PSA: Wii Shop closing soon

[mamboFoxtrot]

Announcement: https://www.nintendo.com/whatsnew/detai ... nouncement
Q&A: http://en-americas-support.nintendo.com ... tion-q%26a

Users will be able to add Wii Points until March 26, 2018, and purchase content on the Wii Shop Channel until January 30, 2019. In the future we will be closing all services related to the Wii Shop Channel, including the ability to redownload WiiWare and Virtual Console games, as well as the Wii System Transfer Tool, which transfers data from Wii to the Wii U system. We will announce specific details as that time approaches.

Last chance to (legally) get Gradius ReBirth, which is why I'm posting this in Shmups Chat and not Off Topic - apologies if it doesn't belong here.

Few months-old news at this point, but I only just found out about it, so I figured others might not have heard it either.

[NYN]

Thanks.
Still some things I wanna get. Motivated by this.

[evil_ash_xero]

Everyone in the world should have their Wii softmodded, and these games backed up on PC.

Just my opinion.

[ZellSF]

Well it's understandable. The Wii sold so terribly they couldn't possibly afford to develop a solid store infrastructure. With the DS failing so badly at the same time I'm surprised they could afford to keep this going as long as they did.

[opt2not]

Uh what? Sarcasm, yeah?

[bigbadboaz]

I don't really see an issue with closing a store 13 years after the system launched. They're also giving clear and long-term notice when the reality is the vast majority of users have already moved on.

[BrianC]

I don't really see an issue with closing a store 13 years after the system launched. They're also giving clear and long-term notice when the reality is the vast majority of users have already moved on.

What bothers me more is how inconsistent Nintendo is with different systems. The DSiWare games were added to the 3DS eShop, but the Wii games weren't moved to the WiiU eShop. Same deal with being able to load games directly from SD card on Wii and having to manually copy DSi games to system memory to play them on 3DS.

[kitten]

there's a few things i need to pick up off the jp shop before it closes down, but i wouldn't know how to go about doing that. any advice?

in particular, i'd really like to play that... one famicom-looking, deliberate kusoge. i forget the name.

[ZellSF]

Uh what? Sarcasm, yeah?

Yes.

I don't really see an issue with closing a store 13 years after the system launched. They're also giving clear and long-term notice when the reality is the vast majority of users have already moved on.

Taking the ability to redownload your titles away, meaning they'll be lost forever when your console dies isn't an issue to you? Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

[kitten]

Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

not entirely true. there are some ps3 titles and pieces of dlc that have been both delisted and cleared from server history, meaning your license doesn't even grant you access to them anymore. wouldn't be surprised if microsoft has done the same for some 360 stuff, but last i checked you still retained the ability to redownload everything if it got delisted. that doesn't remove the fact that they killed everything for the xbox, though. anything downloaded for their first console is gone in the wind. this is particularly killer for a commonly split-screened game like halo 2, where its first major update drastically rebalanced the multiplayer in a hugely positive way... not to mention the maps you can't get without piracy, anymore. though a physical disc does exist with the patch and most of the maps, it's missing a couple of the last ones.

i expect to see more of this from microsoft and sony going into the future - digital preservation is not a high concern for corporations. what nintendo is doing is particularly draconian and heinous, but both competitors have already done or dabbled in this and will again. i've stopped buying digital titles unless it's something where i particularly want to support the work and am fine essentially considering like a ko-fi or patreon pledge for the developer. given my declining interest in modern gaming, in general, there have only been small handful of titles i've done that for, this year. i've also stopped buying new retail games in a lot of instances, instead waiting for them to get a reissue with their final patches & dlc on-disc, if i even pick them up at all.

i really hope the rebirth games somehow get reissued, preferably in physical form - i particularly liked contra rebirth, and gradius was pretty good, too. m2 is one of the only good things still standing in gaming, today, and they deserve better than this. a shame about western territories only getting a single compilation of their 3D classics, too.

[bigbadboaz]

Taking the ability to redownload your titles away, meaning they'll be lost forever when your console dies isn't an issue to you? Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

Again, the store has been online for a very reasonable amount of time and they are giving obvious notice with another extended length of time built-in for anyone concerned to make preparations.

Nothing lasts forever in this world and we have just been told we have until 2019 to get in there and complete our downloads. What more do you reasonably want? Anyone who can't be bothered to get in there and download a few needed titles in the next THIRTEEN MONTHS has given up the right to call themselves a conscientious gamer several times over. I mean, come on.

