Nintendo Wii to get DVD playback next year

The Sony PlayStation 3 doubles as a Blu-ray player, the Xbox 360 now has a HD-DVD player add-on, and the Nintendo Wii plays... well, nothing except its own games and Gamecube's. The fact that the Wii has no playback compatibility for other media formats is perhaps one of the reasons for its considerably lower cost when compared to its rivals. It seems that Nintendo wants to change this by adding DVD playback in future revisions of their console. Sonic Solutions confirmed this when they announced that Nintendo had chosen their CinePlayer CE DVD Navigator software to play DVD movies on the Wii.

Being able to play DVD movies on the Wii will make it more attractive, but all those eager to be the first to own the new console will miss out on it, a real shame. The upgrade is expected to arrive well into 2007, and there is no word on the effect this may have on the price of the Wii, though a raise would seem unlikely.