Nintendo Wii U updates speed up the console and connect Miiverse to your smartphone

By Anthony John Agnello Published January 23, 2013

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Nintendo Wii U owners rejoice: The Christmas purchase of a brand new Nintendo console was not made in vane. The Kyoto company is bringing all kinds of games your way over the next eighteen months. There’s new Mario, Mario Kart, and Super Smash Bros. waiting for you at E3, but there’s also all kinds of peculiar new stuff to satisfy the serious gamer. There’s a new Yoshi inspired by Kirby’s Epic Yarn and a Fire Emblem crossover with Shin Megami Tensei. If that doesn’t tickle your fancy, Nintendo’s trying its hand at HD remakes with The Legend of Zelda: The Wind Waker.

New games are all well and good, you say, but what about the Wii U itself? Even after the massive mandatory update that needs to be installed after plugging the box in, that console chugs, with long wait times for loading up a game and even navigating the menu. Nintendo says that it’s got major fixes and new functionality coming to the console this spring in addition to all those shiny new games.

Recommended Videos

Two firmware updates are coming to Wii U between now and the end of summer. The first update will add the Wii U’s new Virtual Console to the eShop, bringing NES, Super Nintendo, and Game Boy Advance games to the machine, but that’s not all. Nintendo preisdent Satoru Iwata promised on Wednesday that this spring update will greatly improve loading times as well as navigation back to the console’s home screen. No more waiting for two minutes after selecting an Amazon Prime movie through Nintendo TVii. The following update in the summer promises to bring more new features to the system, but Nintendo won’t detail those until closer to release.

Nintendo is also introducing another piece of major functionality this spring. Miiverse, Nintendo’s social network that so far is Wii U only, is going to be available as an app for smartphones come spring. This will also introduce private communities to new games like Wii Fit U.

This new app is arguably the most exciting thing about all of Nintendo’s announcements. It’s a show of growth on the part of company, a tangible example of how it’s changing the way its games interact with people’s lives. Being able to track fitness progress on a mobile device is just the sort of thing that could make Wii Fit relevant again.

Topics

Anthony John Agnello

Former Digital Trends Contributor

Anthony John Agnello is a writer living in New York. He works as the Community Manager of Joystiq.com and his writing has…

Gaming

Pick up these Nintendo games you can only get on Wii U and 3DS

xenoblade and pokemon picross headline eshop update chronicles x nintendo wii u

The Nintendo Switch has one of the greatest first-party lineups of any Nintendo console. In addition to several outstanding original games, a lot of awesome Wii U games like Super Mario 3D World, Pikmin 3, and Mario Kart 8 finally got all the love they deserved when they were ported to the Switch. Even some 3DS games like Miitopia have made their way to Nintendo Switch. Still, that isn't all-encompassing, so when the Nintendo 3DS and Wii U eShops are discontinued on March 27, we will lose access to some amazing first-party Nintendo games that aren't available elsewhere.
From black sheep in their respective series to new IP that tests out some novel ideas, four Wii U and four 3DS games that are still platform exclusives stuck out the most to us. If you're specifically looking for Nintendo-published games to pick up before the 3DS and Wii U eShops stop allowing the purchase of new games, consider picking up one of these titles.
Xenoblade Chronicles X

Considering the rest of the Xenoblade Chronicles series is on Nintendo Switch, it's very surprising that Xenoblade Chronicles X has not made the jump over yet. This RPG stands as the black sheep of the series, with a more gritty style and tone, mech suits, and a plot about humans who crash land on an alien planet after escaping Earth, which might be why it didn't come over before the trilogy was completed. Xenoblade Chronicles X is a great game in its own right, though, and also makes ample use of the Wii U GamePad for its detailed map and menus. As such, it's a worthwhile Wii U pickup for those who like to play games uniquely tailored to the system and enjoy seeing what the oddball entries in game franchises have to offer.
Star Fox Zero

Gaming

Download these rare Wii U games before they disappear

Nintendo's Wii U is notorious for how hard it flopped and for providing the Switch with some of its best ports, but that doesn't mean it didn't have worthwhile games that are still exclusive to it. While many Wii U games have escaped to other platforms and Game Boy Advance games are now coming to Nintendo Switch, some experiences are uniquely suited to the Wii U GamePad or aren't able to make the jump elsewhere due to other outside factors.

As such, when the Wii U and 3DS eShops shut down on March 27, there are some unique Wii U games that will become significantly more expensive and tougher, if not outright impossible, to play. If you're one of the 13.5 million people who actually have a Wii U and are wondering what to pick up before the eShop closes, we recommend these stranded games.
Affordable Space Adventures

Gaming

Nintendo’s Wii Shop Channel and DSi shops are back online

Nintendo 3DS close-up.

After months of service outages, Nintendo's Wii Shop Channel and DSi Shop are back online.

Nintendo's two virtual marketplace services went down in March of this year. In a statement to Kotaku on the outage, Nintendo acknowledged the downtime but had nothing to report other than that the shops were undergoing maintenance and that it would provide updates on them at a later date. It seems it completely skipped the update and simply put both back online instead.