Topic: Should I get a Wii U?

I'd really consider getting one even if you are just going to play Wii games. It upscales Wii games to HD, from what I understand.

@DannyBoi not true wii games are still 480p on Wii u

I know that it was abandoned by Nintendo very soon, long before Switch was released but I love my Wii U as well. In my opinion, Xenoblade Chronicles X is the best Wii U game excluding The Legend of Zelda remasters and including games that were ported to Switch. Twilight Princess HD in particular is vastly improved. Then there are some gems, more than Switch has received in a longer time. Most of the Switch gems are Wii U ports. Even then, some of those games are still better on Wii U. Then, the thing I like about Wii U the most is the backwards compatibility plus the Virtual Console and that it accepts a wide variety of controllers. All of this with an unmodded Wii U, if you soft-mod it, you can run your GameCube and Wii games on a HDD or USB flash drive. Considering that GameCube and Wii lack HDMI, Wii U is the ultimate Nintendo console and better than the somehow unreliable and very limited Switch.

@MorningRain

If you’re just looking to play your Wii library then no, get a Wii.

If you’re willing to hack it, also yes, it’s a great Emulation box.

Without that I wouldn’t bother. It’s a muddled mess of a very slow system with little to offer and most of its good games are on the Switch.

@1UP_MARIO Wii U upscales everything to your selected output resolution. Try hitting the info button on your television's remote control the next time you have a Wii game going on your Wii U. It will show the resolution your Wii U is set to output at, definitively proving the matter.

The one exception, unless an OS update eventually fixed it, are PAL Wii U's via component. Wii games won't be upscaled and 60 hz progressive scan capable Wii games can't have that mode enabled (The Wii U will instead deinterlace their 50 hz 576i output to 576p instead of letting the game render at 480p/60hz). That's not the case for NTSC systems, with component capable of everything the system can also do via HDMI.

@Atariboy true. Still looks like 480p like if you’re using component on Wii. Upscales to match hdmi.

I finally cracked and bought a wii u. By dint of seeing videos in recommendation, and I was able to rediscover this console.

hey,

Yes, the Wii U is definitely worth owning today, but it obviously depends on your gaming preferences. While Nintendo no longer supports the console with new software, the Wii U has access to seven generations of fantastic games – and the system can be found for a fraction of the cost of current gaming hardware.

so ive been messing with my softmodded wii recently and today I was thinking of modding the wii u, is there any reasons to mod it as well ? Can I use it the way I do the Wii and rip my wii U games onto and external?

@wizkids0 Yep, you can rip Wii U games to an external drive. There are lots of tutorials for it

@StarPoint sweet I think I have to start the mod on my wii U then

@StarPoint do you know if wii u uses clean rip as well?

@wizkids0 I’m not too sure. I would check for help on other forums like GBATemp or Reddit for extra help

Yes, you can rip Wii discs with CleanRip on a Wii U. Games ripped on a Wii can be used on a Wii U though, so there's no need to do them twice. You can't rip GameCube games with a Wii U either, so hang on to your Wii if just for that.

To rip Wii U discs you'd use a different tool, probably Wudump, which works much the same way. There are plenty of step by step guides online so just follow one of those and it'll all be good.

@Matt_Barber i watched a tutorial online and got it modded i just wanted to rip wii u games on an external which I was able to achieve.

@Atariboy Just a heads up to any PAL Wii U owners, you get a much better picture on some Wii games on a samsung tv if you switch the output in the Wii U options from 1080p to 480p.

I'm wondering if you have it set to 1080p on a PAL Wii U it defaults to 576p or 576i, which it perceives as the higher resolution.

The game I tested it on is Tony Hawks Downhill Jam, which in 1080p was letterboxed vertically, and you could see the edges were jittery.

Wii U, MClassic, 720p. Perfect setting for every game including Wii.

@Wargoose It's basically down to the upscaler as the Wii U applies no anti-aliasing. As such, if you set it to 1080p you'll get all the jagged edges from the Wii's video output but they'll be in 2-3 pixel steps rather than just one at the time, with the larger size and greater clarity of HD TVs making them stand out more. I don't think there's anything wrong with that look myself, but it's certainly not to everyone's taste.

Setting the output to 480p will use the upscaler in your TV set which will typically apply a smoothing filter. This might look better to some, but every TV I've ever used gives a blurry picture that's losing a lot of detail compared to what the Wii U upscaler gives. They're mainly designed to deal with broadcast TV and DVD rather than video games, for what it's worth.

If your tastes are somewhere in between you can get special cables that apply a much milder amount of anti-aliasing. I can't say that I've ever felt the need for one, but they seem fairly popular and might worth a look for anyone who can't get a good enough picture via either of the other options.

I have a Retrotink and HD Retrovision component cables for my Wii. Couldn't be sharper. The Wii U is literally the only console I don't ever want and don't regret selling.

@Matt_Barber Hi I'm not talking about a difference in sharpness, size of pixels. I'm talking letterboxing, black lines at the top and bottom of the screen and the edges of the image visually shake. The 1080p signal a PAL Wii U produces for Tony Hawks Downhill Jam just doesn't look like it's compatible with my Samsung TV.

I'm wondering if it's trying upscale a 576i/p signal, and the Samsung TV is struggling to understand the image it's being sent. When I switch the Wii U to 480p it looks normal with no letterboxing.