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Nintendo Confirm Wii U Region Lock

By Jorge Ba-oh (jb)

10224 on 25.09.2012 at 11:29

Nintendo Confirm Wii U Region Lock on Nintendo gaming news, videos and discussion

Players who purchase a Wii U in one region may only play titles released for that region, Nintendo confirmed this week.

Speaking to CVG earlier this week, the UK arm confirmed that the Wii U is region locked. This certainly isn't a new approach from the longstanding force of video games - with decades of Nintendo consoles also tied down to their respective regions.

"Unlocking" consoles has been a possibility in the past through specific discs, homebrew software and physical modding, however it will likely be some time before the Wii U becomes unlocked to the masses.

Sony and Microsoft have taken a more flexible approach to region-specific gaming, with publishers mainly deciding on whether or not to do so.

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PMD on 26.09.2012 at 06:17#1

This doesn't effect me since I don't import, but I can't understand why this is still necessary. Nintendo is very old fashioned in regards to publishing and different regions seem to act completely independently instead of a worldwide whole.

Flynnie on 26.09.2012 at 19:30#2

Oh well...If Nintendo could keep up their rate of publishing the popular JAP titles then that's ok, i didn't feel like i missed anything on the Wii that i couldnt have got. However the GC probs missed out a few so a freeloader was definitely of use there!

TAG on 27.09.2012 at 04:08#3

How irritating, Nintendo. Our community is consisting of more global connections everyday. It would be nice if Nintendo (and others) recognized this instead of placing artificial barriers impeding this progress. It's frustrating to try to learn a foreign language only to stumble over a useless hurdle in the way of experiencing other cultures (and it's just as frustrating when you already share that language, but can't partake in a slice of that culture because of region locking, like the PAL and NTSC regions).

Stupid.

( Edited 27.09.2012 04:17 by TAG )

TAG: That American Guy

"If it is possible, as far as it depends on you, live at peace with everyone." Romans 12:18

RudyC3 on 27.09.2012 at 09:56#4

There were many great titles for Wii that didn't make it here. If it wasn't for soft-modding, I'd never have imported so many games, but I'm glad I did now.

I understand their need to protect themselves against lawsuits, because Europe for instance forces them to implement parental controls that matches their own exigences while these are totally different depending on where you are in the world. It's true that making a reliable parental control system that allows you to set up the console so you rkids can't play inappropriate content no matter what the region is would be complicated, and especially impossible to make easy to use since every region uses a different system (Cero A, B, C in Japan / ESRB E, T, M in NA / PEGI 3, 7, 12, 16, 18 in Europe / etc). How do you setup a console for your 7 y.o. kid so he can't play inappropriate games when he can buy an import copy of the same game with his allowance, which will by pass the Pegi system?

Nintendo wants to keep that image of family friendly, I can understand that. It bothers me nonetheless, because I already know for sure we will miss out on great titles that won't be released in Europe.

Cubed3 Limited Staff :: Review and Feature Writer

God on 27.09.2012 at 12:10#5

Apparently the WiiU won't be that powerful so shouldn't take too long before you'll be able to emulate its games on pc. Hopefully. Then you won't have to worry about any artifical barriers set up by Nintendo or missing out on extras or paying twice the price simply because you were born in the wrong country.
Plus being able to play your games with any control setting you'd like and so on.

All you need is a little bit of patience.

You are not alone. I am here with you. Though we're far apart...you're always in my heart. Love u!

SuperLink on 27.09.2012 at 12:20#6

God said:
Apparently the WiiU won't be that powerful so shouldn't take too long before you'll be able to emulate its games on pc. Hopefully. Then you won't have to worry about any artifical barriers set up by Nintendo or missing out on extras or paying twice the price simply because you were born in the wrong country.
Plus being able to play your games with any control setting you'd like and so on.
All you need is a little bit of patience.

Highly doubt it, a little bit of patience? Well considering there have been no consistently successful emulations of the Saturn, 360, PS3, (or even original XBOX) yet, the wait is going to be a very long one.
Apparently the power of the PC needs to be multiple multiple times the power of the system in order to emulate it, it's going to be a very long wait if that's what you're after.

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Amlani (guest) on 27.09.2012 at 12:29#7

Meanwhile in the slums of Africa, someone is just trying to get clean water to drink and there's a lack of electricity.

God on 27.09.2012 at 12:44#8

I was playing great emulations of Wii games 8 months ago, don't know if that was available much earlier - but yeah, worked great.
I'm not sure why the Xbox hasn't been emulated yet, maybe because most of those games are available on PC too?

Guest: yeah, don't go there. The sun is horrible too, can't even play your handheld games properly. Africa really sucks for gaming. :/

You are not alone. I am here with you. Though we're far apart...you're always in my heart. Love u!

SuperLink on 27.09.2012 at 12:58#9

God said:
I was playing great emulations of Wii games 8 months ago, don't know if that was available much earlier - but yeah, worked great.
I'm not sure why the Xbox hasn't been emulated yet, maybe because most of those games are available on PC too?

That's because the Wii's build is very similar to the Gamecube's, they even share the same emulator (the Dolphin). The XBOX I'm guessing hasn't been emulated well because it's complex or is too similarly built to a PC or something.
However for HD systems it's going to be a loooong wait.

Twitter | C3 Moderator | Backloggery

God on 27.09.2012 at 21:47#10

We'll see.

You are not alone. I am here with you. Though we're far apart...you're always in my heart. Love u!

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