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WiiWare, Nintendo’s answer to Microsoft’s Xbox Live Arcade and the Playstation Network, is due to start getting games on May 12th. With Final Fantasy Chronicles (pictured) and LostWinds being some of the first games to be sold via the service.

Although WiiWare has been available since the console launched, via the Wii Shopping Channel, it has only been used to distribute Wii Channels, such as the Internet Channel and the Everybody Votes Channel. After May 12th you will be able to buy games being distributed over the service using your Wii Points.

The service has been designed by Nintendo to allow third party developers an easy and cheap platform to produce games for. With strict size limits enforced by the Wii’s relatively small memory, any game produced will need to be fairly compact. As XBLA games have shown however, limited memory doesn’t necessarily lead to limited capability.

We have already seen what is possible when the Wii is left in the hands of inventive developers, which gives me great hope that we will soon start to see some very unique and exciting applications arriving into our living rooms.

No date has yet been given for any region outside of the US.

Source: EuroGamer

Tags: Wii, WiiWare

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