In its first week of release in the US, an impressive 45% of people who have Mario Kart DS have already started their first few miles on its free Wi-Fi capabilities, a first for a handheld of this calibre. This high usage of the Wi-Fi service is due to the easy setup of the service, and the increased access of Wi-Fi, along with the fact that it includes all the Mario Kart goodness from the previous titles.

On 14th November, Mario Kart DS became the very first game to use Nintendo Wi-Fi, by the end of Sunday, more than 112,000 people in the US had brought the game, and 52,000 of those used the Nintendo Wi-Fi connection to play people all over the country.

"From the user-end, this is the easiest way to get online in video games," writes popular video game blog Kotaku.com. "The Wi-Fi integration is seamless. It's as easy as clicking multiplayer on the menu and joining the game."

As we all know, with the Wi-Fi connection, you can connect without any hassle to the service wherever you are, so wireless home networks and Wi-Fi hotspots that are compatible with the service. In addition, there is a USB Wi-Fi connector just in case you live out in the middle of no-where, and this just plugs into your PC like any other USB device.

There will be many titles to use the new service, including Animal Crossing: Wild World on December 5th, and Metroid Prime Hunters on March 20th. As mentioned before on Club Skill, the demand for the new Animal Crossing title for the DS has already reached fever pitch, and four very strict game reviewers at Weekly Famitsu, Japan’s leading gaming mag, scored it an immense 37 out of 40, which is a landmark achievement for this title.

As always, stay with Club Skill for more about the Wi-Fi connection, as we shall be testing it out at a major fast food chain that already gets too much publicity. Guess what it is yet?

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