Wii Downloadable Games

In today’s Nintendo Direct, Nintendo revealed that Wii games will be available for purchase and download through the eShop on your Wii U. Gone are the days of having to enter “Wii Mode” to play last-gen games (when they become available) Now, once downloaded, you can run them directly from the Wii U home screen. Games that are compatible with the Wii Classic Controller will be able to be played with the GamePad.

The image above pretty much says it all: The first three Wii games announced for the Wii U eShop are Super Mario Galaxy 2, Punch-Out!!, and Metroid Prime Trilogy. Super Mario Galaxy 2 is available now, while the other games’ release dates are spread out over the next two weeks. And, to top it off, they will be on sale for half-price during first week after each game’s release.

More games are promised to be announced at a later time. The North American Direct didn’t give specifics, but the European Direct mentioned Donkey Kong Country Returns as one of the feature’s three launch titles, plus Kirby’s Adventure Wii (aka Kirby’s Return to Dreamland), Sin and Punishment: Successor of the Skies (Sin & Punishment: Star Successor in North America), and Pandora’s Tower as future releases. Don’t get your hopes too high up for Pandora’s Tower, since it was XSEED Games who published that here in North America, but all the games are a possibility to some degree.

What do you think of this new feature? What games are you looking forward to seeing released? Let us know in the comments.

Eric Chetkauskas
Eric has been playing video games for longer than he can remember. His interests skew toward retro games with an emphasis on Japanese RPGs like Chrono Trigger and the Dragon Quest series.