We knew Punch-Out Wii supports the Wii Fit Balance Board, but until opening the game’s instruction manual today, we didn’t know how.

Note that the board can only be used in the game’s single-player mode. A case of Nintendo fearing the prospect [[link]] of two people boxing on boards side-by-side?

Perhaps not.

A year ago, a Ubisoft producer who [[link]] was showing me Shaun White Snowboarding for the Wii told me that the Balance Board’s signals are interpreted by the Wii as two [[link]] Wii remotes. If that’s still the case, then a single player using Punch-Out with a Wii controller and board would already be using three slots — not enough slots for the other player to have the same controls set-up.

That will keep your household furniture a little bit more safe.

Punch-Out is out from Nintendo next week.