational conglomerate (company), conglomerate headquartered at Sony City in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. The Sony Group encompasses various businesses, including Sony Corporation (electronics), Sony Semiconductor Solutions (i ...

Panasonic is a Japanese multinational electronics manufacturer, headquartered in Kadoma, Osaka, Kadoma, Japan. It was founded in 1918 as in Fukushima-ku, Osaka, Fukushima by Kōnosuke Matsushita. The company was incorporated in 1935 and renamed and c ...

Sanyo is a former Japanese electronics manufacturer founded in 1947 by Toshio Iue, the brother-in-law of Kōnosuke Matsushita, the founder of Matsushita Electric Industrial, now known as Panasonic. Iue left Matsushita Electric to start his own bu ...

, Sharp, Fujitsu,

Toshiba is a Japanese multinational electronics company headquartered in Minato, Tokyo. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, elevators and escalators, electronic components, semiconductors ...

NEC is a Japanese multinational information technology and electronics corporation, headquartered at the NEC Supertower in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. It provides IT and network solutions, including cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI), Inte ...

Pioneer Pioneer commonly refers to a person who is among the first at something that is new to a community. A pioneer as a settler is among the first settling at a place that is new to the settler community. A historic example are American pioneers, perso ...

Hitachi () is a Japanese Multinational corporation, multinational Conglomerate (company), conglomerate founded in 1910 and headquartered in Chiyoda, Tokyo. The company is active in various industries, including digital systems, power and renewable ener ...

Funai is a Japanese consumer electronics company headquartered in Daitō, Osaka. Currently, it is in liquidation. Apart from producing its own branded electronic products, it was also an OEM providing assembled televisions and video players/recor ...

JVC JVC (short for Japan Victor Company) is a Japanese brand owned by JVCKenwood. Founded in 1927 as the Victor Talking Machine Company of Japan and later as , the company was best known for introducing Japan's first televisions and for developin ...

Mitsubishi The is a group of autonomous Japanese multinational companies in a variety of industries. Founded by Yatarō Iwasaki in 1870, the Mitsubishi Group traces its origins to the Mitsubishi zaibatsu, a unified company that existed from 1870 to 194 ...

and

Aiwa Aiwa (, stylised aiwa) is a Japanese consumer electronics brand of Aiwa Co. Ltd., a subsidiary of Towada Audio holdings. The current company was established in 2017 and creates mainly audio products; the brand is also licensed to or owned by othe ...

. This functionality worked by having the console's sensor bar send a signal, which is then reflected off of the wall and detected by the television. The feature was originally intended to be available from the Wii's

system settings System Settings (known as System Preferences prior to macOS Ventura) is an application included with macOS. It allows users to modify various system settings, which are divided into separate Preference Panes. The System Settings application ...

, as seen from leftover data, but it was not implemented in the end, making this channel the only software to ever use it. The feature was later incorporated on the

Wii U The Wii U ( ) is a home video game console developed by Nintendo as the successor to the Wii. Released in late 2012, it is the first eighth-generation video game console and competed with Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's PlayStation 4. The W ...

, using the

GamePad A gamepad is a type of video game controller held in two hands, where the fingers (especially thumbs) are used to provide input. They are typically the main input device for video game consoles. Features Some common additions to the standar ...

's infrared. Nintendo later released a TV remote for Premium

Club Nintendo Club Nintendo was a customer loyalty program and magazine that was provided by Nintendo. The loyalty program was free to join and provided rewards in exchange for consumer feedback and loyalty to purchasing official Nintendo products. Members o ...

members in Japan that was designed to look like a Wii Remote, but because it is a simple TV remote, it cannot be used with a Wii console.

Shutdown

Although the service had originally started as a push towards the country's switch to digital television, scheduled for 2011, it was discontinued at 12:00 JST on 24 July 2011, following the final shutdown of analogue broadcasting, due to the G-Guide service ending support for the no longer active analogue channels.

References

External links

Official Television Friend Channel G-Guide for Wii websiteOfficial Japanese Wii website
{{Wii Wii software