Though Nintendo's other subsidiaries have been quiet, in Nintendo's home country of Japan, the Wii Shop Channel is gaining the ability to let Wii owners purchase Virtual Console titles with their own Wii Points and send them to a friend's console.
The gift arrives on the recipient's Message Board in the form of a lovely gift-wrapped letter, which links them to the Wii Shop Channel to download the title. The channel will check to see if the recipient already owns the title, and if they do, it will stop you from spending your precious virtual currency on the gift.
A video demonstration can be seen at the Japanese Wii site.
Update: Sure enough, shortly after we went live with this story, NOA issued a release indicating they'll have the gift functionality available for American Wii consoles as well. The functionality will launch "later in the day" today. They didn't say whether a system update will be required to take advantage.
The gift arrives on the recipient's Message Board in the form of a lovely gift-wrapped letter, which links them to the Wii Shop Channel to download the title. The channel will check to see if the recipient already owns the title, and if they do, it will stop you from spending your precious virtual currency on the gift.
A video demonstration can be seen at the Japanese Wii site.
Update: Sure enough, shortly after we went live with this story, NOA issued a release indicating they'll have the gift functionality available for American Wii consoles as well. The functionality will launch "later in the day" today. They didn't say whether a system update will be required to take advantage.