The Wii U is a mysterious console yet finally, with just a few weeks to go, images are surfacing that show off some of the various applications on offer. The images are courtesy of Nintendo's Japanese site, so stay tuned as a translation is sure to follow in the next few days. 

First in our fresh batch of photo's is the Wii U eShop, which displays a search option, different categories and seemingly some 'spotlight' titles in the middle of the screen. Thankfully it already looks a lot more user friendly and colourful than the Wii Shop Channel. 

Meanwhile, the new Mii's are positively gleaming (because they're worth it, no doubt) though the Mii Studio doesn't look drastically different to what we saw on Wii and 3DS. The Mii Studio allows you to take a picture of yourself which will then be converted into a Mii, though if it's anything like the 3DS, it is certain to give you a huge head and small eyes... unless that's just us. 

The Mii's also seem to have less freedom now. Instead of aimlessly walking around and staring at each other, they are couped up in what seems to be a Wii branded jail. Thankfully though, keeping them in order allows for a massive 3000 Mii's to be stored on your system. 

Now, 'Wii Mode' on Wii U seems to work in the same way that GameCube games did on Wii, in the sense that it is limited to playing games and displaying things in their original form, not operating with the new features of the Wii U. With that in mind it seems that Wii Mii's will only be available in 'Wii Mode', the same applying to Wii U Mii's on Wii U, though this has not been confirmed. 

Keeping in line with the separate Wii and Wii U modes is the Activity Log. The Activity Log looks almost identical to the 3DS version and in the same way that GameCube games didn't appear in the "Recently Played" message on Wii, Wii games aren't displayed in the Wii U Activity Log. 

Finally, there are some images of the social aspects of the system. The Friends List looks slightly different to the 3DS, as here your friends are displayed as a list with a box underneath for text. This text is presumably their latest statement (or indeed, Nintendo Tweet as people have been calling it). Wii U Chat seems to be a different entity to the Friend List, displaying Mii's in a horizontal manner.

What do you make of the new images? Special thanks for forum member Dcubed for the heads up! And be sure to stay tuned to N-Europe for the full translated information soon.