Lastly, the concern about the disappearance of digital goods is a bit overblown. The emulation and ROM scene has shown for decades now that physical software can be preserved in the digital realm. Do you really think these titles - which were digital to begin with - aren't going to be recoverable in the same way?

[egg_sanwich]

This is why digital distribution is wack. I prefer to own my games, not have a temporary license for them.

[kitten]

Again, the store has been online for a very reasonable amount of time and they are giving obvious notice with another extended length of time built-in for anyone concerned to make preparations.

Nothing lasts forever in this world and we have just been told we have until 2019 to get in there and complete our downloads. What more do you reasonably want? Anyone who can't be bothered to get in there and download a few needed titles in the next THIRTEEN MONTHS has given up the right to call themselves a conscientious gamer several times over. I mean, come on.

Lastly, the concern about the disappearance of digital goods is a bit overblown. The emulation and ROM scene has shown for decades now that physical software can be preserved in the digital realm. Do you really think these titles - which were digital to begin with - aren't going to be recoverable in the same way?

the problem isn't so much that they'll be erased from the earth as it is that this move feels deeply anti-consumer. what happens when your hardware goes bad and you don't have the means to back these games up, because they didn't legally entitle you to any way to do this? these titles are tied to the console, meaning that you can't just jam 'em on an SD card, and that when your console goes, they go. my wii started to have hardware failure issues and a huge reason i got a wii-u was just to import my virtual console library that i naively bought very much into the idea of 10 years ago. if my wii-u goes and i need to replace it, i don't even know for sure what option i can take despite the fact nintendo clearly had the means to record and document my purchases on their club nintendo program. they also have other absurd restrictions like only letting me switch which 3ds has my stored licenses on it 5 times (already used two).

nintendo is in no financial pickle and has more than the ability to leave a few servers online and put people in a ticket line to at least slowly redownload if need be. hell, i guarantee that if they'd allow it, some people would even volunteer to fundraise and sustain it all on their own. when most people buy these games, they do so with the assumption that what they have is going to stick around, not that it's going to be an extended rental. nintendo persists on goodwill by the consumer and is spitting in their face at the same time that their current marketplaces are being sustained by many of the same people. many wiiware exclusive titles have only been out 5-7 years - that's a fairly limited window of access given the cost you had to pay for the license to play for that time period. yes, servers cost money, but that's what we paid for when we bought the games and when we continue to buy games from the same distributor.

this also significantly reduces the accessibility and exposure of certain titles. many people have hang-ups about piracy or emulation as well as limited knowledge on how to go about it or resources to be able to easily do it, so quality games like the rebirth series are going to sink into a very preventable obscurity to newer audiences because of the absurd and selfish drm security nintendo placed on the downloads. you cannot legally back this stuff up or share it online in any way. if a service like GoG went offline, sure, at least they let me back all those nice, DRM-free things up and made them very easily accessible and preservable, but in a case like this? you're screwed, especially with platform exclusives.

- - - - - - - - - -

what i think would be perfectly within reason to want is that when they close a service like this (which they shouldn't do, because the means to keep it open are of only a minimal cost to an absolute juggernaut distributor - valve does this effortlessly with a library hundreds of times the size), they remove DRM from the downloads and allow you to create back-ups. sure, this will enable easy piracy, but if they're not selling the games anymore, why care so much? because they'll lose an inconsequential fraction of sales of trying to get you to buy the same content a second time, when it's repackaged as HD a few years later - should the game even be so lucky to get sold again?

i'm still constantly discovering games i missed out on on all sorts of platforms despite my collection reaching a tremendous size, and it's quite upsetting to think what i'm not going to discover in time to pick up and conveniently play right on the intended hardware.

also, to ask again: anyone have advice on downloading jp wiiware stuff? preferrably on a wii-u?

[ZacharyB]

Taking the ability to redownload your titles away, meaning they'll be lost forever when your console dies isn't an issue to you? Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

I also don't think it would be a big deal to have a couple of guys somewhere in the Nintendo main office watch over a RAID array of, what, five 5 TB drives?, as they serve download requests (slowly). Let's say they're each paid a salary of 4,000,000 Yen a year, around $80,000. Maintenance costs negligible. Doesn't seem very hard...

