Topic: Wii Purchases Aren't Forever! (Yahoo)

Not to mention that no one should have to send in two Wiis and be without either for weeks in the first place when much simple systems are possible.

And documents have suggested that 3DS may have a separate download service from DSi, with 3DSWare or something of the sort registered or planned to register, though I imagine we'll know the answer to this part of the question in a month, so speculation is pointless.

I'd like to see Club Nintendo used like a PSN ID for access, but Nintendo for some reason does not require registration, so I'm sure the majority of consoles are unregistered and may not even remember Club Nintendo exists by this point. It would be nice to see an update force this.

I really wouldn't even mind if they made it so you could still register games to only one console. It'd likely be no less secure. The same people who would be abusing the system as are already getting these games illegally. All this system does is punish those who play by the rules, not the ones who break them.

This is one of those things that shows Nintendo is far behind the competition in the online realm. The other systems (not to mention Steam, etc.) have a system figured out, so why not Nintendo? If my Wii breaks and there was no way to get my downloads back without paying I'm not sure I would bother with a Nintendo system again.

You know, I've often thought about this problem, and what if Nintendo distributed a device to stores like Gamestop, Target, etc. where you could just plug in the Wii or DSi with the downloaded content into one slot, attach the Wii/DSi/whatever you want to transfer the downloaded games to into another slot and after a short bit, poof! You now have your old games on your new system! As long as a store employee supervises the transfer or does it him/herself, wouldn't this work?

@Birdman13: Nintendo probably wants to keep a tight rein on that kind of thing, though, and the store employees would probably need Official Nintendo Training or something like that, lol. it'd be nice, but i can't see it happening without Nintendo having some kind of representative at each location with these devices.

I think they'll offer a solution when Wii2 is released. It should be easy enough to offer a Transfer Channel that deletes the games from the Wii, unlinks your Club Nintendo account and sets your games to Limbo mode. Relink your Club Nintendo account to the Wii2, install the Transfer Channel to reassign your games, and everything should be available for download.
They could also do it without Club Nintendo by letting you enter the Wii2's serial number or friend code in the Transfer Channel.

I'm sure they could create something like that in a few days, so they're probably just waiting for the right time (Wii2 release) or they really don't want to do it.

I think it's time they updated this then.
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[quote]here's what the linked Wired article had to say:
http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2010/05/black-wii-upgrade/

I'm really bothered by this quote. Nintendo need to fix this problem NOW, not a few years down the line when their next system is released. Especially now that a number of people are switching over to the new black Wii's.

You know, I was thinking about this issue the other day. Couldn't Nintendo just use the unique friend code on each system and have that as the persons account number? Like for example, whenever the Wii successor is released, I can transfer all my purchases by just entering in my old friend code into the new system? Wouldn't that make sense?

That's true. I think Nintendo figured not too many people would do the switch. it's aimed at new users. I guess the Dsi XL too.

I can something along the lines of a transfer between the consoles with Wii2. I think they can even put a special USB cable with Wii2 that will do the transfer. What people are missing though is that no company solved this issue. If you use an account and it doesn't force you to delete the original games, then it's abused - people copy the games this way. You need a system where the games are deleted from one console so you only have it at one console at a time. As far as I know, this wasn't solved by anyone, was it? Of course people do it anyway in piracy, but it doesn't justify it as far as Nintendo is concerned, and frankly I understand them, even though it sux.

Nintendo will come up with something!

The more I think about it, the less I think our VC , DSiWare and WiiWare purchases will be transferable to the next consoles. Most significantly, the 3DS' launch is merely months away, and Nintendo has not made any announcement to the effect of, "Don't stop buying DSiWare -- it will still be good on the new system." They know this is a concern, and yet they haven't said anything. Why? Probably because they don't intend to let you transfer this stuff and they don't want you to stop buying now, in anticipation of the next console. In fact, they did say that DS game cards will be compatible -- why no mention of DSiWare? That's an ominous sign to me. Maybe they'll say something at E3, but my guess is, if they don't, then this stuff won't be transferable.

I can something along the lines of a transfer between the consoles with Wii2. I think they can even put a special USB cable with Wii2 that will do the transfer. What people are missing though is that no company solved this issue. If you use an account and it doesn't force you to delete the original games, then it's abused - people copy the games this way. You need a system where the games are deleted from one console so you only have it at one console at a time. As far as I know, this wasn't solved by anyone, was it? Of course people do it anyway in piracy, but it doesn't justify it as far as Nintendo is concerned, and frankly I understand them, even though it sux.

This "piracy" concern is crap. Developers and publishers that put stuff up on the Sony and Microsoft download services are perfectly capable of making money through them. If piracy were so easy, or people abused those, better, terms and conditions, then no one would make any money.

As it stands both the Playstation and Xbox are far more popular online, so Nintendo's actually costing itself more money than it would if it let the occasional pirate get by (besides which, both Sony and Microsoft have their own anti-piracy measures in place, while still allowing game transfers.)

@mnementh you are very mistaken on this whole issue. Many other companies are faced with the same or a similar issue but implemented a solution that has pleased their customers. Even netflix for instance limits you to 5 separate devices that netflix service can be registered on which is very fair.
Having a user account does not cause piracy and that's a ridiculous idea. All they need to do is track your account and verify that across the hardware you use it on. Pretty simple actually. They can set their own rules they want like only one system at a time can have the games or one old system and one new one.

