The Dolphin emulator is well known in its particular scene, especially for its ability to run Wii and GameCube titles in HD - that was an especially big deal when Nintendo was still all about 480p. It's still under continual development, and its team has come up with a rather surprising and neat update.

In addition to SD card import / export, recent updates allow full access to the Wii Shop Channel - it opens, credit can be purchased and games can be bought and downloaded. The Wii Shop - unlike online multiplayer on Wii - has remained open, and Dolphin is now so accurate that the store thinks it's a real Wii.

So just digest that - an emulator that can purchase Nintendo games.

As the blog post on this makes clear, getting it to work is a careful process.

Impressive stuff, and quite an unexpected development when looking in from the outside; for Dolphin enthusiasts it's certainly a high point in terms of the technicalities and work to make it possible.

[source dolphin-emu.org]