Topic: What Happens to Our VC Games Next Generation?

Anybody have a clue or wanna take a guess about what will happen to the VC games we download off the Wii when the next generation comes out? Or how about in 2 more generations?

What happens if you can't bring them over because they are tied to our consoles? Maybe we will have to bring them over on Memory Cards and re-download the licenses once we log in.

If we can't bring them over, this would be a huge mistake for Nintendo cause they won't get a dime for me if they try to release more VC games of more powerful consoles. Now if they did right thing and let us bring our games over then Nintendo has me as a customer for good. I'm big into retro gaming, so I guess we will see.

I can see it going either way. While it would make sense for Ninty to set it up so you could transfer somehow, but just the same, they may not if the rights issue is too tricky. That being said, even if they don't transfer, nothing would stop you from still being able to play those games on your Wii.

Perhaps looking to MS's model with XBLA may shed light on what Ninty will do -- though XBLA was very limited on the original Xbox, it was there -- and as far as i know, nothing you downloaded there transferred to the 360.

According to what I've read, buying VC and Wiiware games gives you "permission" to play it on one console only, and given Nintendo's money hungry rep, I'd have to say that come next generation, we won't be able to keep ANYTHING that was downloaded. Personally, Ima keepin' my Wii for like, ever. Hell, I had my NES, SNES and N64 until I got my Wii, so there.

The original XBOX didn't even have a marketplace as such, so transferring wasn't an issue.

I would imagine that the next Nintendo console would allow for a one-time transfer of downloaded content somehow. It can't be rocket science to reassign the DRM somehow.

I agree it's not rocket science but sometimes companies make it much more complicated than it has to be, and yes while there is nothing stopping me from playing my Wii, I thought the point of VC games were to have all your old school console games on one console. Making me start another collection of newer "retro games" on a newer console defeats that purpose.

It will be very interesting to see how different companies handle this issue going forward into further console generations; the fact is that there isn't much precedent for it, as the big shift to downloadable content is fairly recent.

Very true, which is why I'm curious to why gamers are so confident their console maker won't screw them on this. Not that I don't trust Nintendo, but they have been known to overlook obvious things before.

@LoopyLuigi: I always thought we were buying them. We put in $5-$12 for them, why should they be not ours entirely?

Also, there's going to be a new generation?

We aren't really buying anything when it comes to digital content. You more than anything buy the license to play the game or in some cases, rent the game. And yes, eventually there will be another generation, technology moves fast, catch up

So, because I own the licenses to play those games, Nintendo can't just erase everything while keeping the $90 I spent on all of them?

I am sure they would never do that on purpose but as waroswoods said this is pretty new to everyone. I know people that have got their Wii's replaced by Best Buy and lost all their content even though they had it backed up on a memory card because the licensing was screwed up on Nintendo's part.

I wouldn't want to worry anyone but it does play in the back of my head when I make VC purchases and if this got settled I'd buy a lot more than the 20 or so games I have now.

Well, that's understandable. Being able to do that would allow your friends to have your games and all you do is download them again. That's illegal. If that's all, then I'll just keep my Wii. If the VC becomes exclusively Wii 2, then I'll get it while keeping my Wii.

I just hope Nintendo figured out a way to brings our games over maybe via memory card and then once we log in as ourselves we can download the licenses while taking them off the old Wii, one console at a time?

More people need to learn to do it the Apple way (with their music), make it only 2 consoles can have have rights games at once and allow us to take it off one console and move it to another.

The thing is, what's going to stop people from selling off the second console?

I get the feeling that the whole affair will become quite a headache for us gamers. For several reasons.

First, think about the state of slow, trickling releases VC has had. Are we going to have to go through such an agonizing wait for our favorite games to be released....again? I've spent several years waiting for Mega Man X to release. And I'm still waiting.