Maybe there's some kind of digital contract. Rights to serve a game? But, I thought that Nintendo owned the games; they were licensed to them. Maybe the license expires now?? Who knows...

[mamboFoxtrot]

To clarify about redownloading: Nintendo has not given a date yet on when that service is being shut down. The two dates given are the deadlines to buy and spend Points respectively.

[bigbadboaz]

the problem isn't so much that they'll be erased from the earth as it is that this move feels deeply anti-consumer.

I'm as anti-corporate as the next guy, but I just can't get behind this sort of thing as malicious. Again, it comes down to how much time they're giving us and how they handle notification. Anyone getting into digital merchandise knows from the get that it's a very different type of product from the discs and carts we once knew. Hell, speaking of actual physical goods, companies like Nintendo cut off services for those as well after a certain amount of time. You're not getting any NES or SNES units repaired by them, even though they're still around and in fine financial shape. There's simply common expectation that companies will move on from old product after a certain amount of time - product of any type. I don't see this situation as based on the physical/digital thing, and I don't see their move away from the Wii to be in any way premature.

Anyway, that's about all to say on that subject. You're obviously on the other end of the opinion spectrum, and that's fine.

[kitten]

Anyone getting into digital merchandise knows from the get that it's a very different type of product from the discs and carts we once knew.

steam is by leaps and bounds the largest and best-known service for distributing digital games. most people know when they get a digital game on there, it stays until the company dies, it's secure for a long time to come. it's what a lot of people think other services will do, and then find themselves baffled to discover they don't - valve is quite frankly doing the bare minimum. i would say this announcement took many by surprise, as there's constantly new waves of people yet to have delt with this brazenly poor behavior. i'm sure you could google hundreds of stories of feeling betrayed being shared. call the people naive, sure, but i think it's ridiculous to blame the consumer for thinking a juggernaut would coldly revoke their service for such an immensely popular product this quickly, especially while they're still overtly successful and costs would be minimal to keep this up.

steam is still highly anti-consumer and manipulates its base to extremes, but it is lightyears ahead of nintendo and still leagues beyond microsoft or sony. you are absolutely not "anti-corporate" if you play defense for this.

You're not getting any NES or SNES units repaired by them, even though they're still around and in fine financial shape. There's simply common expectation that companies will move on from old product after a certain amount of time - product of any type. I don't see this situation as based on the physical/digital thing, and I don't see their move away from the Wii to be in any way premature.

yes, but i can take those to any sort of person with technical expertise and get that done, or use a little DIY. it's not as if they're irreparable. because of DRM, i cannot do the same for digital copies of games - there's no failsafe if the data corrupts or my console gets tanked. there are situations where even if you repair it, you're irreconcilably boned because the data is gone. imagine your snes busting and your entire library of games suddenly, forcibly going with it. the comparison is vaguely similar, but vastly different in magnitude of effect.

[Turrican]

I agree that this will sooner or later happen on the Sony and Microsoft camp, as well. It's unavoidable I guess. Keeping the store has a cost, and digital preservation is not their business.

However, the sooner it happens, the sooner people will feel less guilty about ahem, preserve this "abadonware". Sort of.

Back to the Wii, I frankly think it's depressing that even by giving it some thought, the ONLY software one feels they're gonna miss from this service are three half-baked Konami revivals.

[BrianC]

Back to the Wii, I frankly think it's depressing that even by giving it some thought, the ONLY software one feels they're gonna miss from this service are three half-baked Konami revivals.

Some of those ArtStyle games (mostly by Skip) and Maboshi's Arcade aren't bad either. At least some downloadable retail Wii games are on the WiiU shop.

kitten, is that deliberate kusoge you are thinking of Pole's Big Adventure?

[DoomsDave]

Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

MS did it with the original Xbox Live Arcade - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox_Live_Arcade#Xbox

I bought Marble Blast and Smash TV on there and have no way to dl them again.

[GSK]

Every WiiWare game you might ever want to play has been dumped and can be installed onto any Wii console with minimal effort, so the termination of the service isn't really a practical concern.

there's a few things i need to pick up off the jp shop before it closes down, but i wouldn't know how to go about doing that. any advice?

in particular, i'd really like to play that... one famicom-looking, deliberate kusoge. i forget the name.

There's no simple, fool-proof way to buy out-of-region games on Wii, but region-patching and installing out-of-region games via homebrew is very simple.

