TV at your fingertips

Nintendo has revealed that TVii - the application that allows users to merge all of their video streaming packages together and change TV channels - will be available in selected European regions at some point in 2013. It looked as though Japan was being left in the lurch but this is not the case as the Land of the Rising Sun will indeed be getting TVii on December 8th when the Wii U launches.

The Japanese TV guide data will be extracted from Rovi's G-Guide service, and will be available to use in the middle of a TV show or video game and even when you're not using the television at all. There is a slight catch however; while the North American channel changing feature will be free to download, Japanese Wii U owners will need to fork out 100 Yen for it - that's around $1.20.

Bizarrely, seeing as we don't have a concrete date for the North American release of the service, Japan could well end up getting it first - quite a turnaround considering it looked like it would miss out altogether not so long ago.

[source nintendo.co.jp, via engadget.com]