Wii U

Template:MPConsoleInfobox
The **Wii U** (*ウィー ユー*, *Wī Yū*), codenamed **Project Café**, was a home video game console developed by Nintendo, the successor to the Wii, and the predecessor to the Nintendo Switch. Initially released in North America in 2012 and discontinued on January 31, 2017, it was the first eighth-generation home video game console and competed with the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

The console was announced in E3 on June 7, 2011. It was marketed along with the Nintendo 3DS and as a home console that would allow gamers to play games on it off-TV with a controller with an integrated touch-screen, called the *Wii U GamePad*. The latter would also have other features like a movement recognition which is also present on the Nintendo 3DS, and a NFC that would be used mostly for Amiibos.

## Hardware specifications

* CPU: Tri-Core IBM PowerPC "Espresso" @ 1.24 GHz
* Memory: 2G DDR3
* Storage: 8 / 32 GB internal flash memory
* Display: 1080i, 1080p ,720p ,576i ,576p ,480i ,480p
* Graphics: 550 MHz AMD Radeon-based "Latte"
* Media: Wii U Optical Disc, Wii Optical Disc

## ‎Why U Will Play It Next

1. Most of the system's exclusive titles are really great, such as:
	* *New Super Mario Bros. U*
	* *Super Mario 3D World*
	* *Super Mario Maker*
	* *Super Smash Bros for Wii U*
	* *Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze*
	* *Mario Kart 8*
	* *The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild* and *The Legend of Zelda* HD remakes of GameCube titles
	* *Splatoon*
	* *Bayonetta 2*
	* *Fatal Frame: Maiden of Black Water*
	* *Yoshi's Woolly World*
	* *Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker*
	* *Pikmin 3*
	* *Kirby and the Rainbow Curse*
	* *Xenoblade Chronicles X*
	* *Nintendo Land*
	* *Wii Party U*
2. The controller allows off-TV play, meaning that you can continue playing on your controller screen while someone else is using the TV. It can also be used in local multiplayer without resorting to split-screen.
3. Despite being rather gimmicky, the GamePad is comfortable to hold and is lighter than its appearance suggests.
	* If you don't want to use it, you can use the Pro Controller for many games instead.
4. The GamePad also gives dual-screen capabilities to the Wii U, a first among home consoles.
5. The console is fully backward compatible with all Wii games, software, and accessories.
6. Despite the small library, it still has some great third-party games such as:
	* *Mass Effect 3: Special Edition*
	* *Tekken Tag Tournament 2*
	* *Rayman Legends*
	* *Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate*
	* *Call of Duty: Black Ops II*
	* *Resident Evil: Revelations*
	* *Sonic & All-Stars Racing Transformed*
	* *Batman: Arkham City - Armored Edition*
	* *Assassin's Creed IV: Black Flag*
	* *Taiko no Tatsujin*
	* *Monster High* video games (*Monster High: 13 Wishes* and *Monster High: New Ghoul in School*)
7. It's also the first Nintendo home console to have indie games, inducing:
	* *Shovel Knight*
	* *Super Meat Boy*
	* *Freedom Planet*
	* *Shantae and the Pirate's Curse*
	* *Runbow*
	* *The Binding of Isaac*
	* *FAST Racing NEO*
	* *Guacamelee*
	* *Shakedown: Hawaii*
8. As Nintendo's second and last home console to feature the Virtual Console line, it offers an enormous quantity of games. It has titles from the NES, SNES, Game Boy Advance, Nintendo 64, Nintendo DS, and Wii libraries.
	* Plus, it even has titles from the TurboGrafx-16 and MSX (Japan only) libraries as well!
9. It was also the last console ever made to have free online, something its competitors, and even its successor, the Nintendo Switch, lacked.
10. While there was still some produced, there was much less shovelware developed for it than for the Wii.
11. The digital downloads are now licensed for an account, instead of a single console only. This allowed players to download their digital games back without having to buy them again after the console broke.
12. The console is great to use for internet browsing.
13. It had an actual, searchable friend system rather than the Wii's ludicrously convoluted system of exchanging 16-digit codes and then waiting for a central server to sync.
14. It had Miiverse, which, while having some crappy rules, some toxic users and some questionable content made an easily accessible hub for the communities of games that was closely connected to features in many games, as well as individual people.
15. It was Nintendo's first console to support HD graphics with the use of an HDMI cable that support up to 1080p.
16. Unlike the PlayStation 4 which had no AV port, the Wii U could be hooked up into an old TV using an AV cable, though the latter wasn't included with it.

## Bad Qualities

Despite the console's well reception, the system was a commercial failure, so much so that its successor, the Nintendo Switch, surpassed the Wii U's lifetime sales in its first year, therefore making it noteworthy on Crappy Games Wiki, for more details about what caused it flop, click here.

## Reception

While the console garnered mixed-to-positive reviews even from critics and was well-received for the improvements over the Wii, it was a massive failure and considered by many as the most underrated game console, only 13.56 million units were sold as of December 31, 2016, which is lower than Nintendo's previously lowest-selling home system, the GameCube, which was 21.74 million.

Nintendo learned from the mistakes and would improve almost everything with the Nintendo Switch. The production of the Wii U was discontinued on January 31st, 2017 and *The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild* went on to be the last first-party game released for it.While the Nintendo Switch lacks backward compatibility unlike its predecessors, Nintendo is currently porting Wii U titles to other Nintendo platforms, such as *mh:awesomegames:Mario Kart 8* and *mh:awesomegames:Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker* were ported over to the Nintendo Switch, *Hyrule Warriors* and *Poochy & Yoshi's Woolly World* were ported to the 3DS, with extra content and all previously released DLCs in the Switch version, to the point that some of them outsold not only their original versions, but the console itself such as *Mario Kart 8 Deluxe* selling 43.35 million copies on the Switch alone, which is almost **2 times higher than the original game and its console combined**.

The Wii U has a rating of 3.93 on GameFAQs, while it still has positive, it is currently the lowest-rated Nintendo home console. (not counting the mh:crappygames:Virtual Boy, which was the portable system)

## References

1. ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eToRfMrjbzM&ab\_channel=1UP