When people get a wii 2 and make their account nintendo can just ask them either the friend code of the old system or the serial number or something and can look at what they have purchased from there.

Its not even really a matter of whether they can do such a thing but rather do they want to or do they just want to pretend they are "looking into" the issue while making their customers re-buy all their old stuff.

Yikes, that's an illuminating article. Hopefully Nintendo is working on a solution--if your Wii/DSi Shop Channel data is synched with your Club Nintendo membership, for example, it would be easy for them to make the transition.

The Transfer Channel which Olorin suggested in post 25 is the way to go. Nintendo needs to get a grip on reality and realize they are never going to stop piracy. Therefore, they need to stop cheating the people who DON'T steal games. Any "anti-piracy" scheme which only punishes paying customers is idiotic, brain dead, and delusional.

I think it's fair to say that the majority of Wii owners aren't signed up with Club Nintendo - I certainly don't have a Japanese Club Nintendo account.

So requiring something like that seems like a non-starter - it might be something going forward for Wii2 or whatever, but I don't see it as a solution in the here-and-now. I've said it before, but it seems like something should be possible with a system update, as suggest a Transfer Channel or whatever. Clearly when you activate a Wii Shop account (Club Nintendo optional) your system's hardware is somehow linked to it - even beyond formatting your Wii via the system menu. The only time Nintendo needs to do any work is when they do something to change your system's hardware id like swap out the system board. Therefore it should be possible to transfer this account relationship via a combination of offline/online means: offline do the transfer from the old machine with an online confirmation which re-links the shop account.

Given the number of soft-hacked machines, though Nintendo will probably be paranoid about implementing this and I could see them working to somehow isolate soft-hacked or hardware modded systems from their network prior to rolling out this update beyond the steps they've taken thus far (if that's even possible). It will be interesting to see what they do, but clearly they intend the Wii to be a commodity like a set-top box where you trade up to the new model, they just haven't really thought through how the online component will fit into this.

One thing that's missing from the equation is the actual percentage of Wii owners with a large collection of downloadable titles. If this turns out to be a small segment of Wii-owning households, then they may well put this on the back-burner as something that's only of concern to "otaku" since people who own retail titles won't be affected beyond importing save data (though this will also prove annoying thanks to the inability to transfer any part of a save file for a game with an online component - grrrrrr), and that's unlikely to be a deal-breaker for many who will just be happy to be able to load their disks/use remotes with the new system.

@Sean

Ignoring it would be a boneheaded move though, customer relations wise, seeing as the "otaku" are the ones spending the most money on the system (and the most likely to trade their system in on launch day to upgrade). I hope they don't figure that the "otaku" will be pissed, yet will still buy everything again anyways just to have the latest greatest thing. Even then, that's less money they can spend on the new games coming out. No matter how you slice it, it's a poor business strategy.

Their best bet would be some sort of transfer system that users could implement WITHOUT having both of their systems in the same place. A transfer channel would be cool. It loads all games on an SD card, deletes them from the Wii menu, and unlocks them for installation on one new console. I'm not sure if that would be possible with a single firmware update, or if you would need to update every single game (possibly the transfer channel could download and update all the games at once).

I'm sure retailers like Gamestop will be putting some pressure on them, because I'd imagine they make lots of $$$ on trade-ins, and it would be difficult to offer trade-in incentives if you couldn't bring your Wii1 to the store when you went to purchase your Wii2.

These are two seperate issues. Maybe Nintendo is wrong and people don't abuse the system as much as they think they do. But technically, nobody solved this problem, and nobody came up with solutions against it as far as I know. I don't know all the systems, but technically, nobody presented here an alternative system that stops the copying. If you have an account, you can share the account with your friend. Sometimes he will log in and sometimes you will log in. Or only he will log in, but you were able to re-sell the games to him - so it's not YOUR fixed or new system... you keep playing your console with discs, while he plays the games you downloaded on another console. That stuff happens all the time. Is it stupid to prevent them? Most likely. Do millions of people pirate wii games easily? Yes. But techically, it doesn't change what Nintendo is saying. That's why they're doing it. So the piracy concern might be "crap" - but that's a different issue altogether. Technically Nintendo is correct in preventing people, without any modding, and regardless of this logic, in abusing this current system.

What do the technicalities have to do with any of this? Nintendo is wrong, pure and simple. I like Nintendo, but there's no way to be an appologist in this regard. Imagine if a Nintendo representative came with every Wii purchase to make sure that you don't lend your retail games to anyone else, or even wander over to a friend's place with your copy of smash brothers on multiplay. Imagine if they tried to enforce a "retail games are locked to a single console," policy. It's ridiculous, and just as ridiculous as their online policy.

Sony has it much better. As a result I find myself buying more downloadable games from the PSN.

I think they could do this with Club Nintendo because when you buy software it registers it to your account and lets you take a survey on it. You can erase it on the Wii or DSi and it would still be registered. That's most likely why you can't because all you would need to do is register your Club Nintendo account on your friend's Wii and presto they have it too. The transfer channel is a good idea and I hope if they make it they will also make it on the DSi. I was also thinking about that they could do the same thing they do with the Wi-Fi stuff on the DS how it transfers it to your new DS and deletes it on your old one.