Secondly, say I download the entire NES catalog available on the Wii. If I can't transfer these to the next gen console, and am not allowed to put them on a memory card and save them to a new Wii if mine should crap out, what then? Purchase them anew, flushing all that money down the toilet? The Wii was supposed to eliminate the need to have 7 different systems in order to play those games...it doesn't make much sense to force your consumer base to start all over again, if only to gather profit.

In an ideal world: One universal Virtual Console that will extend to Ninty's next console(s), which will contain the current library of games VC has and will have, and that allows the transfer of all your purchased games....a BIG plus being added VC support for new consoles (such as the Sega Saturn, and other games too big for the Wii's current file size limit).

The question is....what will Nintendo decide? Do they make us wait & pay all over again, or will there be a solution? Time will tell. I've got my (Power Glove) fingers crossed.

lol sony is the only system of the 3 that already has a system transfer of downloaded games (ps3 to psp). if sony can do it nintendo can!

I think a misconception is that the VC was intended for the purpose of consolidating classic game collections. While that may be the effect for many of us older gamers, the real purpose was to offer classic games to a new audience, while allowing older gamers to recapture some nostalgia of years gone by. I may be mistaken, but Ninty never held out the Wii and the VC as "now you will only need one console for all your classic gaming needs". I'm personally always going to be keeping my Wii hooked up (esp. with the HBC and DosBoxWii!) unless a newer console comes along that makes it unneccessary.

I'm sure they could figure out how to do it, that's not the issue. As was mentioned above, this is relatively new ground (the whole DRM stuff), especially when it comes to gaming, so it remains to be seen what the industry behavior will become as obviously the issue will only become more and more prevalent (especially with the release of the PSPGo).

Personally, i'd of course like our VC to carry over to the next console, but i'm more concerned with the issue of what if my Wii craps out on me years from now and i have an SD card that i can't use on a new Wii i buy because of the DRM issues.

That's why I would never go through a third party with replacement Wii's and so forth. If you ship it to Nintendo to fix they (and the harddrive is salvagable) they will take all of your downloaded content (and they tell you this on the phone before you send anything in) and save it, then transfer it over to the replacement Wii, or, just keep it safe during the repair process. This is why it is especially useful to have a Club Nintendo account, because once that is linked up to your Wii, it will record all of your downloads on that extra database. Then, you will have the download services records (which is why you can redownload a game you've already bought) PLUS the Club Nintendo verification.

It seems apparent that the company has some sort of mechanism in place to deal with the transfer of this licensed material, otherwise they wouldn't be able to transfer any old data onto replacement Wii's, so there does appear to be a solution here, at least, in part. If, for some reason we aren't able to transfer the old data over to the next gen, then I'll live- I'll just leave my Wii hooked up to the tv like I currently do with my NES, N64 and PS2.

This is a rather facinating topic though, especially for a game like Mega Man 9 which would have been a high selling disc game had it been made available in stores. There MUST be a solution for the Mega Man collector who proudly boasts that he has all 9 games in the series. But when his friend asks to see them all- what's he going to do if the licensing runs out of downloaded content, or something? What is he going to show off when his Wii eventually gets torched or the components just die on him in 40 years? With a cartridge you can just pull it out (working or not) and smile and say "see, I own this" but with a simple data download there needs to be a way to keep these games alive and playable.

Like, what if my grandkid wants to play Mega Man 9 one day? My Wii has been played to death so he has to do what? Go to a vintage game store and purchase an entire counsole- one that downloaded MM9 years ago and still has it in its hard drive? See what I mean? There's obviously going to be a solution to this StriderNo9, if nothing for the fact that it would be better for business if they keep games available, if nothing else to instill confidence in the system itself, thus causing you to buy more games. If they whiped the slate clean every generation, people would stop buying DLC, and considering the fact that DLC is very likely the future of the medium, I don't see any other alternative.

My main issue is, if Nintendo releases another Wii like Wii HD or something that sells VC games on it with added console support and we have to keep two consoles hooked up for retro games. If they decided to kill VC with the next console and leave it a Wii only thing fine. But don't sell the next console expecting me to rebuy my games.

haha, counting chickens guys...