You can say anything you want about Nintendo's Wii except for one thing: that it's not the most family-friendly console ever. Following this idea, we can say that the Miis are not meant to be used in M-rated games, nor associated with such titles in any way. Now we also know that Xbox 360 users will receive their own Miis, called Avatars by Microsoft. It seems that, since the company kind of borrowed this concept from Nintendo, the two products will have many similarities, too.

One of them, as reported by Xbox Live GM Eric Kilgore during the recent Gamefest in Seattle, is that avatars will be restricted to non-violent games at least when the service is launched: "The final guide we have this year is to think of them in an 'E10' context. That doesn't mean it won't change - but this Fall they won't be able to blow each other's heads off," Kilgore said, as reported by Develop magazine.

Except for that, things seem to be pretty interesting: Microsoft is currently in talks with game developers to find out what are the best ways of implementing the Avatars - either as 3D characters that will take the place of the game's hero or as 2D static images. This means that technology is slowly advancing to the point where players will be able to insert a virtual-self in the video games they play - something like holograms and true virtual reality. Which is amazing!

However, until that moment comes, we'll have to be glad we have the Miis and the Avatars. The latter are not completely detailed yet - and Microsoft itself has to work on some details, too, according to Kilgore: "We think it's really important that these things can scale between in game and out of game, and how we can use them on the web," he said, explaining that the company is designing Avatars so they can be seen on websites and embedded in forum profiles or Facebook pages just like gamertags.