Nintendo's first commercial airs tonight

Call your friends, cancel your plans and set your cell phone on vibrate. The first TV commercial for Nintendo’s amazing new Wii� video game system is set to air Tuesday night. The first in a series of four 30-second ads runs during the performance finals of ABC’s Dancing with the Stars.

The commercials feature two Japanese men who show up at homes across the United States and announce: “Wii would like to play.” The fun ads demonstrate the motion-sensitive abilities of the Wii Remote controller while a cool Japanese pop tune plays.

“The fact that we have people all but begging to see Wii commercials demonstrates the huge amount of interest in our new system,” says George Harrison, Nintendo of America’s senior vice president of marketing and corporate communications.

The commercials will be posted to Nintendo.com and YouTube.com. The first place that viewers can see all four of them together in a two-minute film will be Nov. 15 on MTV2’s Sucker Free. To accomplish Wii’s goal of bringing gaming to the masses, ads will air on ABC, NBC, Comedy Central, BET, USA, TBS, Discovery, Animal Planet, ABC Family, Nick at Nite, Sci-Fi, TLC, Fox, The CW, MTV 10 Spot, MTV, MTV2, MTVU, Adult Swim, Fuse, Si TV, The N, VH-1 and Black Family Channel.

Nintendo has focused on hands-on marketing efforts like the Nintendo Fusion Tour and viral sampling events in cities across the country. Now the Wii experience moves into people’s homes for the holidays. Even as these new ads run, experiential sampling events will continue into 2007. For more information about Wii, please visit Wii.com.

Nintendo press release