Nintendo loves our friends Down Under

[Razer]

from IGN.com-
Nintendo DS Cracks 500,000 Units Sold in Australia
Plus, Nintendo and Telstra team up to offer over 1,000 free Wi-Fi Hotspots!
by Cam Shea, IGN AU

Australia, April 3, 2007 - Good news Aussie DS gamers! Nintendo Australia, in conjunction with Telstra, today announced that Aussie players now have access to over 1,000 Telstra Wireless Hotspots to feed their DS Wi-Fi habit. Destinations available run the gamut from McDonald's restaurants and Starbucks cafes through to airports, hotels and city Hotzones (throughout Melbourne and Sydney). The list really is massive, and you can check it out in all its glory at Telstra's website. Just click the link and you can download a spreadsheet with every Hotspot in the country, or you can do a search for your nearest Hotspot using this page.

The service won't cost you a cent either - it's completely complimentary for Nintendo DS Wi-Fi users. Connecting couldn't be simpler either; just hit a Hotspot, search for a connection and the Telstra service will appear, unlocked and ready to use. "This is an Australian first," enthused Telstra's Director of Internet Products Craig Turner, "and is all about providing convenience through innovation, ensuring Nintendo DS users are automatically authenticated onto the Telstra Wireless Hotspot network whenever they enter a coverage zone."

Rose Lappin, Director of Sales and Marketing at Nintendo Australia had this to say about the announcement: "This agreement with Telstra will bring countless people together to play games in a single, simultaneous wireless community. Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection is simple to use. Beginning with free access at participating destinations, we have removed one of the major barriers that have kept people from going online to play games."

Oh, and did we mention that the service is active right now? Yes, you can trek on down to your nearest Hotspot and get playing. There are a number of great titles to test out online, from Mario Kart DS and Animal Crossing: Wild World, to Metroid Prime: Hunters and Star Fox: Command. Plus, you can expect more top tier titles with Wi-Fi play baked right in later in the year.

That's not the only huge news out of Nintendo Australia. Yes, it's official, over 500,000 Nintendo DS handhelds have been sold in Australia! That's a huge number for a system that's been available for just over two years, and further underlines how effectively Nintendo's gamble on innovative hardware and an expansive software range is paying off. By way of comparison, the Xbox 360 - which admittedly is a much more expensive machine - sold 157,000 units in its first year on the market. We'll put together some further comparative stats in the next few days.

I know we have hotspots all over too but not here in El Paso. If anyone knows of a similar link (to hotspots nationally or whatever) then let me know. I'm tired of getting the "no server" message around town.