Ever since the late 90’s, Flash games have been pivotal to providing us with web-based entertainment and helping us escape from intolerable boredom. These Flash games make the Internet great, but with the new advancements in next-gen technology we ponder; wouldn’t it be awesome if we could play these games on our TV? Well Aaron Worrall, David Stubbs and John Eysman thought the exact same thing. They took it among themselves to create a website where you could play flash games designed for the Wii!

Wiicade is a Flash arcade website. It focuses on Flash games that exclusively use the mouse to play the game, allowing wii owners to play (via the integrated Opera browser) using their wiimote! The great thing about this website is the way it’s bridging the gap between console gaming and casual web-gaming, creating a whole new format that’s enjoyable and challenging to all.

When asked on how he came up with the idea of a Wii-friendly flash gaming site, Stubbs states “I was actually walking to work after playing a pseudo 3d Flash FPS game, and it struck me that the Wii can play Flash games! I put two and two together and then immediately hopped on the phone to contact Aaron and John to making this website, and they loved the idea!”

While there wasn’t a ton of research needed to build the site, the team had several considerations to manage such as choosing a screen resolution. “We originally thought the screen resolution would be 640 X 480 because that’s what a standard TV’s resolution is, and we also assumed it would support Flash Player 9, namely because the PC version of Opera 9 (which the Wii version is based off) supports Flash Player 9.”

But it hasn’t all been smooth sailing for the team at Wiicade. The crew have faced many difficulties such as their servers failing to support the required bandwidth (resulting in two separate server changes) and a major lack of sleep. Self-financing the website has also taken it’s toll on the members, however, the team at Wiicade feels if they achieve their goal, it would’ve all been well worth it. When asked about this overall goal, we were told: “(Our goal is) to create a community much like NewGrounds, but for the Wii. Also while its not TRUE homebrew, this is somewhat in between developing for a console and developing for yourself. It’s a happy medium founded on a tried and tested platform, Flash.”

On Wiicade there are a variety of games spanning over several genres such as action, shooting, precision and puzzle. Wiicade has a fantastic library of games to suit any type of gamer. One minute you could be using careful mouse/wiimote timing to navigate your character away from certain doom, next you could be flailing your arms around wildly to get the ball past a difficult opponent. It’s very surprising that a site that hasn’t been around for such a long time has such marvellous variety.

The site layout itself is simple, user friendly and pleasing to the eye. A lot of the menus are done in Flash to make it more appealing and wiimote friendly. The forum is filled with a surprising degree maturity. Of course, being a Wii site, you can expect an abundance of Nintendo fanboys, but so fat, it hasn’t been a problem.

One thing I like about the site is that it encourages users to create content especially for the site (or more importantly, the wii). One game that really impressed me was “Super Mario Sunshine 128” (who’s title is a throwback to the secret Mario 128 game Nintendo has been teasing us with since 1999). While this game is still in development (a demo was linked via the forums), it’s just phenomenal! I can’t wait until it is completed.

Developers can upload their own Flash games onto the site if they are Wii compatible (wich basically means, you can play with your mouse) and players can register on the forums to meet other gamers interested in online gaming for the Wii and chat with game developers about their work. With hours of fun to be had, and new innovation for next-gen web gaming, you surely won’t be disappointed (unless you are one of those poor saps that doesn’t have a wii yet).

Wiicade is sure to be a prime gaming site in the very near future!

[ Visit Wiicade Today! ]