It's been a long time coming, but after an initial test roll out last month Netflix has finally brought its instant streaming service to the Wii. The company has begun shipments of instant streaming disks to all members who requested one, at no additional cost, enabling those with a broadband connection and an $8.99 a month or superior membership to start streaming movies and TV shows directly from their Nintendo console.

Netflix streaming on consoles originally debuted on the Xbox 360 with considerable success back in late 2008. Since then the company has been rolling out its service to as many devices possible, including a few television sets as well as Sony's PlayStation 3 and now the Nintendo Wii as the last of the big three consoles. They are also pushing their own set-top box, the Roku.

In all Netflix already has more than 12 million subscribers, but the Wii's install base of over 28 million has the capacity to bring that number up even higher. Those who own Nintendo's console that are also Netflix subscribers can go to www.netflix.com/wii to request a special Wii disc that will enable the streaming functionality.