[ZellSF]

Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

not entirely true. there are some ps3 titles and pieces of dlc that have been both delisted and cleared from server history, meaning your license doesn't even grant you access to them anymore.

There's a pretty large difference between allowing third party publishers to remove titles and removing a store entirely though.

Neither of Nintendo's competitors are doing this.

MS did it with the original Xbox Live Arcade - https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xbox_Live_Arcade#Xbox

I bought Marble Blast and Smash TV on there and have no way to dl them again.

Also a difference between the scale of the original Xbox Live Arcade and the Wii Shop. Though it is still worrying and I can recall two other worrying precedents in Microsoft history (their music store, Games for Windows Live). I really distrust Microsoft, yet I'm not at all shocked that the first company to close a store from the 360/PS3/Wii generation isn't them.

[Kobayashi]

Warning: the deadline for adding funds is fast approaching. With regard to shmups these are the last days to acquire legally for Wii digital versions of classics such as Gradius ReBirth, Gradius II (in the great version for TG-16), Gradius III, M.U.S.H.A, Gate of Thunder, Axelay, Star Parodier, Detana Twinbee, Galaga '90, Ordyne, Blazing Lazers aka Gunhed, Gley Lancer, Darius Twin, Ironclad, Zanac and others.

I strongly recommend reading this article as soon as possible:

http://twinfinite.net/2018/03/wii-shop- ... -shutdown/

[FRO]

This is why digital distribution is wack. I prefer to own my games, not have a temporary license for them.

This x1000. I will buy a digital game here and there, when it's something I absolutely want to play, or if I get a humble bundle or something like that. But by and large, I want a physical product, so that my license to play the game extends in perpetuity, even after my console dies. Without that guarantee, it's all borrowed time. That said, I've been curious about Gradius Rebirth, as well as the other 2 Rebirth games, so I might consider throwing a couple bucks at them, just to show Konami some of us still want real traditional games, not pachinko and whatever the heck Metal Gear Survive is supposed to be. Plus I need to grab a couple Neo Geo games and TG16 titles.

[Kobayashi]

FRO, Gradius Rebirth is another very good chapter in the series and a love letter for those who have known and enjoyed the great Gradius 2 aka Nemesis 2 for MSX (which is a different game from the Gradius II Arcade aka Vulcan Venture which in turn was ported to certain consoles like NES, TG-16, PS1/Saturn and PS4). With respect to technical aspects, Gradius ReBirth is graphically similar to Gradius Gaiden and there are certain heavy slowdowns, especially in Stage 2, although some believe they were placed intentionally and not because of lack of hardware power. It's important to note that the developer was the M2 studio and not Konami.

[FRO]

FRO, Gradius Rebirth is another very good chapter in the series and a love letter for those who have known and enjoyed the great Gradius 2 aka Nemesis 2 for MSX (which is a different game from the Gradius II Arcade aka Vulcan Venture which in turn was ported to certain consoles like NES, TG-16, PS1/Saturn and PS4). With respect to technical aspects, Gradius ReBirth is graphically similar to Gradius Gaiden and there are certain heavy slowdowns, especially in Stage 2, although some believe they were placed intentionally and not because of lack of hardware power. It's important to note that the developer was the M2 studio and not Konami.

Interesting, thanks for the info! I definitely need to check it out then. I've played the MSX Nemesis 2 game, and I thought it was solid.

[Kobayashi]

Interesting, thanks for the info! I definitely need to check it out then. I've played the MSX Nemesis 2 game, and I thought it was solid.

Yes, it is. I believe you will appreciate Gradius ReBirth. Ah, one more info: there was an online leaderboard, but it's been some time since I played the game to see if it's still working or not.

[opt2not]

Make sure you guys snag all the Konami Rebirth titles: Gradius, Castlevania, and Contra. They're fabulous, and highly worth picking up.

Though, there was a rumour earlier this year that these titles might be brought to the Switch, which I'd be all over.

[Jonny2x4]

It's important to note that the developer was the M2 studio and not Konami.

I don't think Konami has made that many games in-house since last-generation. Hell, Gradius V on PS2 was by Treasure. Wish they.would allow M2 to make a Gradius VI.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Back to the Wii, I frankly think it's depressing that even by giving it some thought, the ONLY software one feels they're gonna miss from this service are three half-baked Konami revivals.

Star Soldier R? Hudson Soft seemed like about the only devs who'd sincerely embraced the Wii.