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Earlier this week Nintendo began the first shipments for its eagerly anticipated new gaming console, the Wii U. Check out some images of what to expect when you get your new console home.

The Wii U is here! Sort of. Nintendo has begun shipments of its new gaming console, a device that is certainly going to be one of the hot items this holiday season. Media outlets around the world have begun to receive their units to test the device, and stores are likely filling their backrooms at this time as well.

We’ll have a full review on the hardware itself next week, along with several of the launch title games, but we wanted to give you a look at what Wii U buyers can expect when they get their new console home and unbox it for the first time.

The Wii U will be available as two bundles: Basic and Deluxe. Basic will set you back $299.99, and the Premium/Deluxe hits $349.99. The Basic model comes with 8GB of storage, while the Deluxe (seen here) comes with all the same cables, as well as 32GB of storage, the Nintendo Land game, a Nintendo Network Premium Subscription, and stands for both the Wii U and GamePad. In all other regards, the systems are identical, just with a different color scheme.

Nintendo also sent along the Wii U Pro Controller, which comes in two colors, black and white.

Check back with us next week for a detailed review of the hardware, as well as plenty of launch coverage for the Wii U.

Battlestar Galactica will return as 10-episode webseries premiering this week.

Battlestar Galactica fans have been in withdrawal for quite a while now since the popular sci-fi series concluded and the subsequent spin-off series have had less-than-stellar success. All is not lost, however, as the Battlestar Galactica universe will return as a 10-episode webseries that premieres this week. A new clip from that series arrived online today.

Titled Battlestar Galactica: Blood & Chrome, the new series (which was originally conceived as a two-hour movie) will serve as a prequel to the wildly successful series that ran for four seasons on Syfy. Blood & Chrome stars Luke Pasqualino as a young William “Husker” Adama, and he’s joined by actors Ben Cotton and Lili Bordán.

All ten episodes of the series will be released on Machinima.com starting November 9, and the entire project will then air on Syfy in early 2013.

The premise of the series follows Adama during the tenth year of humanity’s war with the robotic Cylons, as he’s assigned to the massive Galactica battleship and clashes with a battle-weary commanding officer (Cotton). The series is based on a story by Michael Taylor, Bradley Thompson, and David Weddle, as well as the reimagined series’ co-creator, David Eick.

You can watch the first clip from the series below:

Missed all the new app updates this week? Here's a roundup of the week's best additions that are the clear must-haves on your smartphone.

Man, there were a lot of apps that got some update love this week. Did you manage to download them all? If not, have a look through our roundup and see for yourself whether or not these changes seem urgent to your needs. We know, data gets expensive, so feel free to spread them out as you see fit.

Tumblr

With the latest iOS update, Tumblr is now “completely native,” meaning a faster and more responsive interface for you iPhone users. The update also comes with a new notifications board that lets you see exactly who liked, reblogged, commented, or replied to your posts. One of the more interesting updates, however, is animated GIF playback. This will be great for all you LOLcat lovers now that animated GIFs will play automatically from the dashboard without needing a separate tap. Gesture shortcuts also include right swipe to return to the previous screen, and holding a tap to open up more options.

Evernote

Evernote got a nearly complete refresh with its new update, offering a new homescreen, navigation interface, and existing notes list. “Our goal with the redesign was simple: make all major functions accessible within two taps,” Evernote writes on its blog. You’ll find this with a shortcut navigation to your content, and a tap on the header to browse the section. The Notebook section is one of the most improved aspects, gathering all the notes you’ve ever created or have been shared under one hood. Additionally, you can sort your notes by tags or places – the latter of which will bring up a map of plotted notes according to their location info. There are also shortcuts (“Quick Notes”) on the top of the homescreen to help you quickly add new notes and take photos. This Evernote 5 update will be compatible with the iPad mini as well, and is free across iOS platforms.

Foursquare

You know how Facebook lets you tag friends you’re at an event with when you check into spaces? Well, now you can do the same on Foursquare, even if your friend isn’t a Foursquare user. The hot link will just sync to your friend’s Facebook account instead – where your friend can either approve or hide the Facebook notification for a wall post.

In addition to the social aspect update, users can also rate establishments on a scale of 1 to 10 to help explorers get a gauge on the venue’s rating. The number rank will appear in a color square next to the name of a location under your Explore tab. The update is available only on iOS, but Android users should be receiving the same love shortly.

Clear for Mac

Clear is a hotly popular app on the iPhone, and this week, the beautiful to-do lister app comes to the big screen: your MacBook. The Mac edition will include all the touch gestures available on your iPhone if you own a later edition of MacBooks that have gestures built into the touchpad. This means you can still perform all the left and right swipes to “clear” a task and drag items around to reorder them. After you finish setting up your lists on the Mac, the app also syncs with your iPhone so you can access lists on the go. To make accomplishing tasks even more fun, you can fudge with the preferences to set sounds and theme colors to make you want to use the app more.

Pinterest

Starting your holiday shopping early but don’t want anyone to find out you’re using Pinterest to save your to-buy lists? The new Pinterest updates for iOS and Android will now include Secret Boards so you can create up to three privatized boards made for your eyes only. You can also share them with a few santa helpers to get the holiday season rolling, or turn the secret boards public after you’re finished putting the last pieces on the board. The option can be found right when you create a new board, or at the bottom of your app homepage.

Pulse News

Pulse 3.0 is here for both Android and iOS, complete with a sleeker mobile interface and a new search feature to help you browse more efficiently. With the search side bar, you can sort news by sources (Reddit, Tumblr, Google, Flickr, Facebook, etc.) and there’s an infinite scroll so you can keep dragging down for more stories. Seriously — as many as you can stomach in one sitting.

Editing pages is also simpler thanks to the side bar, which allows you to add, edit, and reorder to your customizable needs. Basically, the mobile version gets the same personalization options the Web service Pulse.me already has, so if you’ve an avid fan of the Web edition, now you’ll have the same features on the go.