Check this out. This peek into the Wii remote hardware by CNN Money and Fortune 500 magazine reveals an Audio Translator chip on the back of the circuitboad for the remote. The description is as follows:

Audio translator
Manufactured and designed in the Philippines and Japan by Rohm

Function: Converts analog data such as human speech into a digital data stream. This feature is unused now but will probably be employed in future games.

Estimated Cost: $2.00

Has there been a microphone in this thing all along? Or at least, the potential for one once a light-on-hardware microphone or headset is plugged into the Wii? While a microphone wouldn’t be a huge revelation (as EA’s Boogie and Disney Interactive’s High School Musical are set to use microphones), the fact that it’s been built in all along would be a huge thing.

CNN Money

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