A Gold-Plated Nintendo Wii Was Once Sent To The Queen & There's One Game She Loved Playing

Queen Elizabeth II was surrounded by all sorts of golden and bejewelled items over her 96 years of life, but few of those riches compare to the gold-plated Nintendo Wii console that was custom-made for her.

Not only was the queen a corgi-lover in her spare time, but it seems she was also a bit of a gamer.

In fact, her favourite game to play on the Wii was bowling, and she was reportedly pretty good at it.

The queen first started playing the Wii in 2008 after Prince William got one for Christmas, the Mirror reports.

"She thought the Nintendo looked tremendous fun and begged to join in. She played a simple 10-pin bowling game and by all accounts was a natural," a source told the paper at the time. "It was hilarious. William was in fits of laughter. He was enormously impressed at having such a cool gran."

One year later, the gaming company THQ pounced on that tidbit of news and made her a gold-plated Wii to promote its new title, Big Family Games.

"We thought that Her Majesty the Queen wouldn't want to play on any old console, so an extra-special gold one was commissioned," THQ product manager Danielle Robinson said in a news release at the time. "We hope that she and the rest of the royal family enjoy the game!"

THQ sent the Wii to the queen, but Buckingham Palace security stepped in and she never actually got to play it.

"For security reasons, the Correspondence Team are unable to accept any unsolicited gifts which are sent to The Queen," the palace's mail room says on its website.

THQ went bankrupt a few years later (maybe it was the golden Wiis?) and the console ended up going to a collector.

A Dutch man named Donny Fillerup ended up with the console and he tried to sell it a few times on eBay in recent years, with an asking price of over $200,000.

The console didn't sell until last May, when someone grabbed it for a winning bid of $30,000.

We don't know who owns that Wii now, but here's hoping they'll bowl a few strikes in honour of the late queen!