Yesterday more details about the Nintendo Wii Controller have been revealed at the E3 2006 presevent of the game maker.

As reported yesterday, the Wii Remote lets you wave and point. It also rumbles for force feedback and has a built-in speaker for sound effects (you know swoosh, slurrrp, knock,...).

Besides the nunchuck motion controller there is a third part of the Nintendo Wii controller system. It looks like a long thin sensor strip that has to be placed on top or in front of the TV.
I am not sure what part of the motion control this sensor is responsible for. There is no description on the Japanese Wii Controller site (Japanese). If you know it, please email me.

Update:
Current best guess for what the sensor strip is good for is that it is for non-CRT TVs, because Plasma and LCDs do not have a scan-line. The scan-line is necessary to measure the position on the screen the controller is pointing at.

In related news, STMicroelectronics announced that they are the maker of the three-axis acceleration sensors that will be used in the Nintendo Wii controllers. More details in this press-release.